Can we blame them? An examination of the moral responsibility of current and former child soldiers.

前圣主抵抗军领导人多米尼克·翁格文目前正因包括绑架和训练儿童兵在内的反人类罪受审。他的辩护律师声称，由于翁文曾是一名儿童兵，他不应为此负责。我的项目评估这种辩护是否合理——童年经历在多大程度上破坏了道德责任？为了做到这一点，我的项目结合了哲学和心理学研究来评估儿童兵的道德责任，特别关注创伤和冲突如何影响道德发展。目前的法律讨论采用的观点是，儿童兵的道德责任已完全减轻- -他们是受害者而不是犯罪者（联合国，2000年）。我的项目认为，这些概念不一定是相互排斥的。儿童兵可以具有双重受害者-加害者的性质，因为有理由将一定程度的道德责任归于他们。为了支持这一点，我提出了不同于目前在哲学和法律中占主导地位的道德责任条件。虽然儿童兵是许多减少责任条件的受害者，例如强迫和创伤，但这并不意味着他们的道德责任完全消失。我认为，在某些条件下，行为主体当前认可其先前行为（包括道德上令人发指的行为）的事实可以建立一定程度的道德责任，即使这些行为不是在自由条件下进行的。有了这种道德责任的解释，我的项目发展了一种恢复性的方法，允许前儿童兵接受这种责任，并重新融入他们的社区。我对这个项目有充分的准备。我目前正在攻读哲学硕士学位，主题是人道主义干预的伦理，并凭借本科第一年级的成绩获得了校友奖学金。我也是AHRC美容需求项目的研究助理，这给了我进行大规模的，经验丰富的伦理研究的经验。伯明翰大学哲学系是我项目的理想基地，因为它是世界领先的应用伦理学和经验主义心理学哲学中心（也是全球伦理学研究中心和新成立的哲学、心理学和精神病学中心的所在地）。伯明翰城市大学法学院的Ozlem Ulgen博士在发展我的项目的实际意义方面也将是非常宝贵的，因为她在国际法和道德方面的专业知识。

Dominic Ongwen, a former Lord's Resistance Army leader, is currently on trial for crimes against humanity including the abduction and training of child soldiers. His defence claim that because Ongwen is a former child soldier he cannot be held responsible. My project evaluates whether this defence is plausible - to what extent do childhood experiences undermine moral responsibility?To do this, my project combines philosophical and psychological research to assess the moral responsibility of child soldiers, with particular focus on how trauma and conflict exposure affects moral development. Current legal discussions adopt a view of the moral responsibility of child soldiers as wholly diminished - they are victims not perpetrators (United Nations, 2000). My project argues that these concepts need not be mutually exclusive. Child soldiers can possess a dual victim-perpetrator nature because there are grounds for attributing a degree of moral responsibility to them. To support this, I propose different conditions for moral responsibility than those currently dominant in philosophy and law.Though child soldiers are victims of many responsibility-diminishing conditions, such as coercion and trauma, it does not follow that their moral responsibility is completely extinguished. I argue that under certain conditions, the fact that an agent currently endorses their prior actions (including morally heinous actions) can establish a degree of moral responsibility, even if the actions were not carried out under conditions of freedom. With this account of moral responsibility in place, my project develops a restorative approach, which allows former child soldiers to accept this responsibility and be rehabilitated back into their communities.I am well equipped for this project. I am currently completing an MRes in Philosophy on the ethics of humanitarian intervention, for which I was awarded an Alumni Scholarship on the strength of my first class undergraduate degree. I am also a research assistant for the AHRC Beauty Demands Project, which has given me experience of conducting large-scale, empirically-informed ethical research. The Philosophy Department at the University of Birmingham is an ideal base for my project, as it is a world-leading centre for both applied ethics and empirically-informed philosophy of psychology (and home to the Centre for the Study of Global Ethics and the newly-created Centre for Philosophy, Psychology, andPsychiatry). Dr Ozlem Ulgen at Birmingham City University's School of Law will also be invaluable in developing the practical implications of my project because of her expertise in international law and ethics.