-----Original Message----- From: lbo-talk-bounces at lbo-talk.org [mailto:lbo-talk-bounces at lbo-talk.org] On Behalf Of mdawson at pdx.edu
This whole Churchill thing raises the issue of the logic/sociology of blame.
I know I've read a few classic helpful statements explaining how blaming everybody is basically a way of blaming nobody, as well as a sign of the terrorist mentality. Can anybody who understands the point suggest where to
find the definitive philosophical explanation of this point?
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Michael, I'm not too familiar with the sociology of blame lit. but in philosophy the issue travels under the concept of collective responsibility, on which much has been written. The following are well worth a try:
http://www.helsinki.fi/~pylikosk/collint/ [ a bibliography]
War Crimes and Collective Wrongdoing : A Reader / edited by Aleksandar Jokic Blackwell Publishers, 2001
Collective Responsibility : Five Decades of Debate in Theoretical and Applied Ethics / edited by Larry May and Stacey Hoffmann Rowman & Littlefield, c1991
Complicity: Ethics and Law for a Collective Age / Christopher Kutz Cambridge University Press, c2000
World poverty and human rights : cosmopolitan responsibilities and reforms / Thomas W. Pogge Cambridge, UK : Polity Press ; Malden, MA : Blackwell Publishers, c2002 [this is a *great* book, btw]