The Elements of a Categorical Apology

I Was Wrong considers a wide variety of apologetic meanings and warns against thinking of apologies in binary “all or nothing” terms. The following benchmarks guide my standards for categorical apologies and serve as touchstones for our thinking about apologies in law. Categorical apologies, which I understand as a regulative ideal for acts of contrition, address the following concerns:

1. Corroborated Factual Record: A categorical apology will corroborate a detailed factual record of the events salient to the injury, reaching agreement among the victim, offender, and sometimes the community regarding what transpired. The parties will also agree regarding what amounts to such salient events, leading them to share an understanding of the relevant aspects of the context in which the injury occurs. Rather than providing general and vague descriptions of the events (“I acted badly”), the record will render transparent all facts material to judging the transgressions. Such a record will often include honest accounts of the mental states of the apologizer at the time of the offense when such information would prove relevant, for example by describing the offender's intentions when committing the transgression.

2. Acceptance of Blame: In accordance with prevailing notions of proximate causation, the offender accepts causal moral responsibility and blame for the harm at issue. We can distinguish this from expressing sympathy for the injury or describing the injury as accidental or unintentional. We can maintain a binocular view of wrongdoing that attributes individual blame while appreciating environmental and structural contributors to wrongdoing such as systemic inequality.

3. Possession of Appropriate Standing: The categorical apologizer will possess the requisite standing to accept blame for the wrongdoing. The offender can and does accept proximate responsibility for the harm and she – rather than a proxy or other third party – undertakes the work of apologizing described herein.

4. Identification of Each Harm: The offender will identify each harm, taking care not to conflate several harms into one general harm or to apologize for only a lesser offense or the “wrong wrong.”

5. Identification of the Moral Principles Underlying Each Harm: The offender will identify the moral principles underlying these harms with an appropriate degree of specificity, thus making explicit the values at stake in the interaction.

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