Journal of Applied Philosophy, Vol. 4, No. 1, 1987 89

DISCUSSION ARTICLE

On Evading Responsibility

NEIL COOPER

ABSTRACT The paper examines J. Glover’s 1970 account of the evasion of responsi- bility. Attention is focused on the Eichmann case and Glover’s contention that moral condemnation of Eichmann depends on the view that there is a duty to submit one’s actions to moral criticism. Two uses of the word ‘moral’ are distinguished (one use for moral commitment, the other for logical diagnosis) and it is argued that Glover’s thesis is accordingly ambiguous. It is contended that Glover must either abandon his stipulative account of the concept of morality or accept the objectivity of moral judgements or mod@ his unqualified thesis that eveybody ought to submit his conduct to moral criticism. An account of problems of evading responsibility involves us, it is maintained, in an area of moral philosophy, the Dialectic of Morals, where knock-down arguments are sparse.

All evasions of responsibility are disreputable, but some are more disreputable than others. Non-culpable ignorance of relevant matters of fact is an acceptable excuse, but ignorance of the law, whether of the legal law or of ‘the moral law’, is notoriously held not to excuse. There are obvious grounds of legal policy as well as of fairness why ignorance of positive law should not excuse from responsibility. However, evasion of responsibility on the part of a wrongdoer who is unaware of the moral wrongness of what he has done is more difficult to handle. It is this case of which Jonathan Glover is concerned to give an account in the last and least discussed chapter of his book on Responsibility [ 11. Glover’s principal example is taken from the Eichmann case. I shall try to show in this paper that Glover’s account of evasion in general and of Eichmann’s evasion in particular is oversimplified and that, while Glover has rightly advocated adopting a wider as opposed to a narrower concept of morality, his application of the distinction has led him into important confusions. I shall argue that an adequate account of these matters leads us into what I shall call the ‘Dialectic of Morals’.

Glover’s contention [2] is that “our moral condemnation of Eichmann, if indepen- dent of any belief that he appreciated the wrongness of what he did, must depend on the view that people sometimes have a duty to submit what they do to moral criticism”, a duty to “raise questions about the morality of what one does”. Now one important way in which people try to evade the ‘duty to submit what they do to moral criticism’ is by appealing to realms of activity outside morality. Glover quotes [3] Lord Justice Parker’s rhetorical question to the journalist at the ‘Vassal1 Tribunal’ (1963) as a clear instance of this view. Lord Justice Parker said “How can you say there is any dishonour in you if you do what is your duty in the ordinary way as a citizen, in putting the interests of the state above everything?” Lord Justice Parker apparently

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held the belief that any alternative viewpoint to his own was ruled out from the start as obviously mistaken. He was implying that one cannot legitimately say, “This involves putting the interests of the state foremost but it is dishonourable”. For Lord Parker, putting the interests of the state first was morally paramount. Because of this he would not have regarded himself as evading responsibility, or as failing to fulfil his duty of submitting all his decisions and actions to moral criticism, if he himself had in the journalist’s position put the interests of the state first. On the contrary, he would presumably have held that since the interests of the state should be paramount, everybody was under the duty of submitting all his decisions and actions to criticism in the light of that prime consideration. In my opinion, although I find Lord Justice Parker’s position morally objectionable, Glover is wrong to give it as an example of a strategy for evading responsibility. It may be a way of avoiding submitting decisions and actions to criticisms deemed by Glover (and me) to be morally potent, but such avoidance is perfectly compatible with an honest and earnest resolve by one who holds Lord Parker’s views to submit all his decisions and actions to what he regards as moral criticism. Glover sees Lord Parker’s position as implying that there are some activities ‘outside the jurisdiction of morality’ [4]. This in his opinion involves an unduly narrow and compartmentalised view of morality. For he stipulates [ 5 ] that “Moral beliefs about what ought to be done just are those which one accepts cannot legitimately be subordinated to any except other moral beliefs”. He goes on to say about disputed concepts in general and the concept of ‘morality’ in particular [6]: “The case for this stipulative account ultimately rests on the view that, for purposes of moral argument, this is the most useful way of using the word. No doubt this view in turn rests on moral assumptions with which people could disagree”. As far as I can see, Glover’s prime reason for preferring the wider concept is to take a conceptual prop away from the vulgar evasions of responsibility. But as he, himself realises, by removing this conceptual prop he does not ‘subvert’ the compartmentalised theories he has been attacking. One cannot by giving a different meaning to the words ‘morality’ and ‘moral’ subvert the facts, and it is a fact that some people consider some activity or activities more important than what others regard as moral considerations. This can be expressed in another way by saying that these activities are ‘outside the jurisdiction of what others regard as moral considerations.

