Definition
A12: “An intention directed toward a joint or group-level course of action whose attribution depends on more than the observation that several participants produced a common outcome.” A claim says which of three:
- Participatory shared intention. The participants have suitably interrelated intentions and expectations about their parts in a joint activity.
- Institutionally constituted intention. An authorized decision procedure fixes an operative intention for a group or institution.
- Attributed collective intention. An observer reads coordinated behaviour as purposive at group level, without either of the above being established. A12: “The third is an attribution, not automatically a genuine instance of the first or second.” CLAIM-415 is the case in which the observer is a member who is organized by a judgement attributed to a collective that does not hold it.
Rival criteria for the first two, which A12 said “should be preserved rather than merged into a falsely consensual definition”, and which the record already holds, though A12 cited only Tuomela:
- Bratman’s interlocking intentions: LIT-471 and LIT-488, both Unavailable; his intrapersonal analogue is THEORY-076.
- Gilbert’s joint commitment: LIT-477, Unfetched.
- Tuomela’s we-intentions: LIT-476, Unavailable.
- List and Pettit’s corporate agency: LIT-391, Unavailable; List’s related papers (LIT-700, LIT-705) are read in THEORY-127.
What it is not
- Common behaviour, aggregated preference, conformity, a shared perspective or joint causal efficacy (A12). CLAIM-418 holds the perspective half; CLAIM-457 the efficacy half: a coalition able to realize an outcome need share no intention.
- Collective agency. An institution can form an operative intention by procedure (sense 2) without meeting an agency criterion (TERM-044, TERM-063), and the converse question is left to those terms.
- Responsibility. A12: “The ability of several institutions to produce a coordinated outcome does not entail that they possess one shared intention. Nor does the absence of such an intention entail that no institution bears responsibility” (CASE-175). CLAIM-332 is the record’s case of a loosely organized population changing an institution through separately motivated acts, with no collective intention.