Causeless complicity

Abstract

I argue, contrary to standard claims, that accomplice liability need not be a causal relation. One can be an accomplice to another's crime without causally contributing to the criminal act of the principal. This is because the acts of aid and encouragement that constitute the basis for accomplice liability typically occur in contexts of under-and over-determination, where causal analysis is confounded. While causation is relevant to justifying accomplice liability in general, only potential causation is necessary in particular cases. I develop this argument through the example of the role of U.S. legal officials in abetting the acts of unlawful interrogation that have taken place since 2001. I also suggest that there may be a limited justification for ex post ratificatory accomplice liability.

Extraordinary rendition: expanding the circle of blame in international politics

“…The relationship between actors and the harm caused is important as it details 'in both criminal law and in ordinary ethical thought … ways one person can be liable … for bad things … done through the agency of another'; it gives details on how one's (in)actions feature while illustrating whether and how an actor was living up to their duty of care. 46 This is, however, a difficult topic, made more so by a rather diverse taxonomy used throughout the literature, with terms sometimes used interchangeably and without care to delineate the different levels of blame that each contribution would represent. 47 Indeed, 'aiding and abetting', the mainstay of legal terminology, is too broad to cover the necessarily different forms of procuring, causing, inducing, failing to prevent, permitting, enabling, persuading, allowing, participating, being an accessory, being a dependant, contributing and sanctioning.…”

“…The situation Kutz presents is, If a criminally-minded acquaintance is debating whether to burgle a house, [and] I tell him I know of a fence who can help dispose of the loot, and this consideration is dispositive in his deliberations, then I causally contribute to his act. 53 The accomplice's role is not necessary, yet its contribution increases the likelihood or makes easier the harmful end and so should be seen as playing an important role. This section includes advice, persuasion, sanctioning and promoting, whether through direct encouragement, permitting the activity or failing to prevent the activity when it is within one's clear ability to do so.…”

Unethical Consumption and Obligations to Signal

“…12 Others have used the concept to generate a weak membership condition for collective agency, and thereby joint responsibility for collectives' acts. 13 To diagnose unethical consumption in terms of complicity, we would take the principal offenders to be the corporations who run sweatshops, who purchase conflict minerals, who pay unfair prices for coffee and chocolate beans, and so on. And we would take consumers to be complicit in these harms via their purchases, which show support for or encouragement of those harms by sustaining demand for the products-at least when consumers are aware of the unethical production history, but perhaps even when not.…”

U.S. Complicity and Japan's Wartime Medical Atrocities: Time for a Response

“…Complicity is a complex and disputed concept but is normally taken to capture the idea that one can do wrong by being associated, in a certain way, with the harmdoingor, more broadly, wrongdoing-of other individuals or collectives (Gardner 2006;Kutz 2007; Lepora and Goodin 2013).…”

“…One reply to this objection could be that perhaps a case can be made for a noncausal view on complicity, according to which contribution is not necessary for complicity (see, e.g., Kutz 2007). Such a view is, however, likely to remain controversial.…”