Glover’s main morul contention in this chapter is that everybody has a duty to submit his conduct to moral criticism. This contention has two meanings, depending on whether one has a narrow or a wider conception of morality. It is reasonable to suppose that Glover is using the word ‘moral’ in its wider sense in accordance with his own stipulation and he would thus appear to be contending that every agent has a duty to submit his conduct to criticism in the light of those considerations which the agent thinks to be overriding. On this interpretation Glover is maintaining the following:

(A) Eichmann ought to criticise his conduct in the light of those considera- tions which he thinks of overriding importance.

But I think Glover and the rest of us would only say this if we agreed with Eichmann as to what was of overriding importance. If, on the other hand, what Eichmann thought to be of overriding importance was something Glover and we found unacceptable, like the interests of the state, I do not think that either Glover or the rest of us would want to argue that Eichmann had a duty or obligation or ought in any way to submit his conduct to criticism in the light of such considerations. Indeed Glover and we would think it better, I believe, if Eichmann failed to submit his conduct to criticism of this

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kind, for if we consider that he has bad moral principles, we must think it better that he should not live up to them. If we interpret ‘moral’ in its wider sense, Eichmann would be presented by Glover with a cast-iron evasion-procedure, indeed with all the justification that a ‘conscientious Nazi’ could desire.

Glover’s slip here is not difficult to find. He has failed to see that the word ‘moral’ can be used both for logical diagnosis and for moral commitment [7]. His elucidation of the concept has been designed primarily for logical diagnosis. But when he goes on to use the word ‘moral’ by saying that everybody has a duty to submit his conduct to moral criticism, he apparently fails to notice that he is now using the word as a term of moral commitment. When Glover uses the expression ‘moral criticism’ he appears to mean ‘criticism in the light of considerations which I, Glover, think to be overridingly important’. So Glover’s thesis turns out to be:

(B) Eichmann ought to submit his conduct to criticism in the light of considerations which 1, Glover, think to be overridingly important.

If this is what Glover is saying, then we may well agree ‘in theory’, but the trouble now is that both Glover and Eichmann are confined within their respective ‘spiritual zoos’ [8] and there does not appear to be any more reason why Eichmann should accept (B) than why Glover should accept ( C ) viz.:

(C) Glover should submit all his conduct to criticism in the light of considerations which Eichmann thinks overridingly important.

Glover could escape this difficulty if he abandoned the position clearly stated on p. 190, namely that, “Someone who holds a narrow or peculiar set of basic moral beliefs, but who is consistent, and also unyielding to the modifying influences of experience or imagination, is beyond the reach of argument”. If Glover derelativised his position and maintained that what he meant by ‘moral criticism’ was criticism in the light of considerations which really are important, then his contention would, I think, appeal to the vast majority of us nice chaps in our smug pre-philosophical simplicity. We could then restate Glover’s position thus:

(D) Eichmann ought to submit all his conduct to criticism in the light of considerations which are really overridingly important.

Of course, (D), as uttered by Glover, would appear to Eichmann to be no more than another form of (B) sailing under the false colours of objectivity, and while Glover might feel happier about the truth or correctness of what he says, Eichmann would not have been given a shred of an inducement to accept it. There are also serious philosophical difficulties about applying the language of appearance and reality to moral distinctions, but Glover, I am sure, would agree on this point.

