5 - Negligence, recklessness and blame
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 05 October 2013
Summary
We have argued that certain incidents which lead to harm and attributions of liability may, in fact, reasonably be regarded as accidents – in the sense in which we have defined accidents – and not as occasions for blame. We have also suggested that error is an inevitable concomitant of human activity, particularly in complex systems. In practice, however, when things go wrong, there is often a call by the community, or by the injured party, for an explanation, and this is frequently accompanied by pressing demands for the attribution of blame. In some cases these demands are justified, but the justification lies not in the mere fact that harm has occurred, but in the fact that it has been caused in a culpable manner.
Theories of moral responsibility based on free choice have traditionally stressed the inextricable link between blame and culpability. Yet this connection has been weakened by the tendency to assume that if there has been a harmful outcome then there is a strong possibility of blame. This claim may be made in the name of accountability and is a concomitant of the policy of dismantling elitist patterns of professional privilege. The consumerist movement has encouraged this view, arguing that more strenuous efforts to uncover responsibility for mishaps will ensure better protection for the public. There is, of course, some merit in this: it is clearly not in the interest of the public that those providing public services should be able to conceal incompetence or deliberate wrongdoing behind institutional or professional shields.
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- Errors, Medicine and the Law , pp. 127 - 151Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 2001
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