Most theorists agree that once something is in the past, you are either responsible for it or not. Enoch (2012) and Mason (2019) argue, however, that you can make yourself responsible in some cases, that is, become responsible for past action by taking responsibility now. Both contend to capture important data points in our everyday practices. Call any such view Responsibility Expansionism (RE). This paper examines whether RE is tenable, argues that both views are unsatisfactory, and offers a novel way to defend RE.

I first clarify RE and place it within the literature on responsibility. Second, I discuss Enoch’s normative power account and Mason’s emotional engagement account and argue that both are unsuccessful, raising three problems for each. I carve out their common problematic denominator to provide an alternative. Third, I defend RE by amending the pluralist view, an account of taking responsibility for wrongdoing. I show how it does all the explanatory work the other accounts aim to do, and that it allows for RE by locating the expansion at a change in operative norms the agent subsumes under instead of in specific self-conceptions. Thus, we can indeed become responsible by taking responsibility, although not quite so mysteriously.