What does it mean to be responsible?

This opinion piece is part of The Age of Mistrust? season at the British Academy.

It may seem somewhat presumptuous, but I suspect that I am not alone in viewing our world as an age defined by gross irresponsibility. From climate change to AI, from war to the rise of populism across democratic nations, these are trying times. Amid such challenges and widespread public mistrust, one pressing question remains: what does it truly mean to be responsible?

The meaning of responsibility can be surprisingly vague. I say surprising because in general, we have no problem knowing how to use the term. The everyday usage reveals important insights. A major one is that the meaning of responsibility is exceptionally context dependent. For example, we can use the concept of responsibility to mean being answerable for one’s choices, to be liable, accountable and even complicit. When applied to a specific identity, such as a parent, friend, or someone holding a particular office or job, responsibility takes on the form of duty, an obligation, or a commitment.

There is also the responsibility we might hold towards others, whether it’s a stranger in distress or a victim of violence, or the collective responsibility we have for things that are done in our name, or which we benefit from. However, these are all quite different and they have different meanings.

How to think about the moral complexity of responsibility

An insightful way to think about the wider issues here is that being responsible does not always explain what the right thing to do is. Yet, when we think of being responsible, responsibility tends to include a moral component, even if that morality changes based on context, person, time and place. What is one to do in the face of such complexity when a single definition is unlikely to be up to the challenges of our times?

One way forward is to think about how responsibility is itself moral, and it is in our call to be responsible that we demonstrate our complex morality. Responsibility emerges when we are faced with something not working as it should – when the meaningful structures of our societies begin to break down and we are forced to confront more about ourselves and our world than we normally do. Fortunately, however, we have a lot of practice in contemplating what responsibility might mean in such moments. Indeed, this is the type of exploration that we find in a lot of science fiction.

What sci-fi literature can teach us about responsibility in an age of mistrust?

In my British Academy-funded project, 'Political Responsibility in The Worst of All Possible Worlds: A study of political responsibility using dystopian and science fiction',  I have been working through the archives of both Carl Sagan and Octavia E. Butler – two dramatically different types of science fiction authors. Both, however, were very political individuals who were concerned with questions of responsibility, particularly of political responsibility.

Sagan’s focus often revolved around trying to influence the levers of policy. His archive reveals a very politically active man, but it also showcases his wider concern that in order to work out the practice of responsibility, we need to be clear in our intellectual faculties. Yet, Sagan could never escape the paradox of how to address problems that science produces but cannot solve. His lesson here – an important one in an age of post-truth politics, disinformation and misinformation – is that to comprehend the meaning of responsibility, we need to also understand the practices involved in producing meaningful knowledge.

In Octavia E. Butler’s ‘Parable’ series, she explores the politics of living in a society on the brink of total collapse. Yet, as Butler wrote in a note to herself, the ‘Parable of the Sower’ was intended to be a story of hope – despite its dystopian and apocalyptic tone. The two novels offer a commentary into the role of religion – an issue that Sagan also addresses in ‘Contact’ – as well as the dangers of a society without government, where sexual violence is rampant, theft is a way of life, and trust is in short supply.

Yet, Butler seems to be telling us how being responsible can mean putting yourself at risk, requires faith in others, and, importantly, is heavily context dependent. Responsibility demands recognising context as a fickle friend. It can guide us forward, but it can also hold us back and even work against us. While being responsible might mean having to steal, just like it means coming to the aid of a stranger, it functions as a means to reveal our morality. Butler suggests that we can be moral without a clear moral law. Or, if there is such a moral law it is based on accepting the uncertain and that things can change.

These insights help us to understand the meaning of responsibility, and in being comfortable in the fact that responsibility is not a delivery vehicle for a pre-existing moral code, but rather the process whereby we reveal our own morality.

Ilan Zvi Baron is a Professor of International Politics and Political Theory at the University of Durham