Striking and the Means Principle

Some strikes seem insufficiently discriminating. Rather than being aimed exclusively at potentially “legitimate” targets (e.g., employers who, by refusing to pay a fair wage or provide acceptable working conditions, might have made themselves liable to bear certain costs), these strikes are (also) aimed at individuals who do not seem to be liable. Most problematically, such strikes invite the charge that they harm the innocent opportunistically or exploitatively. (Call this the third party (exploitation) objection.) In other words, those who strike face the charge that they are harmfully using the innocent as a means to further their own ends, thereby violating a central and enduring principle of deontological ethics, namely, the means principle. This paper aims to set out the best case that can be made for the third party (exploitation) objection.