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Planning for Collective Agency

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Collective Agency and Cooperation in Natural and Artificial Systems

Part of the book series: Philosophical Studies Series ((PSSP,volume 122))

Abstract

Which planning mechanisms enable agents to coordinate their actions, and what if anything do these tell us about the nature of collective agency? On the leading, best developed account, Michael Bratman’s, collective agency is explained in terms of interconnected planning. For our plans to be interconnected is for them to concern not just facts about our environment and goals but also facts about each others’ plans. This chapter contrasts interconnected with parallel planning. In parallel planning, we each individually plan all of our actions and so are in a position to conceive of our own and each other’s actions as parts of a single plan or exercises of a single ability. (The very idea of parallel planning may initially seem incoherent; the chapter examines this issue.) Could parallel rather than interconnected planning underpin collective agency? Some considerations in favour of a positive answer are provided by appeal to recent evidence on the role of motor representation in coordinating exercises of collective agency.

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Notes

  1. 1.

    Recent contributions include Bratman (2014); Gilbert (1990); Gallotti (2011); Gold and Sugden (2007); Kutz (2000); Ludwig (2007); Miller (2001); Schmid (2009); Searle (1990); Seemann (2009); Smith (2011); Tuomela and Miller (1988); Tuomela (2005). Even the terminology is fraught with pitfalls. I take ‘collective agency’ and ‘shared agency’ to be synonymous; likewise ‘collective action’ and ‘joint action’. Use of the term ‘collective’ occasionally cues audiences to expect discussion of large-scale activities, although in this chapter ‘collective’ should be understood, as it is in discussions of plural prediction, as contrasting with ‘distributive’ (see, e.g., Linnebo 2005).

  2. 2.

    The use of contrast cases to draw conclusions about collective agency is not new (compare Searle 1990). The strategy is familiar from Pears (1971), who used contrast cases to argue that whether something is an ordinary, individual action depends on its antecedents.

  3. 3.

    If this is right, Gilbert is wrong that ‘[t]he key question in the philosophy of collective action is simply … under what conditions are two or more people doing something together?’ (Gilbert 2010, 67).

  4. 4.

    Events D1, … Dn ground E just if: D1, … Dn and E occur; D1, … Dn are each part of E; and every event that is a part of E but does not overlap D1, … Dn is caused by some or all of D1, … Dn. This notion of grounding is adapted from Pietroski (1998).

  5. 5.

    Event D partially grounds event E if there are events including D which ground E. (So any event which grounds E thereby also partially grounds E; I nevertheless describe actions as ‘grounding or partially grounding’ events for emphasis.) Specifying the intentions in terms of grounding ensures that it is possible for both people to succeed in painting the bridge, as well as for either of them to succeed alone.

  6. 6.

    Here I ignore complexities involved in accurately specifying how events must be related to intentions in order for the events to involve exercises of collective agency; these parallel the complexities involved in the case of ordinary, individual agency. (On the individual case, see Chisholm (1966).)

  7. 7.

    This argument is adapted from Bratman’s (1992, 132–134; 2014, 48–52).

  8. 8.

    His proposal has been refined and elaborated over more than two decades (for three snapshots, compare (Bratman 1992, 338), (Bratman 1997, 153), and (Bratman 2014, 84)). Here I skip the details; the discussion in this chapter applies to all versions.

  9. 9.

    It may be tempting to think that invoking joint action here is somehow circular. But Bratman is using ‘joint action’ as I am using ‘collective action’; and, as illustrated in Sect. 8.2, there are collective (or ‘joint’) actions which do not involve collective agency.

  10. 10.

    In specifying that a plan describes how we, you and I, should act, I do not mean to imply that the plan must be, or include, a plan for how you should act where this is something over and above being a plan for how we should act. (Distinguishing senses in which a plan on which I act might be a plan for how you should act requires some care.) I specify ‘you and I’ just to emphasise that the plan is supposed to answer, partially or wholly, the question, What should we do? and not only the question, What should I do?

  11. 11.

    Two or more agents’ plans match just if they are the same, or similar enough that the differences don’t matter in the following sense. First, for each agent’s plan, let the self part be the bits concerning the agent’s own actions and let the other part be the other bits. Now consider what would happen if, for a particular agent, the other part of her plan were as nearly identical to the self part (or parts) of the other’s plan (or others’ plans) as psychologically possible. Should this agent’s self part be significantly different? If not, let us say that any differences between her plan and the other’s (or others’) are not relevant for her. Finally, if for some agents’ plans the differences between them are not relevant for any of the agents, then let us say that the differences don’t matter.

  12. 12.

    Support for the hard line might be extracted from Laurence (2011). He defends the view that, in some cases, several agents’ ‘individual, first-person-singular actions are all subject to the special collective action sense of the question “Why?” and […] the same answer holds in each case’ (p. 289). While there are many differences between Laurence’s view and the line I am considering, both appear committed to the idea that exercising collective agency sometimes involves this: that from the point of view of any individual agent, it is almost as if all the agents’ actions are guided by a single piece of practical reasoning.

  13. 13.

    This is not to say that philosophers have not attempted this at all; see, for example, Tollefsen (2005) or Gallotti and Frith (2013).

  14. 14.

    This section draws on work in progress with Corrado Sinigaglia and, separately, Natalie Sebanz and Lincoln Colling. But it is not endorsed by these researchers, who would probably have avoided the mistakes I will doubtless have made.

  15. 15.

    For reviews, see Jeannerod (2006), Rizzolatti and Sinigaglia (2008), Rizzolatti and Sinigaglia (2010). If motor representations occur in action observation, then observing actions might sometimes facilitate performing compatible actions and interfere with performing incompatible actions. Both effects do indeed occur, as several studies have shown (Brass et al. 2000; Craighero et al. 2002; Kilner et al. 2003; Costantini et al. 2012).

  16. 16.

    Note that this does not imply that others’ actions are ever represented as others’ actions motorically. It may be that some or all motor representations are agent-neutral in the sense that their contents do not specify any particular agent or agents (Ramsey and Hamilton 2010).

  17. 17.

    Two outcomes match in a particular context just if, in that context, either the occurrence of the first outcome would normally constitute or cause, at least partially, the occurrence of the second outcome or vice versa.

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Acknowledgements

Much of what follows has been shaped by objections and suggestions from readers of drafts and from audiences at talks, including Olle Blomberg, Michael Bratman, Gergely Csibra, Naomi Elian, Chris Frith, Mattia Gallotti, Eileen John, Guenther Knoblich, Guy Longworth, John Michael, Marlene Meyer, Catrin Misselhorn, Elisabeth Pacherie, Wolfgang Prinz, Johannes Roessler, Thomas Sattig, Hans Bernhard Schmid, Natalie Sebanz, Corrado Sinigaglia, Thomas Smith, Joel Smith, Matthew Soteriou, Anna Strasser, Cordula Vesper, Hong Yu Wong, and some peculiarly helpful anonymous referees.

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  1. Department of Philosophy, University of Warwick, Coventry, CV4 7AL, UK

    Stephen A. Butterfill

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  1. Institute of Philosophy, University of Stuttgart, Stuttgart, Germany

    Catrin Misselhorn

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Butterfill, S.A. (2015). Planning for Collective Agency. In: Misselhorn, C. (eds) Collective Agency and Cooperation in Natural and Artificial Systems. Philosophical Studies Series, vol 122. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-15515-9_8

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