Clearly something has to go somewhere. Either Glover abandons his stipulative account of the concept of morality, or he rejects ‘subjectivity’, or he modifies the unqualified contention that everybody ought to submit his conduct to moral criticism. For myself I would choose to modify the latter contention. Each of us may concede that he should submit his conduct to what he regards as moral criticism, that is, to criticism in the light of considerations which he regards as of overriding importance. When, however, we try to extract the common principle from what ‘each of us may concede’ in such a way as to make it clear that it contains no reference to any particular agent, the principle no longer appears to be a moral principle, but rather a structural principle concerning how conduct and belief should rationally be related. One might compare the following at the theoretical level: Everybody ought in testing a

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theory to abandon his u priori beliefs only in the last resort. If the beliefs in question really are your beliefs and they really are a priori for you, then you should in all consistency abandon them last of all. In the practical case one finds analogous structural principles such as, ‘You should practise what you sincerely preach’ or ‘You should apply what you sincerely preach to what you practise’. If certain beliefs really are ‘moral’ ones for you, then you ought in all consistency to use them both in arriving at decisions and in appraising your own conduct. I suggest, then, that there is a perfectly legitimate use of Glover’s thesis as a meta-moral principle of rationality applicable without qualification to all moralities.

Many people would doubtless argue that to avoid so many mountains in labour it would be better to abandon Glover’s wide concept of morality and to opt for the narrower view. Indeed it may be the case that, whatever Glover’s intentions, his thesis, if it is salvageable as a morul thesis, has to be interpreted with a utilitarian gloss. He had argued [9] on conceptual grounds against G. J. Warnock’s view [lo] that the content of morality must be concerned, in Warnock’s words, with “the good or harm, well-being or otherwise, of human beings”. If, as is possible, Glover holds the more modest view of normative utilitarians that the content of morality ought to be concerned with ‘the good or harm, well-being or otherwise, of human beings’ and living creatures in general, we can understand his thesis as amounting to the claim that we all have a duty to submit our conduct to criticism of a utilitarian kind. If this is his view, we can understand why he says [ 111 that “ ‘emotional’ descriptions of suffering are relevant to moral argument”. Emotional descriptions of suffering have the effect they do because those of us who produce such descriptions care about any harm which is done to ourselves, to other human beings or to living creatures in general.

I would agree with Glover that it is one of the moral philosopher’s tasks to distinguish desirable from undesirable kinds of evasion. In my opinion this task is the same as distinguishing good from bad or middling arguments in morals and belongs to the Dialectic of Morals. Let us look at some examples and see whether we can place the Eichmann evasion within a classification. Consider the Latitudinarian Evasion or The Thin End of the Wedge. This evasion is parasitic on the notions of necessity and impossibility. One rebuts the ascription of blame conclusively by showing that one could not, in a strict sense of ‘could’, have done otherwise. Now it would be ‘unreasonable’ to allow impossibility to excuse or exculpate while insisting on giving a full measure of blame to the failure to perform actions of very great difficulty. After all, very great difficulty is very near to impossibility. It is, one might say, practically impossible, it is for all intents and purposes impossible. One may go further. Fairly great difficulty is not very distant from very great difficulty. And so the argument continues its debilitating course until all weakness becomes merely failure to do what is supererogatorily good and the concept of duty is eroded and deprived of any application. Against this latitudinarian evasion may be set a rigourist evasion-counter. This would run as follows: “Even though these actions may be fairly difficult to perform or even almost impossible, ‘almost’ is not ‘quite’, and there is a world of difference between not being able to do something and being just able to manage it”. The upshot of these two is a rational synthesis. Even though very great difficulty does not excuse, yet we should proportion blame, if blame be in place, to the ease with which wrong is done. While strict impossibility totally excuses, very great difficulty, although it cannot be said to excuse, serves to extenuate or mitigate and this is a matter of degree.

