CFP: Res Practica Special Issue - “The Faces of Responsibility”

CFP - Res Practica, New CRÉ Journal – Special Issue: “The Faces of Responsibility”

Edited by Christine Tappolet and Christian Nadeau

The Centre de recherche en éthique (CRÉ) invites you to submit a manuscript for publication in the first special issue of its new journal Res Practica, to be launched formally in the Fall of 2026 and which will replace Les Ateliers de l'éthique / The Ethics Forum. This special issue aims to explore the plurality of forms that responsibility takes in our individual, social, and institutional practices. Drawing on multidisciplinary perspectives by bringing together expertise in moral and political philosophy, political science, and legal theory, our objective is to examine the concepts of moral responsibility, political responsibility, and legal responsibility.

We especially welcome contributions that interrogate the points of convergence and divergence between these different kinds of responsibility: their foundations, their attribution criteria, their functions within our normative practices, and the tensions they may generate in contemporary contexts.

The conference encourages theoretical, critical, or applied approaches and aims to provide a space for dialogue for early-career researchers specializing in any aspect of responsibility.

As the conference is fully bilingual, presentations may be given in either French or English. The presentations will be accompanied by a short abstract in the other language.

We invite the submission of research articles (8,000 to 12,000 words) addressing questions related to moral, political, and legal responsibility, as well as issues at the intersection of these fields, including but not limited to the themes listed below:

·       Moral agency, psychological capacities, and responsibility

·       Responsibility attributions, reactive attitudes, and emotions

·       Responsibility, blame, and punishment

·       Defenses and apologies

·       Responsibility for non-voluntary attitudes (beliefs, emotions, etc.)

·       Moral constructivism and moral responsibility

·       Disagreements in responsibility attributions and the question of relativism

·       Legal responsibility: criminal vs. civil

·       Moral guilt and legal guilt

·       Punishment and liability

·       Legal doctrines of control, fault, and risk

·       Corporate responsibility and institutional responsibility

·       The responsibility gap and artificial intelligence

·       Punishment and responsibility

·       Collective and individual responsibility

·       Collective agency and excuses

·       Political responsibility vs. social responsibility

·       Tensions between moral and legal responsibility

·       Reducing one kind of responsibility to another

·       Collective and individual responsibility

·       Group agency and intentionality

·       Responsibility toward future generations

·       The political responsibility of states and social responsibility

Submission Guidelines

 Submitted manuscripts may be in French or English. They should be between 8,000 and 12,000 words, including references and footnotes. Manuscripts must be accompanied by an abstract of no more than 200 words and must be anonymized in preparation for double-blind peer review.

Manuscripts must be submitted by email to [email protected] no later than August 31, 2026.

About Res Practica

The aim of Res Practica is to create a space for fruitful exchange between experts from a variety of disciplines whose work focuses on, or has implications for, ethical, political, and more broadly normative questions. One important goal is to further our understanding of practical problems that confront both individuals and societies by uncovering philosophical assumptions often left implicit. Another goal is to encourage exploration of innovative solutions to normative dilemmas that confront individuals and societies, in order to provide original and informed ethical guidelines and public policies. Res Practica will invite authors to reach across traditional disciplinary divides, and to explore the multiple ways in which experts from a variety of academic disciplines, including but not restricted to moral and political philosophy, applied ethics, political sciences, and law, can cast mutually enriching light upon pressing practical questions. Res Practica is also committed to promoting exchanges between experts writing in different languages. While we will begin with English and French, we hope, over time, to broaden the range of linguistic traditions that can find a home in our pages.

Res Practica’s editors in chief are Christine Tappolet (Université de Montréal), Daniel Weinstock (McGill University) and Samuel Dishaw (UCLouvain).