Introduction

History reveals many examples of the doings of institutional entities, such as states and corporations. For instance, I take it to be Uncontroversial that, in 1989, the United States removed Manuel Noriega from the Presidency of Panama, and that, in 1991, the U.S.

These claims about what the U.S. and Saudi Arabia did might be false. Yet I take it that no­one would seriously argue against them on a priori metaphysical grounds, such as on the basis of the view that states cannot do anything at all, much less wage war. If these claims are false, they are false for the prosaic reason that they are not borne out by the history of what actually happened in Panama, Kuwait, or Yemen.

We might nevertheless debate how to interpret the claims, or we might debate their truth conditions. It appears that they are straightforwardly claims about intentional actions performed by states — a kind of institutional entity — for which these states might well be blameworthy, depending on whether they violated their moral obligations in so acting. So, depending on what actually happened, Saudi Arabia might have been in violation of its moral obligations in carrying out air-strikes in Yemen, and it might be morally blameworthy for the resulting deaths of civilians. But perhaps a different interpretation of these claims can be defended. There is, indeed, a philo­sophical debate as to whether institutional entities, “as such,” are capable of intentional action “in their own right” and as to whether they, “as such,” can have moral obligations or bear moral responsibility.

Institutional entities are a kind of collective entity. They have individual natural persons as members.¹ States, corporations, and organized criminal gangs are examples. Entities of this kind are distinguished from unorganized groups, such as the group of all brown-haired men, and the mob that stormed the Bastille, in virtue of having an organizational structure and a collective decision procedure, grounded in laws, regulations, institutional practices, norms, or the like.

I shall not discuss views that deny that collective entities exist. Such a view could have a variety of motivations. There is, first, the metaphysical thesis that only the ontologically most fundamental entities exist. On this view, collectives do not exist, but neither do persons. I will use the term “existence” more expansively to allow that things can truly be said to “exist” even if they are not ontologically fundamental (see Rosen 2010; Baker 2006). There is also, second, “Occam’s Razor,” the idea that, other things being equal, we should give more credence to ontologically more parsimonious theories than to less parsimonious ones. I would deny that it is ontologically profligate to think that institutional entities and other collectives exist, for they are constituted by their members, given the laws, regulations, norms, and the like that are in place. It is no more profligate to think that collectives exist than to think there are dining room suites, bee colonies, and tractor-trailer units. But I cannot discuss these metaphysical issues, and I will assume that collective entities exist.

The philosophical debate I mentioned is between those who deny, and those who affirm, that institutional entities “as such” are capable of intentional action. Call people who deny this, “agency individualists.” There is the closely related debate between those who deny, and those who affirm, that institutional entities “as such” can have moral obligations or bear moral responsibility. Call people who deny these things, “moral individualists.” To be charitable, I shall not construe individualists of either kind as doing a priori history — as claiming on a priori metaphysical grounds that the U.S.

It will be helpful to distinguish between different forms of individualism about agency. An “extreme agency individualist,” or an “extremist,” holds that institutional entities are not cap­able of acting, or are not capable of acting intentionally. A “moderate agency individualist,” or a “moderate,” allows that institutional entities are capable of intentional action, yet contends that their actions are “reducible,” “without remainder,” to the actions of individual (natural) persons, so that institutional entities as such are not capable of intentional action. The U.S. waged war against Iraq. The extremist denies that this waging of war was an action of the U.S. The moderate admits that it was an action of the U.S. but holds that it was not an action of the U.S. as such since it was reducible to the actions of individual persons.

The extremist seems to be committed to denying that an institutional entity could have any moral obligations or bear moral responsibility for anything it has done. For, arguably, obligations are obligations to act in one way or another and responsibility of the relevant kind is responsi­bility for action. By way of contrast, a moderate might allow that institutional entities can have moral obligations and bear moral responsibility. But given that the moderate thinks that the actions of institutional entities are reducible without remainder to the actions of individual per­sons, she might be tempted to argue on this basis that their obligations and responsibilities are likewise reducible without remainder to the obligations and responsibilities of individual per­sons. Any obligations of the U.S.

I do nevertheless agree to a point with the moderate agency individualist. Indeed, I take it to be uncontroversial that the actions of collective entities are in some appropriate sense “constituted” by the actions of relevant persons (Copp 1976; 1979).² The U.S. action in invading Kuwait was constituted by relevant actions of relevant persons, including the President. To cap­ture this idea, I will say that collective entities are not “independent agents.” But I do not want to say on this basis that collective entities “as such” are not capable of acting. I do not know what this would mean, unless it is simply another way of saying that collective entities are not independent agents. Perhaps, then, the debate between me and the moderate agency individu­alist is simply about details. Is the relation between collective institutional action and individual action as tidy as the moderate individualists contend? Can there be untidy “remainders”?

I do not agree with moral individualists. Of course I agree that if the U.S. invasion of Kuwait was wrong, this was a reason for the relevant persons not to do what they did. If the U.S. was blameworthy for what it did, then, other things being equal, some relevant person was blame­worthy (Copp 2007a; 2012). As I have argued in other places, however, there can be cases in which an institutional entity has an all-things-considered moral obligation to do something, but where no person has an all-things-considered moral obligation to do what she would have to do in order for the institutional entity to meet its obligation (Copp 1976; 2006; 2007a; 2012). So I do not agree with the individualist who thinks that the obligations and responsibilities of collective entities are reducible without remainder to the obligations and responsibilities of individual persons.

My goal in this chapter is to combat the idea that there is something metaphysically or morally objectionable or problematic in the idea that institutional entities are capable of inten­tional action, properly so-called, and that, strictly speaking, they can have moral obligations and bear moral responsibility. I will argue that, at least on one conception of the point of morality, and on the normative theory supported by this account, we can explain how it might be that institutional entities have moral obligations. I have sketched the basic idea before (Copp 2012). Here I will go into more detail. I will argue that the account I favor can provide a satisfying explanation of the reason there is for individual persons to do what they need to do in order that collective entities they belong to meet their moral duties. I contend that similar arguments can be offered from other theoretical perspectives. In the middle sections of the chapter, I will argue that, even though institutional entities are not independent agents, they can be involved in events in the way that the U.S. was involved in the bombing of Hiroshima. I will argue that such “institutional actional events” qualify as actions. In the final substantive section of the chapter, I will reject reductionist views that are sometimes offered in support of extreme agency indi­vidualism or moral individualism. The upshot, I contend, is that facts about the obligations or responsibility of collective entities plausibly are grounded in the same kinds of facts about the content of morality as ground the obligations or responsibility of relevant individuals.

7.2