Complicity: Criticism Between Collaboration and Commitment

155 Pages·2016·3.594 MB·English

by  Thomas Docherty

Complicity
Off the Fence: Morality, Politics and Society
The series is published in partnership with the Centre for Applied Philosophy,
Politics and Ethics (CAPPE), University of Brighton.
Series editors:
Bob Brecher, Professor of Moral Philosophy, University of Brighton
Robin Dunford, Senior Lecturer in Globalisation and War, University
of Brighton
Michael Neu, Senior Lecturer in Philosophy, Politics and Ethics,
University of Brighton
Off the Fence presents short, sharply argued texts in applied moral and
political philosophy, with an interdisciplinary focus. The series constitutes
a source of arguments on the substantive problems that applied philoso-
phers are concerned with: contemporary real-world issues relating to vio-
lence, human nature, justice, equality and democracy, self and society. The
series demonstrates applied philosophy to be at once rigorous, relevant and
accessible—philosophy-in-use.
The Right of Necessity: Moral Cosmopolitanism and Global Poverty,
Alejandra Mancilla
Complicity: Criticism Between Collaboration and Commitment,
Thomas Docherty
The State and the Self: Identity and Identities, Maren Behrensen
(forthcoming)
Just Liberal Violence: Sweatshops, Torture, War, Michael Neu
(forthcoming)
Complicity
Criticism Between Collaboration
and Commitment
Thomas DocherTy
London • New York
Published by Rowman & Littlefield International Ltd.
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Copyright © 2016 by Thomas Docherty
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any
electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems,
without written permission from the publisher, except by a reviewer who may quote
passages in a review.
British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data
A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library
ISBN: HB 978-1-7866-0101-8
PB 978-1-7866-0102-5
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Names: Docherty, Thomas, 1955– author.
Title: Complicity : criticism between collaboration and commitment /
Thomas Docherty.
Description: New York : Rowman & Littlefield International, 2016. | Series:
Off the fence: morality, politics, and society | Includes bibliographical
references and index.
Identifiers: LCCN 2016020906 (print) | LCCN 2016032476 (ebook) |
ISBN 9781786601018 (cloth : alk. paper) | ISBN 9781786601025
(pbk. : alk. paper) | ISBN 9781786601032 (electronic)
Subjects: LCSH: Criticism (Philosophy) | Critical theory.
Classification: LCC B809.3 .D63 2016 (print) | LCC B809.3 (ebook) |
DDC 801/.95—dc23
LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2016020906
™
The paper used in this publication meets the minimum requirements of American
National Standard for Information Sciences—Permanence of Paper for Printed Library
Materials, ANSI/NISO Z39.48-1992.
Printed in the United States of America
For Roy Park and for Seamus Deane

Contents
Preface and Acknowledgements ix
Chapter 1 Introduction: On Being a Bastard 1
Chapter 2 Diplomacy and Law 9
Chapter 3 Accountancy; or, on Being a Bureaucrat 27
Chapter 4 Skin in the Game 53
Chapter 5 On Democratic Responsibility 77
Chapter 6 ‘Open the Doors!’; or, on Commitment and Reserve 105
Bibliography 133
Index 139
vii

Preface and Acknowledgements
This book grew out of a conference, hosted by Bob Brecher, Michael Neu,
and colleagues in CAPPE, the Centre for Applied Philosophy, Politics
and Ethics, at the University of Brighton in March/April 2015. The confer-
ence was organized by the ‘Understanding Conflict’ research cluster. I am
enormously grateful to colleagues in Brighton for the work that they do in
these areas, for inviting me to speak at the conference, and for focusing my
mind and research onto the topic of complicity. Alongside these professional
drivers, I had personal reasons to be interested in modes of institutional com-
plicity, in the ways in which institutions—especially institutions of education
and cultural formation—sometimes work by encouraging individuals to be-
come complicit with practices that they might normally eschew. Institutional
demands can override the personal, to the point where not only ethical but
also professional responsibilities are made to disappear. Beyond that, those
institutional demands also sit within social and political configurations; and,
consequently, individuals can become complicit with political positions that,
personally, they would prefer to resist or reject. This book is an attempt to
bring the entire idea of responsibility to bear on what is essentially the insti-
tutionalization of corruption in contemporary culture.
I have presented earlier versions of some of the material here in a num-
ber of institutions in Dublin, Bristol, St. Gallen, Oxford, Royal Holloway
London, Wolverhampton, Portsmouth, York, Chelsea College of Arts, and
Alberta, Canada. I am grateful to my audiences and colleagues in these in-
stitutions for hosting me generously and for helping me to explore the ideas
more fully and clearly. In particular, I would like to thank colleagues who,
like Bob Brecher in Brighton, honoured me by inviting my participation in
conferences or by inviting me to give special guest or public lectures: Annette
ix