A Defense of Moral Luck

Central to Yaffe’s argument in his article “Trying, Acting and Attempted Crimes,” is his denial of moral luck. However, denying moral luck requires going against the strong moral intuitions of most people. While this is not necessarily an impossible task, it is a very difficult one. In this post, I will defend the concept of moral luck against Yaffe’s objections.

The criminal law currently makes distinctions in crimes and punishments based moral luck. If someone attempted murder and failed, they would not be convicted of the same crime or punished in the same way as someone who successfully committed murder. This makes moral luck important to justice. If someone fails to commit murder due to circumstances beyond their control — like if the person does not die from their injuries — then the crime is not punished as severely.

However, it seems like moral luck is significant to the balance of justice. When someone commits a wrongful action, they are responsible for all of the bad consequences that stem from the action and none of the good consequences.

Consider the case of Hitler leading Germany. When Hitler sets up labor camps — commits a wrongful action — there are some good consequences that come from his wrongful action: the German economy improves due to the forced labor. However, no one thinks that Hitler should be praised for the good consequence, because it came about through a terribly immoral action. This is generally agreed upon.

The more controversial claim is that one should be held responsible for every bad effect that comes from a wrongful action. For example, if someone commits perjury by telling a false story about a man and his family covering up murder, it seems like the perjurer is guilty not only of perjury, but also responsible for the deaths of the family members when someone is angered by his false story and decides to seek revenge because of it. The bad consequences further downstream from the wrongful action seem morally significant, even though there is a considerable amount of moral luck involved.

One could argue that this does not seem fair. Two people can commit the exact same wrongful action and due to no action of their own, one could have no bad consequences and the other could have many bad consequences purely because of luck. However, the balance of justice seems to demand that those bad consequences fall on someone’s shoulders. No one is blameworthy except the wrongdoer, so it seems like the wrongdoer takes on the guilt of the consequences of his actions — even unforeseen ones.