There's no I in team: Judicial review and community moral agents

In Law's Empire, Dworkin suggests that some groups of people have the potential to be ‘deeply personified’. This chapter takes up Dworkin's intuition, defends it and makes an argument for its expanded relevance. I contend that it is meaningful to talk about collective agency and that our understanding of group activities would be incomplete if we were to give up the notion of collective agency. What's more, I advance the idea that a nation's citizenry, through a form of what I call a sincere artificial agency, forms a collective moral agent. The sincerity involved is a commitment by all citizens to political and moral ideals which are best manifested in a charter. These ideals forge a bond among the citizens because, beyond any differences, they can all identify with the need to strive for fairness and justice. Further, I argue that enshrining a charter or bill of rights will make a community a better moral agent.