Responsibility and gender

Men and women from different cultures around the world often behave in ways that are characteristic of their sex. Social constructivists attribute gender-typical behaviors to socialization alone, while others attribute them partly to evolutionary factors. The first question this raises is whether the choice of scientific explanation makes any difference to how we should hold each other responsible for our actions. Second, gender-typical behavior may result in self-harm, or harm to others. Should that make a difference to whether we hold individuals responsible? These two questions concern, respectively, the origins and the consequences of certain actions. We also need to ask whether the origin that matters is not the scientific origin but rather whether the behavior originates from individuals honoring or neglecting their moral duties, for example, to their offspring. Regarding consequences, perhaps we should attend to whether holding individuals responsible for certain behaviors has better consequences than not doing so. The paper also explains how behaviors that are statistically correlated with one sex may lead some retributivists and deterrence theorists to opposite conclusions.

Political Philosophy and Ethics · Psychology