Does Having No Alternative Always Remove Responsibility?

“A person is morally responsible only if they could have done otherwise” is known as the Principle of Alternative Possibilities. It fits many ordinary judgements. If someone is physically shoved into an object and breaks it, we generally do not blame them as we would a person who deliberately caused the damage.

In 1969, Harry Frankfurt introduced a family of thought experiments challenging that principle. Suppose Jones decides on his own to vote for an unjust proposal. Black is secretly monitoring him and would manipulate his decision if he began to oppose it, ensuring a yes vote. Jones never wavers, so Black never intervenes. Jones could not in fact have voted no, yet his vote arose entirely from his own reasons. Frankfurt argued that responsibility may therefore not require a genuine alternative.

Critics reply that Black normally needs some prior sign to know when to intervene. Jones might at least have been able to display a different intention, leaving a small alternative in place. Whether Frankfurt cases remove every relevant possibility remains contested.

My judgement is that “I could not have done otherwise” is important evidence, but not an automatic exemption. Coercion reduces responsibility not merely because an exit is blocked, but because an outside force takes over the formation of the action. If a backup device never intervenes and the action still issues from the person's own judgement, responsibility should depend on how the action actually arose and whether it responded to reasons—not simply on the number of paths that were open.

https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/alternative-possibilities/
https://doi.org/10.2307/2023833