Ethics Moral Accountability

MORAL ACCOUNTABILITY
Lesson 6
Objectives:
At the end of this lesson, students will be able to:
Discuss moral accountability and it’s conditions;
Differentiate moral accountability and responsibility;
Identify and explain the attribution and the degree on one’s moral accountability.
Discussion
A concept closely related to moral personhood is moral accountability. Moral agents, as discussed above,
can be morally accountable for their actions towards moral patients. In discussing the nature of moral
accountability, we first clarify its meaning in terms of how it relates to the various uses of the word
“responsibility” and differs from the legal kind of accountability; after which we examine the conditions
for its attribution and factors influencing its degree.
Accountability and ‘’Responsibility”
We understand accountability as the deservingness of blame or praise for the actions that we perform.
Accountability is a natural product of our rationality, which consists of our reason (or intelligence) and
free will (or freedom). In the practical context of performing actions, our reason enables us to distinguish
between right and wrong actions, while our free will enables us to choose which action that we would
like to perform. Consequently, we deserve blame for freely choosing to perform an action we know to be
wrong (or for freely choosing not to perform an action we know to be right); while we deserve praise for
freely choosing to perform an action we know to be right (or for freely choosing not to perform an action
we know to be wrong).
Two things are worth emphasizing when it comes to accountability. First, accountability involves both
praise and blame (or reward and punishment), for it is usual to associate accountability with blame or
punishment only (see Uniake, 2010, 602). As we put the blame on people for their wrongdoings, we
should also praise them for their good deeds. Second, deservingness is not negated by actualities. A
person may deserve to receive something and yet may not actually receive it. But the fact that he/she
does not receive it does not negate the fact that he/she deserves to receive it. Immanuel Kant’s view on
the relationship between morality and happiness sheds light on this point. According to Kant, the goal of
morality is not happiness but the deservingness of happiness; and so, the morally good person is one
who deserves happiness regardless of whether or not he/she is in fact happy. It may happen, for
whatever reason, that the person who deserves to be happy is not actually happy; and the person who
does not deserve to be happy is happy. This, however, does not change the situation that the morally
good person deserves to be happy. The same holds true in the case of moral accountability. The person
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who deserves moral blame, for instance, may not really be experiencing the mental sufferings (such as
guilt or shame) that go with moral blame. He/she may in fact be happy with the wrongdoing that he/she
has intentionally done, and perhaps even feel proud about it. But this possibility does not change the
fact that he/she deserves moral blame for his/her wrongdoing.
Now, it is customary to use the word “accountability” interchangeably with the word “responsibility.”
Aside from sharing a meaning with the word “accountability,” the word responsibility,” however, has
other meanings with which accountability may be confused. Another meaning of responsibility is
causation (see Uniake, 2010, 596). Here, being responsible for something simply means being the cause
of that something. The entities that can be responsible in this sense involve both inanimate entities, like
storms and stones, and animate ones, like animals and humans. Thus, we sometimes say, for instance,
that the storm was responsible for the floods that devastated the city; and that the lion was responsible
for the death of the deer. In saying these, we simply mean that the storm caused the floods and the lion
caused the death of the deer. We surely do not mean, in addition, that the storm and the lion were
accountable for these events.
When the cause of something is a person, say a human person, the person is usually referred to, in
philosophy, as an agent (or personal agent). (In contrast, a non-personal cause, such as an inanimate
object, is usually just referred to as a cause.) Being an agent is one necessary condition for accountability,
in that the person accountable for an action must be the action’s agent. But there are other necessary
conditions for accountability, as we shall later on discuss. Consequently, just by being an agent of an
action does not immediately make someone accountable for this action. In this sense, when we say that
Juan was responsible for the writings on the wall, we simply mean that Juan did the writings on the wall,
or he was the agent of the said action. But it will be wrong to immediately infer from this that Juan,
therefore, deserves either blame or praise for this action. [It will be recalled that in discussing moral
persons, we did not state that moral agents are morally accountable for their actions, but rather can be
morally accountable for such. And this is precisely because being morally accountable for actions
requires conditions other than being the cause of actions.]
Still, another meaning of the word “responsibility” is duty or obligation, or having certain duties or
obligations towards other people (see Zimmerman, 2010, 607—08). When we say that parents have
certain responsibilities towards their children, we mean that parents have certain duties or obligations
towards their children. This particular meaning of responsibility is closely related to accountability in that
