CHMRIA · Collective Harm and Moral Reasons for Individual Action: A Comprehensive Theory

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Project objective

In collective harm situations, many individual acts together bring about a harmful outcome, but no individual act seems to make any significant difference. Examples include greenhouse gas emissions contributing to climate change, meat consumption contributing to animal suffering, and fast fashion purchases contributing to harmful labor practices. In this type of situation, although it seems the outcome will be no more or less severe give or take any one act, we think these harmful outcomes give each individual moral reason to refrain from acts such as going for a pleasure drive in a gas-guzzling car or buying a steak for dinner. If no individual act makes a morally relevant difference, however, it is unclear why we have moral reason to refrain. This is the so-called problem of collective harm, which has come to be one of the most important issues in contemporary ethics. Solving this problem means identifying a strong moral reason for an individual not to act in collective harm situations, one that has to do with the harmful outcome of concern. The central aim of this project is to provide a comprehensive theory of moral reasons for individual action in collective harm situations based on three research objectives: 1) to determine which situations raise the problem of collective harm and what kind of moral reasons are relevant in response to it, 2) to propose an original, pluralist account of moral reasons for individual action in collective harm situations, and 3) to demonstrate the broader normative implications of the idea that there are moral reasons for individual action in collective harm situations by showing how this idea applies in the moral evaluation of individual wrongful acts.

Original text from CORDIS.

Participants

• UNIVERSITY OF LEEDS · LeedsCoordinatorUnited Kingdom

Links

• View on CORDIS
• DOI: 10.3030/101273982