Do Good Intentions Make an Action Right?

“I meant well” is often offered as a defence, but a good intention does not automatically make an action right. Someone may sincerely want to help a friend and disclose the friend's private circumstances without permission. The motive can be benevolent while the action still violates privacy.

Philosophy of action commonly distinguishes why someone acted from what reasons there were for acting. The first concerns motivating reasons — what actually moved the person. The second concerns normative reasons — considerations that genuinely count in favour of the action. They can coincide, but they need not. A person may act kindly because they believe something will help, while that belief is mistaken or important countervailing reasons have been ignored.

Intention is not irrelevant. We normally judge deliberate harm, reckless harm and accidental harm under reasonable care differently, even when the outcome is similar. My view is that intention mainly tells us what the agent was trying to do. Whether the action was justified also depends on the reasons, the means used, foreseeable consequences and the rights of others. Good intentions matter, but they are not a moral exemption.

Sources:
https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/reasons-just-vs-expl/
https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/intention/