DLA*: Collective Agents

Abstract

Not only individuals can be said to perform actions with certain results: the same can be said about collectives. In fact, groups of people sometimes do, can do or may do things which the individuals on their own do not, cannot or may not do. It makes perfect sense to say that one soccer team beats another team and, at the same time, hold that none of the players has on his or her own defeated the other team. To give another example, the parliament of a country can see to it that a law is enacted even though none of the individual members of parliament can. Similarly, to say that a group of citizens has permission to do something does not imply that any of the members of the group may, on his or her own, do so. Thus, the necessary consequences of the actual, the possible or the permissible actions of a collective (e.g. a soccer team, a parliament, a group of citizens) may well differ from the consequences of the actions (actual, possible or permissible) taken by the individuals constituting the collective.