the act of performing and not performing one’s duties gives rise to accountability. Parents, for instance,
are accountable for not performing their duties towards their children, which is what is usually meant
when we say that parents are responsible for their children. Michael Zimmerman (2010, 608), in this
connection, refers to responsibility understood as the possession of duties as prospective responsibility,
the kind of responsibility directed towards what will or may happen. In contrast, he refers to the
responsibility understood as accountability as retrospective responsibility, the kind of responsibility
directed towards what had happened already. Having duties towards a person concerns future actions
towards this person; but being deserving of blame or praise for an action concerns an action that has
already been done. Thus, the parents’ prospective responsibility toward their children consists of actions
that they have to do towards their children as a matter of duty; but their retrospective responsibility
towards the same consists of actions that they have already done to their children for which they
deserve blame or praise.
In light of the three uses of the word “responsibility,” when we ask, “Who is responsible for this action?”
(assuming that we have in mind a particular human individual), we may be asking either of the following:
Who causes this action?
Whose duty is this action? (or Who is tasked or has the obligation to do this action?)
Who should be blamed or praised for this action?
These three questions are related in certain ways, but it is important not to confuse them. For the
person who causes the action may or may not be the one tasked, or has the obligation. To perform the
action, and, consequently, may or may not deserve blame or praise for this action.
Moral and Legal Accountability
To further understand the nature of moral accountability, let us briefly examine what makes moral
accountability different from the other types of accountability? For our purposes, let us focus on the
differences moral accountability has with legal accountability. One difference is the kind of standards or
principles used in ascertaining the quality (rightness or wrongness) of an act, for which one may deserve
blame or praise. Legal accountability uses legal standards (laws/statutes) whereas moral accountability
uses moral standards (moral rules or principles). As statues do not always embody moral rules (like laws
that are discriminatory), legal accountability, likewise, does not always reflect moral accountability.
Consequently, the person who deserves moral blame may not deserve legal punishment; and the person
who does not deserve moral blame may deserve legal punishment. Furthermore, assuming that they
embody moral rules, statutes are not always properly implemented. Consequently, the person who
deserves moral blame may not be legally punished; and the person who does not deserve moral blame
may be legally punished. Another difference concerns their kind of sanctions or penalties for
wrongdoers. Legal sanctions for criminal offenses—especially in penal systems following the classical
theory in criminal justice—are said to be external in that they come in the form of physical punishments
(like being deprived of physical freedom as when one is put to jail). Moral sanctions (moral blame or
fault), on the other hand, are said to be internal in that they come in the form of mental sufferings such
as guilt or remorse, shame, self-hatred, low self-esteem, and the like.
Conditions for Moral Accountability
The conditions for moral accountability can be classified into two general sets. We shall call the first the
attribution conditions (or assignment conditions) for they determine whether moral accountability can
be attributed or assigned to a person for an action that he/she has done. Under this set are the
incriminating conditions, which would make one morally accountable for the action under consideration;
and the excusing conditions, which would spare one from moral accountability for the action under
consideration. We shall call the second set the degree conditions because they determine the degree of
one’s moral accountability. Under this set are the mitigating and aggravating conditions. The conditions
are regarded as mitigating when they lessen the degree of one’s moral accountability; while they are
regarded as aggravating when they increase it. Analysis of the degree conditions assumes that the
person whose action is under consideration is held morally accountable for the action in question; what
is being determined is simply the degree of his/her moral accountability.
The Attribution Conditions
As earlier noted, agency or causation is one necessary condition for accountability. According to the
agency condition, a person is only accountable for actions in which he/she is the cause. This condition,
however, is not sufficient for there are two other necessary conditions: the knowledge condition,
referring to the condition in which a person knows or has the capacity to know the moral quality (the
moral goodness or badness) of his/her action; and the intentionality condition, referring to the condition
in which a person intends or freely chooses to perform an action he/she is doing. Taken together, these
three conditions constitute the incriminating conditions. A person is accountable for an action if and only
if he/she: (a) is the agent of the action; (b) knows or has the capacity to know that the action is good or
bad; and (c) intentionally performs the action. It is necessary for all these conditions to concur to make a
person morally accountable for his/her action (Haksar, 1998, 5633). If at least one of them does not
