Institutional Knowledge and its Normative Implications

Non peer reviewe

Culpable ignorance in a collective setting

This paper explores types of organisational ignorance and ways in which organisational practices can affect the knowledge we have about the causes and effects of our actions. I will argue that because knowledge and information are not evenly distributed within an organisation, sometimes organisational design alone can create individual ignorance. I will also show that sometimes the act that creates conditions for culpable ignorance takes place at the collective level. This suggests that quality of will of an agent is not necessary to explain culpable ignorance in an organisational setting.Peer reviewe

Can Corporations Have (Moral) Responsibility Regarding Climate Change Mitigation?

Does it make sense to talk about corporate (moral) responsibility for climate change mitigation? Through utilizing systems thinking, I will argue that mitigation should be incorporated into corporate policies for present and future activities within the existing political framework. However, not much retrospective responsibility exists for past emissions. Exception to this are corporations who have engaged in climate change lobbying activities, voluntarily expanding their sphere of influence in the system. They could be responsible for the damage caused by misinformation campaigns and subject to compensation claims.Peer reviewe

Climate Change Mitigation, Sustainability and Non-substitutability

Peer reviewe

Mitä voimme oppia yksilöiden ja kollektiivien vastuusta tarkastelemalla ilmastonmuutosta

Lectio praecursoria 16.12.2017 Väitöskirjani tarkastelee yksilövastuun ja kollektiivisen vastuun suhdetta ja kysyy, mitä voimme oppia niistä tarkastelemalla ilmastonmuutosta. Käsittelen ilmastonmuutosta esimerkkitapauksena systemaattisesta vahingosta, joka on syntynyt kollektiivisen toiminnan tahattomana sivuvaikutuksena. Tällaisten vahinkojen ja haittojen kohdalla kausaalinen yhteys yksittäisen toimijan ja lopputuloksen välillä on usein epäselvä tai mahdoton osoittaa tarkasti. Osallisuusvastuu on osallistumista, osallisuutta tai yhteyttä väärään tekoon tai kollektiivisesti aiheutettuun haittaan. Ilmastonmuutos ei ole ongelma vain kollektiivisille toimijoille, vaan myös yksilöille pääosin sen takia, että olemme erilaisten kollektiivien jäseniä ja osia. Esitän, että yksilöiden moraaliselle vastuulle ilmastonmuutoksesta on kolme mahdollista lähdettä: suora vastuu, osallisuusvastuu kollektiivisten toimijoiden jäseninä ja osallisuusvastuu järjestymättömien kollektiivien osana. Kukaan yksilö ei ole vastuussa ilmastonmuutoksesta sinänsä, mutta yksilö voi olla vastuussa esimerkiksi vakavan haitan riskin kasvattamisesta. Mitä siis voimme oppia yksilöiden ja kollektiivien vastuusta tarkastelemalla ilmastonmuutosta? Voimme nähdä, että yksilöiden ja kollektiivien vastuut kietoutuvat yhteen, ja että nykymaailmassa emme voi päästä pakottavien ja ajankohtaisten ongelmien ytimeen keskustelematta niistä yhdessä. Olemme yhä riippuvaisempia toisistamme ja etiikan teorioiden tulisi kuvastaa tätä tilannetta. Kirjoitus on käytännöllisen filosofian väitöskirjani lectio praecursoria, joka esitettiin Helsingin yliopistossa 16. joulukuuta 2017

Collective responsibility for climate change

Climate change can be construed as a question of collective responsibility from two different viewpoints: climate change being inherently a collective problem, or collective entities bearing responsibility for climate change. When discussing collective responsibility for climate change, “collective” can thus refer to the problem of climate change itself, or to the entity causing the harm and/or bearing responsibility for it. The first viewpoint focuses on how climate change is a harm that has been caused collectively. Collective action problem refers to an aggregation of individual actions which together produce an outcome that is not intended at the level of an individual action. It cannot be solved by any one agent acting unilaterally. Instead, climate change action must be enacted and supported by numerous agents. The second way to conceptualize climate change as a question of collective responsibility focuses on the collective entities that bear responsibility for climate change. As a global problem, climate change is linked to the realm of international politics, where states, governments, and intergovernmental organizations are the main collective entities. Other important agential collectives in terms of climate responsibility are corporations, including carbon majors who have produced the bulk of emissions. Climate change has also been theorized as a structural injustice, which combines elements from both the viewpoints on what is collective about responsibility for climate change

Who has a moral responsibility to slow climate change?

