Collectivity

Tracy Isaacs is Professor of Philosophy, Women’s Studies and Feminist Research at Western University in London, Ontario, Canada. She is the author of Moral Responsibility in Collective Contexts (2011) and co-editor, with Richard Vernon, of Accountability for Collective Wrongdoing (2011).Kendy M. Hess is the Brake Smith Associate Professor of Social Philosophy and Ethics at the College of the Holy Cross. Violetta Igneski is Associate Professor of Philosophy at McMaster University.

Hess, Igneski, and Isaacs have assembled an exceptional collection of new papers exploring the issues of ontology, ethics and social justice with respect to collectives. Many of the chapters advance and deepen prior analyses of the way collective entities should be considered from the point of view of moral responsibility, practically and theoretically. Collectivity makes provocative moves in the direction of aligning moral assessment and ontological considerations with the real world of corporations, organizations, groups, nations, and other collectives that control much of the social, political, and economic events that shape our lives for good or ill.

• Introduction, Kendy Hess, Violetta Igneski, and Tracy IsaacsPart One: OntologyChapter 1: Social Creationism and Social Groups, Katherine RitchieChapter 2: The Peculiar Unity of Corporate Agents, Kendy HessChapter 3: Can There Be an Ethics for Institutional Agents? Sean CordellChapter 4: At Cross Purposes: The Responsible Subject, Organizational Reality and the Criminal Law, Jennifer QuaidPart Two: EthicsChapter 5: Making Sense of Collective Moral Obligations: A Comparison of Existing Approaches, Anne SchwenkenbecherChapter 6: Individual Duties in Unstructured Collective Contexts, Violetta IgneskiChapter 7: Global Obligations and the Human Right to Health, Bill WringeChapter 8: When Are Collective Obligations Too Demanding? Felix PinkertChapter 9: Who Does Wrong When an Organization Does Wrong? Stephanie CollinsPart Three: Social JusticeChapter 10: What Would a Feminist Theory of Collective Action and Responsibility Look Like? Tracy IsaacsChapter 11: Identities of Oppression: Collec