Permissivism about the lesser evil

FRANCISCO GARCÍA GIBSON

Princeton

Seminario; Princeton University Politics Department Graduate Students Seminar; 2016

Princeton University

Are we always allowed to do the lesser evil? In this article I argue that we are. I defend this viewagainst arguments for (partially or fully) restricting our moral permission to do the lesser evil. In orderto have some concrete examples to motivate the discussion, consider the following two cases in whichgreat evil can be prevented by doing a comparatively lesser evil.