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New Books Network: Responsible Citizens, Irresponsible States (Avia Pasternak)
6 December 2021
Avia Pasternak discusses her newly published book 'Responsible Citizens, Irresponsible States. Should Citizens Pay for Their States' Wrongdoings?' with Robert Talisse on the New Books Network podcast.
We tend to think that states can act wrongfully, even criminally. Thus, we also tend to think that states can be听held responsible听for their acts. They can be made to pay compensation to their victims or suffer penalties with respect to their standing in the international community, and so on. The trouble, though, is that when states are held responsible, the听肠辞蝉迟听of moral repair听is transferred to the citizens of the offending state, including citizens who听辞产箩别肠迟别诲听to the wrongful acts, may have been听unaware of听them, or were听辫辞飞别谤濒别蝉蝉听to prevent them. What could justify this?
滨苍听听(Oxford University Press 2021),听Avia Pasternak听develops a new defense of the idea that citizens have a duty to share in the burdens of their state鈥檚 wrongdoing. However, Avia also addresses the practical moral complexities of state wrongdoing, and defends a context-sensitive framework for distributing the burden.
听is the W. Alton Jones Professor of Philosophy at Vanderbilt University.
