Moral Responsibility at the Social Margins
Katrina Hutchison (Monash University)

May 5, 2016, 12:15pm - 2:15pm
Department of Philosophy, University of Melbourne

G16 (Jim Potter Room)
Old Physics Building
Melbourne
Australia

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Abstract

One criticism of Strawsonian accounts of moral responsibility is that they collapse together the moral responsibility practices of a moral community with what it means to be morally responsible. In doing so, they limit the possibility for critical engagement with, and reformation of, problematic practices. One concern is that biased responsibility practices that impact on members of marginalized groups while truly reflecting the shared norms of the moral community within which they live may be immune to criticism under these accounts.Strawson responded to this sort of concern first with a claim that there is no possibility of criticizing and reforming our practices from ‘outside’, and second, that there is scope to criticize and change practices ‘from within’.

In this paper my aim is to explore more deeply and precisely the limits of criticism and reformation of our moral responsibility practices ‘from within’. In so doing, I make use of a series of examples concerning the experiences of income-managed welfare recipients in Australia. These cases exemplify the complexity of actual practices of ascribing agency and responsibility.

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