LSAT 152 | Section 2 | Logical Reasoning: Q4

LR Question 4 Explanation

QUESTION TEXT: In view of the considerable length of the police chief’s…

QUESTION TYPE: Principle – Justify

CONCLUSION: We should hold the chief responsible for the corruption at his department, even if he wasn’t personally involved.

REASONING: The chief was head of the department for a long time.

ANALYSIS: You may have thought this argument already sounded reasonable. If that happens, pause and see if you can spot the unconscious assumption the argument made you make. You know the argument is flawed, so there has to be one.

Here, the author is using a “the buck stops here” principle. The idea that the person in charge is broadly responsible for what happens on their watch. If this is true, then the chief should have done something to notice and stop the corruption.

Most of the wrong answers talk about the chief’s knowledge. You should instead be looking for something which shows accountability directly. Proving the chief knew about corruption doesn’t show they should be held accountable: they’re two separate things. Someone can know about something but not necessarily be accountable. Also, we can’t assume the chief knew.

___________

1. This is close, but not quite. We don’t know if the chief tolerated the corruption. They may have been oblivious and not even realized that there was corruption.
2. This also sounds tempting, but there are two problems with it. 1. We don’t know that all of the subordinates are corrupt. There are few organizations with 100% corruption! 2. This answer only tells us when to assume a chief knows about corruption. It doesn’t say when to hold them accountable, which is what we’re trying to prove.
3. I stopped reading this when it said “should not be held accountable….unless”. That form shows the answer will present a necessary condition for accountability. We need a sufficient condition. Knowing which type of condition to look for is crucial on principle questions.
    
   Even if this answer was about a sufficient condition though, it would still be wrong. It talks about when a chief knows about corruption. But we don’t know whether the chief knew. Instead, we need to show that a chief is accountable for corruption even if they didn’t know about it.
4. This is talking about a different situation! This answer tells us what to do when a chief has been in charge for a short time. But in the stimulus, the chief has been in charge for a long time.
5. CORRECT. This works. The chief has been in charge for a long time. So according to this answer they have no excuse, and are responsible for the corruption.

Recap: The question begins with “In view of the considerable length of the police chief’s”. It is a Principle Justify question. Learn more about LSAT Principle Justify questions in our guide to LSAT Logical Reasoning question types.