1 INTRODUCTION

The world we live in is unjust and the existing political institutions fail to adequately address the current injustices. In this paper, I will discuss the role and the responsibilities of individual citizens in affluent countries¹ in the face of global structural injustice (GSI): How, if at all, should such individual agents, morally, respond to GSI? This is a challenging question because it links the smallest unit of agency, single persons, with complex moral challenges of an extremely large scale.

Different from attempts to determine the role and moral responsibility of individuals through specific acts and concrete duties, I will propose that a theoretical discussion of global individual responsibility should proceed in terms of an individual—and subsequently potentially collective shared—“ethos.” An ethos is understood as an attitude based on normative commitments that pervasively influence the multiple ways in which individual agents think and feel, talk and act. Proposing and defending the view that the moral responsibility of individuals in the face of GSI consists in fostering an ethos of cosmopolitan responsibility corresponds with the entanglement of individuals in the distinctive moral wrong of GSI. It highlights how individuals can contribute to overcoming structural injustice through targeting its relational origins.

However, even a cosmopolitan ethos held by many individuals alone will not be sufficient to end GSI. What is ultimately needed is significant institutional reform. But a widely shared commitment to the equal status of all, palpable in the way how many people feel, think, talk, and act about it, seems to be a necessary condition for effectively demanding and eventually realizing adequate institutional reform. Personal attitudinal change and personal action thus are essential practical steps toward the larger goal of overcoming GSI—even if their direct and immediate effects remain frustratingly small.

The following argument is based on a normative commitment to the equal moral status of all which has to be respected in all interactions and connections between people, even if these people are different (regarding nationality, individual capacity, sex, gender, race, etc.) and occupy different places and roles in a (global) society (being able to consume or to produce, being in need of assistance, etc.). My view is thus based on a variant of global interactional or relational egalitarianism that requires that all interactions—as well as the absence of interaction where such interaction would be possible—are justified and shaped in the light of this fundamental egalitarian commitment.²

The paper consists of four sections. The first one introduces the problem of global structural injustice as a distinctive moral wrong and analyses arguments about individual responsibility for global injustice. Section two raises challenges for any account of global individual responsibility. Section three outlines an ethos-based view of individual responsibility for global structural injustice focusing not primarily on specific duties to act to address the severe symptoms. Instead, individuals should primarily target the relational origins of GSI insofar as they are within reach for individual agents. The concluding section four not only discusses some merits, but also identifies limitations of this view.

中文翻译：

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个人责任和全球结构性不公正：走向世界责任的精神

1 介绍

我们生活的世界是不公正的，现有的政治机构未能充分解决当前的不公正问题。在本文中，我将讨论富裕国家¹面对全球结构性不公正 (GSI)时个体公民的作用和责任：如果有的话，这些个体在道德上应该如何回应 GSI？这是一个具有挑战性的问题，因为它将最小的代理单位，单个人与极其大规模的复杂道德挑战联系起来。

与通过具体行为和具体职责来确定个人的角色和道德责任的尝试不同，我将建议对全球个人责任的理论讨论应该根据个人——随后可能是集体共享的——“精神”进行。精神被理解为一种基于规范承诺的态度，这种承诺普遍影响个体代理人思考和感受、谈话和交流的多种方式。行为。提出并捍卫这样一种观点，即个人在 GSI 面前的道德责任在于培养一种世界主义的责任精神，这与个人在 GSI 独特的道德错误中的纠缠相对应。它强调了个人如何通过针对其关系起源来克服结构性不公正。

然而，即使是许多人单独持有的世界主义精神也不足以结束 GSI。最终需要的是重大的体制改革。但是，对所有人平等地位的普遍承诺，从多少人对此的感受、思考、谈话和行动的方式中显而易见，似乎是有效要求并最终实现充分制度改革的必要条件。因此，个人态度改变和个人行动是实现克服 GSI 的更大目标的重要实际步骤——即使它们的直接和直接影响仍然小得令人沮丧。

以下论点基于对所有人的平等道德地位的规范承诺，在人与人之间的所有互动和联系中必须尊重所有人的平等道德地位，即使这些人不同（关于国籍、个人能力、性别、性别、种族等）。 ）并在（全球）社会中占据不同的位置和角色（能够消费或生产，需要帮助等）。因此，我的观点基于全球互动或关系平等主义的一种变体，它要求所有互动——以及在可能发生这种互动的情况下没有互动——都根据这种基本的平等主义承诺来证明和塑造。²

论文由四个部分组成。第一个将全球结构性不公正问题介绍为一种独特的道德错误，并分析了个人对全球不公正的责任的争论。第二部分对任何关于全球个人责任的解释提出了挑战。第三部分概述了一种基于精神的观点，即个人对全球结构性不公正的责任，而不主要侧重于采取行动解决严重症状的具体职责。相反，个人应该主要针对 GSI 的关系起源，只要他们在个人代理的范围内。结论部分第四部分不仅讨论了一些优点，而且指出了这种观点的局限性。