Causality and Causation in DOLCE

We present a general conceptualization of causal relations that pivots on the distinction between causality, a law-like relation between types of events, and causation, the actual causal relation that holds between individual events. This distinction finds its formal characterization and embedding within DOLCE, in terms of a number of dependences between (types of) quality changes. Finally an application of the presented theory to the classical example of "the broken window" is provided.