occur, then the person is excused from moral accountability. In other words, moral accountability cannot
be assigned to this person.
The conditions in which at least one of the three attribution conditions does not occur constitute the
excusing conditions for moral accountability. We may, however, refer to the absence or non-occurrence
of each of the incriminating conditions as follows: nonagency for the agency condition, ignorance for the
knowledge condition, and involuntariness for the intentionality condition. In this light, we can express
the excusing conditions as consisting of non-agency, ignorance, and involuntariness. Now, if the non-
occurrence of at least one of the incriminating conditions excuses one from moral accountability, it
follows that the occurrence of at least one of the excusing conditions (being the negations of the
attribution conditions) excuses one from moral accountability. Specifically, a person is not morally
accountable for an action that occurred if he/she failed to have at least one of the following: (a) volition
to perform the act; (b) knowledge whether the act is either good or bad (or have the capacity to know
such); or (c) intention to perform the act. It might be that this person: (1) did the action and knew the
action to be good or bad, but it was not his/her intention to do so; (2) did the action and intentionally
did so, but he/she did not know it to be either good or bad; or (3) simply did not do the action or was
not the one who did the action.
The ignorance condition, however, needs some qualification and elaboration. Consider the case of a
young child who mistook a real gun for a toy and, wanting to play with his older brother, shot and
eventually killed the latter. The young child did not really intend to kill his older brother; he just wanted
to play with him. But even if the child did want to kill his older brother, assuming it was an immediate
reaction to their quarrel, he did not know yet or fully understand the immorality of killing a person. In
this case, it is appropriate to excuse the child from moral accountability. But now consider the following
situation. Suppose a factory manager did not or failed to do preventive measures to protect the health of
his workers from the hazardous fumes emitted in his factory. As a result, a number of his workers got
seriously sick. Later on, when an investigation was done, this manager explained that he did not know
then that such fumes were hazardous. Should the manager be excused from accountability in virtue of
his ignorance? Was this a case where the ignorance condition truly occurred? We surely would not
excuse him from accountability. For not only was he capable of knowing the effects of the factory fumes
on the health of his workers, but it was in fact his duty to know such things. That he did not know then
that such fumes were hazardous. Should the manager be excused from accountability in virtue of his
ignorance? Was this a case where the ignorance condition truly occurred? We surely would not excuse
him from accountability. For not only was he capable of knowing the effects of the factory fumes on the
health of his workers, but it was in fact his duty to know such things.
A distinction can thus be made between the following two kinds of ignorance. The first, called blameless
ignorance, refers to the kind of ignorance where the ignorant person cannot be said to have known
better, either because it is not really the duty of the person to know what he/she is ignorant of, or
because the person does not have the capacity to know what he/she is supposed to know. Blameless
ignorance is the excusing or exempting type of ignorance. The second, which we shall call blameful (or
blameworthy) ignorance, refers to kind of ignorance where the ignorant person can be said to have
known better, because the ignorant person has the capacity to know what he/she should have known
and it is his/her duty to know it. This is an irresponsible kind of ignorance for it results from the ignorant
person’s negligence to do his/her duty to know certain things. Blameful ignorance is thus not an excusing
kind of ignorance. In our previous examples, the ignorance of the child was blameless, while that of the
factory manager was blameworthy.
To further shed light on this distinction, let us briefly examine the example provided by Haksar (1998,
5633): “In order to be morally accountable, an agent does not always have to know or even have the
correct opinion about what the moral requirements are. The capacity for finding out such things can be
enough. For instance, some Nazis who persecuted Jews may have thought sincerely that they were doing
the right thing; but if they could and should have known better, then they can be censured for moral
negligence. Had they thought things through, which they could and should have done, they would have
realized how wrong such acts were.” We can gather from Haksar’s remarks that it can be granted that
some Nazis did not know that what they did to the Jews was morally wrong because they sincerely
thought that what they were doing was right. Nonetheless, their ignorance does not excuse them from
their moral accountability, for they could and thus should have known better. They did not think things
through, of which they were very much capable. This then was a case of blameful ignorance.
But what determines whether a person should know better in a given situation? The following
considerations are helpful: Does the person have the capacity to know what he/she ought to know in a
given situation? And given the person’s role in a given situation, is it his/her duty to know what ought to
be known in such a situation? What determines one’s capacity to know can vary depending on the
