There is nothing illegal about asking someone for money, nor is it illegal to report someone's theft. But if, for example, you threaten to expose someone's crime unless she pays you money, you are guilty of blackmail. Why?
This case has the superficial appearance of a paradox, but although some philosophical and legal writers have labelled it The Paradox of Blackmail , it doesn't really merit the name. Even if blackmail were nothing but a simple combination of a threat and demand, it wouldn't give rise to a genuine paradox.
This is easy to see if you consider some parallel cases. It is not illegal itself to be drunk, nor is it illegal to drive a car, but it is illegal to be drunk while driving. It is not illegal for two adults to have consensual sex, nor is it illegal for them to be seen together in a crowded public park, but it is illegal for them to have sex in a crowded public park.
However, blackmail is not merely any combination of a threat and a demand: the threat and a demand must be related in a particular way. Blackmail is a demand backed by a threat. The threat is made in order to make sure that the demand is met.
If the threat is made for some other reason, then it is not a case of blackmail, as the following example makes clear. Suppose Arthur notices his friend Barbara shoplifting. He is short of money and so approaches her and asks for some cash. He then tells her he is going to report her. Barbara thinks she is being blackmailed , and if she gives him money he will keep quiet. But Arthur will report her even if she pays up, and he tells her this and means it.
In this example Arthur certainly isn't blackmailing Barbara, despite the fact he is making a threat and is asking for money.
Blackmail arises only when a demand is actually backed by a threat. As she knows he is going to carry out the threat whatever happens, Barbara is under no pressure to give him money. Once you recognise that blackmail is not simply a threat plus a demand, then the alleged paradox of blackmail dissolves.
But does it matter whether there is a paradox of blackmail ? Yes it does, because if there was a genuine paradox, then there would be no satisfactory way of justifying a law against blackmail while avoiding the paradox. If one or more of the component acts involved in blackmail were itself illegal or ought to be, then it might seem that this would provide grounds for making blackmail illegal. The alleged paradox would obviously be avoided in such circumstances. For example, a blackmailer who threatens violence commits the separate offence of threatening violence, which is a crime whether or not the threat is made within the context of blackmail. But as this example makes clear, if the wrong involved in the threat themselves were the only wrong involved, then there would be no reason for the law to treat them separately as blackmail. Yet in cases like this the element of blackmail exacerbates the offence, so that there is more to the wrong than the threat of violence.
Where criminals are blackmailed, you might try to identify a further component of the blackmail in virtue of which it should be a crime. For example in English law it is an offence to accept, or agree to accept, money for not disclosing information that might be of material help in enabling a prosecution ( except when the money is reasonable compensation for loss caused by the offence). However the reason why the blackmailer implies that he will take money for his silence is that he threatens to report the crime unless the victim pays up. The implication arises only because the demand is backed up by a threat and does not simply accompany it. It is difficult to see how there could be such an implication if the paradox were genuine and blackmail were simply a combination of unrelated components. But set that complication aside, the proposal would still not cover blackmail adequately, since you are guilty of blackmail as soon as you make a blackmail threat. A victim who neither pays up nor offers to do so has still been blackmailed. And, if the criminality of the extra component were enough to make blackmail of criminals an offence, there would be once again be no need of a separate crime of blackmail in these cases.
In short until you recognise that the alleged paradox of blackmail is really no paradox, you are not going to be able to give satisfactory reasons for making blackmail illegal.
Essay by Michael Clark in A TO Z OF PARADOXES .
This case has the superficial appearance of a paradox, but although some philosophical and legal writers have labelled it The Paradox of Blackmail , it doesn't really merit the name. Even if blackmail were nothing but a simple combination of a threat and demand, it wouldn't give rise to a genuine paradox.
This is easy to see if you consider some parallel cases. It is not illegal itself to be drunk, nor is it illegal to drive a car, but it is illegal to be drunk while driving. It is not illegal for two adults to have consensual sex, nor is it illegal for them to be seen together in a crowded public park, but it is illegal for them to have sex in a crowded public park.
However, blackmail is not merely any combination of a threat and a demand: the threat and a demand must be related in a particular way. Blackmail is a demand backed by a threat. The threat is made in order to make sure that the demand is met.
If the threat is made for some other reason, then it is not a case of blackmail, as the following example makes clear. Suppose Arthur notices his friend Barbara shoplifting. He is short of money and so approaches her and asks for some cash. He then tells her he is going to report her. Barbara thinks she is being blackmailed , and if she gives him money he will keep quiet. But Arthur will report her even if she pays up, and he tells her this and means it.
In this example Arthur certainly isn't blackmailing Barbara, despite the fact he is making a threat and is asking for money.
Blackmail arises only when a demand is actually backed by a threat. As she knows he is going to carry out the threat whatever happens, Barbara is under no pressure to give him money. Once you recognise that blackmail is not simply a threat plus a demand, then the alleged paradox of blackmail dissolves.
But does it matter whether there is a paradox of blackmail ? Yes it does, because if there was a genuine paradox, then there would be no satisfactory way of justifying a law against blackmail while avoiding the paradox. If one or more of the component acts involved in blackmail were itself illegal or ought to be, then it might seem that this would provide grounds for making blackmail illegal. The alleged paradox would obviously be avoided in such circumstances. For example, a blackmailer who threatens violence commits the separate offence of threatening violence, which is a crime whether or not the threat is made within the context of blackmail. But as this example makes clear, if the wrong involved in the threat themselves were the only wrong involved, then there would be no reason for the law to treat them separately as blackmail. Yet in cases like this the element of blackmail exacerbates the offence, so that there is more to the wrong than the threat of violence.
Where criminals are blackmailed, you might try to identify a further component of the blackmail in virtue of which it should be a crime. For example in English law it is an offence to accept, or agree to accept, money for not disclosing information that might be of material help in enabling a prosecution ( except when the money is reasonable compensation for loss caused by the offence). However the reason why the blackmailer implies that he will take money for his silence is that he threatens to report the crime unless the victim pays up. The implication arises only because the demand is backed up by a threat and does not simply accompany it. It is difficult to see how there could be such an implication if the paradox were genuine and blackmail were simply a combination of unrelated components. But set that complication aside, the proposal would still not cover blackmail adequately, since you are guilty of blackmail as soon as you make a blackmail threat. A victim who neither pays up nor offers to do so has still been blackmailed. And, if the criminality of the extra component were enough to make blackmail of criminals an offence, there would be once again be no need of a separate crime of blackmail in these cases.
In short until you recognise that the alleged paradox of blackmail is really no paradox, you are not going to be able to give satisfactory reasons for making blackmail illegal.
Essay by Michael Clark in A TO Z OF PARADOXES .
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