The Yeoh Tiong Lay Centre for Politics, Philosophy and Law is delighted to host Marcia Baron for the fourth lecture in the 2024/25 Lecture Series in Practical Agency.

Title

A Subjective Standard of Reasonableness for Self-Defence?

Abstract

What I’ll present comes from a book manuscript having to do with the distinction between subjective and objective standards of reasonableness, particularly in connection with self-defence. I try both to clarify the distinction and to argue that an objective standard properly understood, properly articulated, and properly applied is just fine. However, in the material that I will present at KCL, I take seriously the position of someone who favors a subjective standard, and who wants to find as viable a subjective standard as possible.

I motivate that position via a case that cannot count as justified self-defence on an objective standard, and which may for that reason lead some to favor a subjective standard. After explaining briefly one obvious alternative—treating the person as partially or fully excused—and then presenting another approach, suggested by Arthur Ripstein, I’ll devote the rest of my talk to trying to figure out how a subjective standard at its best might go, a subjective standard that would facilitate treating this and relevantly similar cases as justified self-defence. This is not something I am endorsing. I am considering it to draw attention to the challenges for anyone who wants to come up with a plausible subjective standard, and hopefully to advance the debate concerning standards of reasonableness.

Author Bio

Marcia Baron is the James H. Rudy Professor of Philosophy at Indiana University. Her main interests are in moral philosophy and philosophy of criminal law. Publications include Kantian Ethics Almost without Apology (1995), Three Methods of Ethics: A Debate, co-authored with Philip Pettit and Michael Slote (1997), “Killing in the Heat of Passion” (2004), “Justifications and Excuses” (2005), “Self-Defense: The Imminence Requirement” (2011), “The Standard of the Reasonable Person in the Criminal Law” (2012), “The Ticking Bomb Hypothetical” (2013), “Rape, Seduction, Shame, and Culpability in Tess of the d’Urbervilles” (2013), "A Kantian Take on the Supererogatory” (2015), “Rethinking 'One Thought Too Many'” (2017), “Sexual Consent, Reasonable Mistakes, and the Case of Anna Stubblefield” (2018), “Shame and Shamelessness” (2018), "Negligence, Mens Rea, and What We Want the Element of Mens Rea to Provide" (2020), and “Recklessness and Negligence in the Criminal Law” (forthcoming). She is currently working on a book entitled Self-Defense, Reason and the Law (under contract with OUP).