Henry Shue’s latest book, The Pivotal Generation: Why We Have a Moral Responsibility to Slow Climate Change Right Now, is an excellent read, both clear and comprehensive. It is written in a way that makes it accessible to philosophers and non-philosophers alike. The book argues persuasively that the people alive today must take immediate and drastic action to tackle climate change, as the current decade will be crucial for determining how severe the impacts will become. Shue warns how a sharp division into past, present, and future is misleading when it comes to climate change and can obfuscate the extent of the responsibility that the current generations bear. For us to acknowledge our responsibility, we must recognise how deeply intertwined our lives are with both the past and the future. One of these innate deep connections between generations is the extensive time period that carbon emissions can continue to contribute to climate change, for dozens of centuries. The current generations have been bequeathed an energy system that relies on fossil fuels and that continues to add greenhouse gases to the atmosphere. For over two centuries now, the planet has been getting warmer as an unintended side effect of industrialisation. We are the first humans to understand the dynamics of the Earth’s climate and how human actions cause anthropogenic climate change. With the rapidly advanced scientific knowledge, it has become apparent that there is a need to quickly transition to a different energy regime. Shue points out that this knowledge has made us the first humans to recognise that action is required, but the urgency of the problem also makes us possibly the last to still be able to act before certain major threats are aggravated. With many irreversible climate change impacts, the date-of-last-opportunity to take action to prevent them might be very soon. According to Shue (2021, p. 6), “This gives us an awesome responsibility. Humans have accidentally set our own house on fire, and if we do not douse the flames while they are no more extensive than they are now, it may not be possible ever to extinguish them”. That is why we alive now are the pivotal generation. Although a sense of urgency runs through the book and the seriousness of the situation is made very clear, Shue steers away from fearmongering. He does not think that human extinction is around the corner, but underlines that we cannot rule out such threats until we stop feeding the beast. Unless we cap emissions at a relatively safe level and transform our infrastructure to net zero, we will keep on increasing risks to future people by “adding continuously to the mushrooming danger” (p. 23). The book stresses that the possibility of passing several tipping points adds to the urgency and the risks because when positive feedback mechanisms are triggered, climate change accelerates. These positive feedbacks can feed into each other, such as when warming seawater melts even more ice, with the possibility of a cascade of feedbacks if enough tipping points are passed. Such changes are irreversible and could themselves become further positive feedbacks. Shue (pp. 24–25) warns that it is “likely that the near future is the last chance to avoid passing significant tipping points and entirely possible that the near future is the last chance to avoid provoking a cascade of tipping points” (emphasis in original). While I applaud the general message of Shue’s book, I find that the brushstrokes he uses when identifying those responsible are a little too broad. The reason for this is twofold. Firstly, it is questionable as to how many of us really know enough about the risks we are leaving future generations with. Secondly, discussion in terms of generations underplays the big differences between the responsibility of different groups of actors within them. In what follows, I will elaborate on these points. I should note from the outset, however, that although I think that these are important issues, I find them to be points of clarification in an impressive and ambitious book on why our actions have such significance and why objections to urgent, large-scale climate action are misplaced

Individual’s responsibility as members of collectives

Peer reviewe

Collective Agents as Moral Actors

How should we make sense of praise and blame and other such reactions towards collective agents like governments, universities, or corporations? Collective agents can be appropriate targets for our moral feelings and judgements because they can maintain and express moral positions of their own. Moral agency requires being capable of recognising moral considerations and reasons. It also necessitates the ability to react reflexively to moral matters, i.e. to take into account new moral concerns when they arise. While members of a collective agent are capable of this, the collective frames the thinking of the individual moral agents within it and affects their options in myriad ways. The moral positions thus formed and expressed belong to the collective. Crucially, unlike marginal moral agents, collective agents as moral actors can be held fully responsible for their acts and omissions

Mitä voimme oppia yksilöiden ja kollektiivien vastuusta tarkastelemalla ilmastonmuutosta : Lectio praecursoria 16.12.2017

Väitöskirjani tarkastelee yksilövastuun ja kollektiivisen vastuun suhdetta ja kysyy, mitä voimme oppia niistä tarkastelemalla ilmastonmuutosta. Käsittelen ilmastonmuutosta esimerkkitapauksena systemaattisesta vahingosta, joka on syntynyt kollektiivisen toiminnan tahattomana sivuvaikutuksena. Tällaisten vahinkojen ja haittojen kohdalla kausaalinen yhteys yksittäisen toimijan ja lopputuloksen välillä on usein epäselvä tai mahdoton osoittaa tarkasti. Osallisuusvastuu on osallistumista, osallisuutta tai yhteyttä väärään tekoon tai kollektiivisesti aiheutettuun haittaan. Ilmastonmuutos ei ole ongelma vain kollektiivisille toimijoille, vaan myös yksilöille pääosin sen takia, että olemme erilaisten kollektiivien jäseniä ja osia. Esitän, että yksilöiden moraaliselle vastuulle ilmastonmuutoksesta on kolme mahdollista lähdettä: suora vastuu, osallisuusvastuu kollektiivisten toimijoiden jäseninä ja osallisuusvastuu järjestymättömien kollektiivien osana. Kukaan yksilö ei ole vastuussa ilmastonmuutoksesta sinänsä, mutta yksilö voi olla vastuussa esimerkiksi vakavan haitan riskin kasvattamisesta. Kirjoitus on käytännöllisen filosofian väitöskirjani lectio praecursoria, joka esitettiin Helsingin yliopistossa 16. joulukuuta 2017.Non peer reviewe