Responsibility and the Criminal Law

In this course, we will bring resources from philosophy of action to bear on questions about who should (or should not) be held criminally liable, and why. The class will be organized in three parts. In the first part of the class, students will gain a basic understanding of the relationship between moral and legal responsibility and of the way in which modern Anglo-American criminal legal doctrine is organized. In the second part of the class, we will concern ourselves with how best to characterize the relation between an individual's mens rea, or "guilty mind," and their performance of an actus reus, or "guilty act," necessary for the justifiable imposition of liability for commission of a crime. In the third part of the class, we will take a social turn. We will consider how relationships between individuals - as aiders to commission of crimes, as members of conspiracies, as members of corporations, and as citizens of states - might support more complicated forms of responsibility and liability. Prerequisites: graduate student standing in philosophy or, for others, prior course work in philosophy that includes Philosophy 80 plus one other course in Philosophy numbered over 99. Undergraduates should enroll in Phil 187B. Only MA students in Philosophy and PhD students in Philosophy or related PhD programs should enroll in Phil 287B.