Is Intent Constitutive of Wrongdoing?
Document Type
Article
Publication Date
2011
Abstract
Conventional wisdom has it that criminal conduct consists of two inculpatory elements: wrongdoing, which is a function of socially-undesirable harms and risks that can be defined independently of an actor’s subjectivity; and culpability, which is a function of an actor’s subjectivity. Antony Duff challenges this paradigm by advancing thesis that some commentators equate with the much-mooted Doctrine of Double Effect. Beginning in Intention, Agency and Criminal Liability (1990) and continuing in Criminal Attempts (1995) and Answering For Crime (2007), Duff argues that an actor’s intent to inflict harm (as opposed to his willingness to harm or to endanger) can affect not only the actor’s culpability in acting but also the wrongfulness of what he does.
As part of a volume in honor of Duff, I examine Duff’s thesis, distinguishing it from the much-criticized Doctrine of Double Effect, while at the same time questioning whether Duff shows that intent is constitutive of wrongdoing sufficient to justify the normative weight he accords it and, if so, whether he also shows that an actor’s willingness to inflict harm differs significantly in that respect from intent to inflict harm.
Recommended Citation
Westen, Peter K., "Is Intent Constitutive of Wrongdoing?" (2011). Public Law & Legal Theory Working Papers. 589.
https://repository.law.umich.edu/pub_law_archive/589