Interpreting Blame

Blame is a response to a person’s perceived faultiness. But it is not clear exactly what kind of response it is. If blame were merely a negative moral evaluation, then it would be difficult to explain why it should have seemed to many people that blame is appropriate only for faults that are under a person’s control. This might be easier to explain if blame is a form of punishment. But it is not clear that blame is a punishment or what penalty it involves. We need an interpretation of blame that is intermediate between these two: more than mere evaluation but not punitive. This chapter elaborates such an interpretation, based on the idea of an impaired relationship. It then discusses the ways this view resembles and differs from Peter Strawson’s wellknown account and considers various objections that have been raised against it.