A second kind of evasion is connected with what has come to be known as ‘The

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Generalisation Argument’ [12]. This runs: “If everybody were to do this, it would be disastrous. Therefore I ought not to do this”. The evasion-argument to counter this would run: “What would be disastrous would be if everybody did it. It would not matter, or would not matter all that much, if it were done only once and if it were not regarded as a precedent. I shall do it just this once and nobody else will know about it. Then it will be perfectly all right”. One might call this the Rake’s Regress Argument. Self-deception, whatever it might be, appears to have some role to play. I may well just be hoodwinking myself that I am only going to do it ‘this once’ and I may forget that the second time is always easier and that one’s scruples put up less resistance. Moreover, and this is important, I may genuinely believe that the only thing wrong with the proposed action is that it would be disastrous if everybody did it. I may not appreciate that if I do it I am at any rate contributing to a disaster. The solution to this antinomy is that the Rake’s Regress argument is a ‘good’ argument if and only if it is everybody’s performing the action which constitutes the disaster. If everybody devoted his entire life to Philosophy, it would be disastrous. But provided everybody else does not follow my example, it is all right if I do so.

Finally, I am uneasy about Glover’s whole treatment of Eichmann. Either Eichmann realised the wrongness of what he did or he did not. This appears to be the basic dilemma. If he realised the wrongness of what he did, he was presumably ‘weak’ in doing what he did. But if he did not ‘realise’ the wrongness of what he did, what are we to say of him? He may of course have been a self-deceiver, but I fail to see that this was necessarily the case. It may have been the case that he thought that the force of circumstances gave him, in Bacon’s words, “dispensations from the laws of charity and integrity” [13], or he may, like Lord Grey, have been “a great lover of morality public and private” but have thought that “the intercourse of nations cannot be strictly regulated by that rule”. Alternatively, he may have had a different sort of morality from Glover’s, so that Glover sees as self-deception what is in fact merely a different order of priorities. To Glover, it seems to me, Veblen’s words are applicable: “Democratically-minded persons who are not moved by the call of loyalty to a gratuitous personal master, may have some difficulty in appreciating the force and the moral austerity of this spirit of devotion to an ideal of dynastic aggrandisement, and in seeing how its paramount exigence will set aside all meticulous scruples of personal rectitude and veracity, as being a shabby with-holding of service due” [14]. If Eichmann had had less of “this spirit of devotion to an ideal of dynastic aggrandise- ment”, had he been consciously swayed by “meticulous scruples”, his masters would perhaps have regarded him as guilty not merely of a “shabby with-holding of service due” but also as guilty of self-deception. If this is so, then it would appear that judgements as to what constitutes self-deception are at any rate in some cases relative to the moral views of the individual.

I have tried to show in this paper that an account of responsibility and its evasion involves us in an area of moral philosophy which is not purely analytical of moral concepts but is concerned with what I have called ‘the Dialectic of Morals’. In this study, as I have tried to illustrate, the arguments are not knock-down ones but are rather, in J. S . Mill’s words, “capable of determining the intellect to give or withhold its assent”.

Correspondence: Neil Cooper, Department of Philosophy, University of Dundee, Dundee, DD1 4HN, Scotland.

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NOTES

[I] JONATHAN GLOVER (1970) Responsibiliry (London, Routledge & Kegan Paul). [2] Ibid., p. 178. [3] Ibid., p. 179. [4] Ibid., loc. cit. [5] Ibid., p. 189. [6] Ibid., p. 192. [7] F o r this distinction see my (1981) The Diversity ofMoral Thinking (Oxford, Oxford University Press). [8] GLOVER, op. cit., p. 190. [9] Ibid., pp. 185-86.

[lo] G. J. WARNOCK (1967) Contemporary Moral Philosophy, p. 57 (London, Macmillan). [ l l ] GLOVER, op. cit., p. 191. [12] See M. SINGER (1963) Generalisation in Ethics (London, Eyre & Spottiswoode). [ 131 FRANCIS BACON ( 1906) The Advancement of Learning, in: Bacon’s Advancement of Learning and the

[14] T. VEBLEN (1964) On the Nature ofpeace, p. 85 (New York, Viking Press). New Atlantis, p. 215 (London, Oxford University Press).