This week on Ask a Teacher, we answer a question from Saeed in Iran about words that can express the idea of duty.
Here is Saeed’s question:
Dear teacher,
What is the difference between accountability, responsibility, and liability?
Especially from the point of view of law.
Sincerely, Saeed
I’m happy to answer this question, Saeed.
All three of the words you ask about express the idea of duty. A duty is what a person must do because it is right and just.
Let’s begin with the noun “responsibility.” It is the most common word of the three, and we use it in everyday speech. However, when we talk about responsibility in legal terms, we are more likely to use the noun “duty.”
We often refer to a task when we use the word “responsibility” or its adjective form, “responsible.” The following examples show this:
When we want to say that only one person or subject is responsible for something, we can use the adjective “sole,” spelled s-o-l-e, or the adverb “solely,” as in these examples:
To express the idea that someone should agree to having a duty, we can use the expression “take responsibility for,” as in the following example:
We usually use the noun “accountability” to refer to possible penalties or bad results people may face if they do not do their duty. To do this, we use the verb “hold” before the adjective “accountable,” as in this example:
We often use the noun “accountability” when discussing organizations. For example, if a business has a “system of accountability,” that means the company’s leaders and workers likely face a penalty if they do not carry out their duties.
“Liability” is the most specific term of the three nouns. If someone or some group has legal liability, that means they have a duty that can be judged in a court of law. We use the adjective form, “liable,” to say that a person or group can face legal penalties because they were not as careful as they should have been. The following example shows this usage:
Notice that we use the verb “hold” before the adjective “liable,” just like we do before the adjective “accountable.”
There is also a common use of the noun “liability” in everyday speech that is not linked to legal issues. We can say that something or someone is “a liability” if they make bad results more likely. The following example shows this usage:
For our readers and listeners, what are your questions about American English? We want to hear from you! Send us an email at learningenglish@voanews.com. And please let us know where you are from, too.
And that’s Ask a Teacher.
I’m Andrew Smith.
Andrew Smith wrote this lesson for VOA Learning English.
task –n. a piece of work or a job that needs to be done
penalty –n. anything that has the effect of punishing a person or group for what they have or have not done