nature of the given situation. It can include maturity, mental health, and access to relevant information.
On the other hand, what determines one’s duty to know is one’s role in a given situation. For instance,
being a factory manager, to know whether the fumes emitted in one’s factory are toxic or detrimental to
the health of the workers is within the range of information that one in that position has the duty to
know.
The Degree Conditions
Moral accountability comes in degrees. Some of the circumstances surrounding the actions we have
knowingly and intentionally performed affect the degree of our moral accountability for these actions.
We refer to these circumstances or factors as the degree conditions of moral accountability. When these
conditions tend to lessen the degree of moral accountability, they are regarded as mitigating; but when
they tend to increase such degree, they are regarded as aggravating. There are four such conditions (see
Velasquez, 2014, 60-61).
The first is the degree of knowledge of the moral wrongfulness of the action along with the relevant facts
related to the action. Here, the more knowledgeable a person is, the greater is his/her moral
accountability. The less knowledgeable a person is, the lesser is his/her moral accountability. Suppose,
for instance, that a defective design of a certain kind of car resulted in accidents which killed and
seriously injured some people. During the investigation, it was found out that an employee overseeing
the manufacture of the cars and the chief engineer, who headed the committee that designed the car,
knew about the defective design of the car; but they connived to hide the information from the
management. Given that both are accountable for the incidents that resulted, who deserved a higher
degree of accountability? From the viewpoint of who understood the seriousness of the defective car
design and the risks it entailed more, the chief engineer would have a higher degree of accountability
than the employee.
The second is the degree of pressure or difficulty in life that forces one to perform a wrongdoing. There
are moments where we feel forced to do certain actions we know to be morally wrong. Because we
know such actions to be morally wrong and choose to perform them anyway, we are then morally
accountable for these actions. But the degree of pressure (or the difficulty in life that we are addressing)
that leads us to perform such actions affects the degree of our moral accountability. Here, the greater
the pressure, the lesser the moral responsibility. The lesser the pressure, the greater the moral
accountability. Thus, suppose two people were guilty of stealing the same amount of money. One did it
to pay for the operation of his daughter suffering from a serious ailment. The other did it to be buy an
expensive gadget for his own enjoyment and pleasure. Given that both were accountable for their
actions, who had the higher or lesser degree of accountability? The one who stole to be able to pay for
the medical operation did it under a greater pressure or difficulty in life, and thus have a lesser degree of
accountability.
The third is the degree of the intensity (or seriousness) of the injury caused by the wrongdoing. The
greater the intensity of the injury, the greater the moral accountability. The lesser the intensity of the
injury, the lesser the moral accountability. Again, suppose two people stole the same amount of money.
One stole it from someone who intended to use the money to pay for the operation of his/her ailing
daughter. The other one stole it from someone who intended to use the money to buy an expensive
gadget for his/her own enjoyment and pleasure. Who had the higher degree of accountability? The
intensity of the injury caused by the one who stole the money from the person who intended to use the
money to pay for the operation of his/her ailing daughter was greater compared to the other one who
also stole the same amount of money from the person who intended to use the money for personal
pleasure. Thus, the former person deserved a greater degree Of accountability. (In the novel Les
Miserables, Jean Valjean stole a loaf of bread from a bakery His moral accountability would have been
greater if he had stolen it from a poor person who had it for his family’s dinner.)
The fourth is the degree of involvement (or participation) in a group or collective act of moral
wrongdoing. The greater the involvement, the greater the moral accountability The lesser the
involvement, the lesser the moral accountability. This condition explains why the accountability of an
accomplice, one who helps someone accomplish the latter’s criminal intention, is lesser than that of the
principal criminal, the one who actually and directly does the criminal act.
Evaluation
Answer the ff questions:
References:w
Bulaong, Jr., et. Al. (2021). A course module for Ethics and Ethics: Foundation of Moral Valuation. (2018).
Manila: Rex Bookstore Inc.
Evangelista, F.J & N. Mabaquiao, Jr. (2020). Ethics: Theories and Applications. Manila: Anvil Publishing,
Inc.
Prepared by:
CARLO A. RAZONABLE
Instructor
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Ethics Moral Accountability

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MORAL ACCOUNTABILITY

At the end of this lesson, students will be able to:

Discuss moral accountability and it’s conditions;

Differentiate moral accountability and responsibility;

Accountability and ‘’Responsibility”

Who causes this action?

Who should be blamed or praised for this action?

Moral and Legal Accountability

Conditions for Moral Accountability

The Attribution Conditions

The Degree Conditions

Answer the ff questions:

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