Holding others responsible

0 C. Macnamara (&) Department of Philosophy, University of California , Riverside, HMNSS Building, Room 1604, 900 University Ave. , Riverside, CA 92521, USA Theorists have spent considerable time discussing the concept of responsibility. Their discussions, however, have generally focused on the question of who counts as responsible, and for what. But as Gary Watson has noted, ''Responsibility is a triadic relationship: an individual (or group) is responsible to others for something'' (Watson Agency and answerability: selected essays, 2004, p. 7). Thus, theorizing about responsibility ought to involve theorizing not just about the actor and her conduct, but also about those the actor is responsible toand specifically about how these people hold the actor responsible for her conduct. In this paper, I give a topology of the terrain of holding others responsible. Over the course of the paper I disambiguate two very broad senses of holding responsibleregarding another as a responsible agent and holding another responsible for a particular piece of conduct. Next, I argue that the latter sense of holding responsible is a genus with two specieswhat I will call ''holding responsible as deep moral appraisal'' and ''holding responsible as accountability.'' Appreciating these distinctions, I argue, sheds considerable light on a number of questions concerning the scope and nature of our practices of holding others responsible. Finally, illuminating these distinct senses of holding responsible and highlighting their features reveals an awkwardness in the most carefully explicated and influential account of holding responsible, namely R. Jay Wallace's account in Responsibility and the Moral Sentiments. 1 Introduction We hold others responsible all the time. A teacher holds her student responsible for his tardiness by giving him detention. A mother holds her daughter responsible for her disrespectful backtalk by sending her to her room. A wife holds her husband responsible for not cleaning the kitchen as he promised with her sharp words of rebuke. Our practices of holding others responsible are of deep practical and theoretical importance; they are of practical import because these practices are a key way by which norms become operative in the world (Reiff 2005), and they are theoretically important because understanding them is key to understanding the concept of responsible agency and the moral life more generally. By some theorists lights, a theory of holding responsible is crucial to a theory of what it is to be responsible, and to understanding the way in which moral agents are bound not just by norms, but to each other (Wallace 1996; Korsgaard 1996; Darwall 2006; Watson 1996). But as important and pervasive as this activity is, it is not all that clear what it is to hold someone responsible. What is it about the above interactions that make them count as holding another responsible? And again, what is the extension of the category? If punishments and sharp words count, what about praising someone for her virtuous conduct? Or feeling resentment but keeping it buried in ones heart? Three things, I urge, have kept us from making more progress here. First, theorists havent spent much time trying to make progress. Responsibility theorists have tended to focus on what is to be responsible; as a result, our practice of holding another responsible often falls off their radar screen. Those that do take it up tend to do so only in the context of some larger project. Wallace (1996), for example, puts forth a view of holding responsible in the course of trying to reconcile worries about determinism and responsibility. Oakley (1992) addresses holding responsible in the context of exploring whether and when our emotions are attributable to us. Smith (2007) discusses holding responsible in the course of objecting to Christine Korsgaard and Wallaces fairness characterization of the responsibility debate. Watson (1996) puts forward a picture of holding responsible in the process of defending the self-disclosure view of responsibility. And Darwall (2006) explores the practice of holding responsible as a means to arguing for the second-personal nature of morality. All of this has left us with many unanswered questions, and not a small bit of confusion. Second, discussion has been hampered by an unreflective oscillation between the concepts of holding someone responsible for her conduct and regarding her as a responsible agent. Much of the best literature on holding responsible is indebted to Peter Strawsons famous discussion of the participant stancethe stance of engaging with others as agents. Contrasting it with the objective stancethe stance we take toward inanimate objects and those people incapacitated in some or all agential respects, the participant stance is the orientation we occupy in ordinary personal relationships (Strawson 1993, p. 55). From this description, it is obvious that we only (properly) hold people responsible from within the participant stance. But discussion has left it deeply unclear what the relationship is between holding someone responsible for her conduct and the participant stance more generally: are they equivalent? different? is the former a part of the whole? Third, theorists are keen to emphasize the distinction between merely believing that anothers conduct does or does not measure up to some moral standard (what Smart (1961) called mere grading) and holding another responsible for her conduct. All agree that merely believing that anothers conduct is wrongmerely describing the actiondoes not count as holding that person responsible (see for example Smith 2007; Watson 1996). This distinction is indeed important, but theorists tendency to focus on it has left underexplored the various senses of holding responsible itself. In this paper, I give a topology of the terrain of holding others responsible. Over the course of the paper I disambiguate two very broad senses of holding responsibleregarding another as a responsible agent and holding another responsible for a particular piece of conduct. Next, I argue that the latter sense of holding responsible is a genus with two specieswhat I will call holding responsible as deep moral appraisal and holding responsible as accountability. Appreciating these distinctions, I argue, sheds considerable light on a number of questions concerning the scope and nature of our practices of holding others responsible. Finally, illuminating these distinct senses of holding responsible and highlighting their features reveal an awkwardness in the most carefully explicated and influential account of holding responsible, namely Wallaces account in Responsibility and the Moral Sentiments. The paper proceeds as follows. In the next two sections, I review the literature on holding others responsible, drawing attention to the confusion and questions that it engenders. In Sects. 4 and 5, I present my picture of the terrain, explaining (...truncated)