Abstract

This chapter contains a detailed discussion of the counterfactual comparative account of harm, according to which an event harms a person provided that she would have been better off, on balance, if it had not occurred. It provides a general version of the account for overall, all-things-considered, harm, and it provides a version that accounts for harm at a time. It discusses how advocates of the counterfactual comparative account should think about pro tanto harm. It then considers objections to the general account and offers responses to some of them. (Subsequent chapters in the book focus on the more serious objections and issues that relate to them.) Finally, it considers several accounts of harm that compete with the counterfactual comparative account and discusses the most substantial challenges for the competing views.