Failures of Imagination: Stuck and Out of Luck in the American Metropolis

Abstract

Ethical choice and action in the built environment are complicated by the fact that moral agents often get stuck as they pursue their goals. A common way of getting stuck has its roots in human cognition: the failure of moral imagination, which shows most clearly when moral agents stand on either side of a sharp cultural divide, like the traditional divide between city and suburb. Being stuck is akin to bad moral luck: it is a situation beyond the control of the moral agent for which that agent might nevertheless be held responsible.

Acknowledgments

The author thanks his colleagues Jason Borenstein, Michael Hoffmann, Jon Johnston and Bryan Norton for their comments on the first version of this paper. A subsequent version was presented at a joint meeting of the International Society for Environmental Ethics and the International Association for Environmental Philosophy in May 2006; the author thanks all those present at that meeting for a challenging and lively discussion. The critical response of an anonymous referee was especially helpful in producing this final version.