Glossary entry

Correction Obligation

Glossary entry in Governance & power. Definitions, checks, and evidence for Correction Obligation.

Quick takeaways

The duty an institution takes on when it delegates consequential action: to notice, stop, reverse, and repair what the delegate does.

Definition

The duty an institution takes on when it delegates consequential action: to notice, stop, reverse, and repair what the delegate does. The obligation is created by the delegation itself, not by the first incident.

It matters because delegating action also delegates the ability to be wrong at scale. Stating the obligation alongside the authority grant is what makes a shortfall in correction capacity visible before it is needed rather than during an incident.

AgencyStructural

Scale: Organizational · Phases: Design, Repair · Measurability: Semi-quantitative · Maturity: Core concept

Scope
H. Governance & power. Structures that determine who sets moral boundaries and who can intervene.
Genealogy
States Law IV as an object attached to the grant, so correction is authorized at the same moment as action.

Adjacent terms

Correction Capacity Authority Grant Obligation Continuity Restitution Ladder

Related concepts

Also tagged: Agency

Delegated Agency Consequential Decision Justified Delegation Stoppability Reversibility Fair Burden Distribution

Also tagged: Structural

Ethotechnics Moral Behavior (of Systems) Ethical Load Path Ethotechnic Audit Conviviality Ethotechnic Maturity

References

Copy citation (APA/BibTeX)

Cite this glossary entry Formats: APA, MLA, Chicago, BibTeX, RIS

Version

v1.4.0

Last updated

Sep 18, 2026

DOI

Pending Zenodo deposit

APA

Ethotechnics Institute Research Team. (2026). Correction Obligation. Ethotechnics glossary. https://ethotechnics.org/glossary/correction-obligation

MLA

Ethotechnics Institute Research Team. "Correction Obligation." Ethotechnics glossary, 2026, https://ethotechnics.org/glossary/correction-obligation.

Chicago

Ethotechnics Institute Research Team. "Correction Obligation." Ethotechnics glossary. Sep 18, 2026. https://ethotechnics.org/glossary/correction-obligation.

BibTeX

@misc{glossary_correction-obligation,
  title={Correction Obligation},
  author={Ethotechnics Institute Research Team},
  year={2026},
  howpublished={Ethotechnics glossary},
  url={https://ethotechnics.org/glossary/correction-obligation},
  version={v1.4.0}
}

RIS

TY  - WEB
TI  - Correction Obligation
AU  - Ethotechnics Institute Research Team
PY  - 2026
UR  - https://ethotechnics.org/glossary/correction-obligation
ER  -

Scholarly metadata

Authorship

Contact: research@ethotechnics.org

Publication details

  • Published: Dec 3, 2025
  • Last updated: Sep 18, 2026
  • Version: v1.4.0
  • DOI: Pending Zenodo deposit

License: CC BY-SA 4.0

Credit Ethotechnics Institute, include the term title + version, and link to the glossary permalink.

Archive: Wayback Machine history

Changelog

  • v1.7.0 · 2026-09-18 — Added Non-Finality, Consequential Contradiction, and The Excluded Case, and generalized the falsified denominator into the falsified ledger — completing the five concerns and the fallibilist ground they stand on.
  • v1.6.0 · 2026-09-18 — Added Human Non-Substitutability, Safe Incompleteness, Anti-Conversion Rights, Abstention, Constitutional Debt, Discretion Migration, and Corrigibility Rent — the person-side principles, the three abstentions, and the rent concept.
  • v1.5.0 · 2026-09-18 — Added Exception Absorption, Exception Learning, Case Corrigibility, Structural Corrigibility, Institutional Learning, Corrective Debt, and the Workaround Presumption, formalizing the historical turn: reading institutions through their failure trajectories rather than their stated controls.
  • v1.4.0 · 2026-09-18 — Added Residual Complexity, Complexity Displacement, Falsified Denominator, Closure Without Remainder, Constitutional Governance, and Post-Optimization Rigor, embedding the foundational contention of burden redistribution.
  • v1.3.0 · 2026-09-11 — Added Attestation, Liability Record, Carve-Out, Delegation Chain, Composed Latency, and Silent-Harm Discovery, each bound to the standard clause that requires it.
  • v1.2.0 · 2026-09-08 — Added The Non-Conversion Principle, Exit Cost, and Jurisdictional Path Dependence, each linked to the theory essay that argues for it.
  • v1.1.0 · 2026-01-09 — Expanded scholarly metadata, operational tests, and provenance notes.
  • v1.0.0 · 2025-12-03 — Initial glossary release with stable permalinks.