Legal versus Moral

Abstract

Since the publication of Kadish’s article ‘Complicity, Cause, and Blame’ in 1985, legal scholars have taken great interest in the notion of complicity and have produced a significant number of publications on the subject. With the exception of Christopher Kutz, these scholars have largely ignored the moral, as opposed to legal, aspects of complicity. In this paper I make an attempt to compare the moral and legal notions of complicity. I will argue that, unless one takes a position of strict consequentialism, the moral notion of complicity casts a wider net than the legal notion. This is a point of no small importance. People need to realize that if they skirt the boundaries of legal complicity, their behavior might well still qualify as complicity on moral grounds.

1. Since the publication of Kadish’s article ‘Complicity, Cause, and Blame’ in 1985, legal scholars have taken great interest in the notion of...