22 23 Against the disengagement of responsibility What happens when one confronts the rubber wall of irresponsibility? In the novel Michael Kohlhaas, the Romantic writer Heinrich von Kleist tells the story of a horse merchant who suffers the effects of systemic injustice under the feudal regime and sparks a revolt against the established order. His journey leads him to confront everhigher levels of power: first, the region's courts subservient to aristocratic rule, then the equally corrupt governor, all up to the Elector of Saxony and the Emperor of the Holy Roman Empire. Kohlhaas wreaks destruction in his wake: this is what happens when responsibility fades away. Systemic deresponsibilisation – that is, widespread buck-passing – makes the system unresponsive, paralyses innovation, and fosters corresponding over-caution. But the crisis of responsibility isn’t merely a functional issue of inefficiency. The deeper issue in a society where no one is responsible for anything is that any possibility of justice – and more profoundly, of meaning – is lost. Perhaps we are all indeed determined, at a subatomic level, in our behaviours, and it is pointless to attempt to counter our spontaneous inclinations, the forces of nature, or the laws of the market. But in this case, deprived of free will, the only role left for us is to be small cogs in a vast machine heading towards an unknown direction. Many little Eichmanns. Perhaps behind every leader, there is another leader, and at the top of the pyramid, there is no great leader, as Fantozzi suspected: no one will listen to our complaints, no one will solve our problems. But if the function is absent, we will hardly be able to renounce the fiction. And this is why, sometimes, we must take responsibility, even when we are not responsible. It is not my fault, I was confused, They coerced me, They misconstrued me, I am a victim of circumstances: often, this is indeed the case. And surely there’s no single culprit when facing crises, pollution, or criminality. Often we err in good faith, or because we’ve been deceived. Yet, in personal relationships as in politics, sometimes the only thing needed – much like Batman at the end of The Dark Knight by Christopher Nolan – is someone who to take on that bejewelled responsibility. If we are willing to solve the countless crises affecting human life on planet Earth, starting with the climate one, we must take the Imperative of Responsibility seriously. As Hans Jonas argued, we can no longer afford to say «It is not my fault» when we do consume resources, pollute, or sustain unsustainable systems, because our actions have uncontrollable and long-lasting systemic repercussions. It’s about taking on responsibility, even when it cannot be clearly assigned. In a world where power is diffuse and anonymous, where often no one is directly responsible but everyone is involved, the true act of courage is not finding a culprit, but becoming aware of our role and acting nonetheless, for the sake of those who will come after us. We will be truly responsible, only when we can say: «I did everything I could to prevent this from happening».
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