Abstract

In the grand debate between the paternalist and the libertarian, VanDeVeer sides decidedly with the libertarian. Paternalistic intervention he regards as presumptively wrong, and so the question becomes whether there are countervailing, morally relevant considerations by which paternalistic intervention can be justified. In shifting the burden of justification to the paternalist, VanDeVeer is not being innovative. H. L. A. Hart broke that ground in his Law, Liberty, and Morality in 1963, and Ronald Dworkin used the technique effectively in his 1966 Yale Law Journal essay "Lord Devlin and the Enforcement of Morals." VanDeVeer's contribution, however, is in the explanation he gives for laying the burden of justification on those who would defend paternalistic intervention. Whereas Hart's explanation spoke at the societal or governmental level, VanDeVeer's speaks at the level of the individual person. He rests his argument on the essence of the libertarian position: a principle of overarching individual human autonomy. Consistent with his individualistic focus, he avoids restricting his definitions of paternalistic intervention to activities at the societal or governmental level. VanDeVeer insists that there are moral bounds to paternalistic intervention on the part of private individuals, and it is, perhaps, both the strength and the weakness of the book that he by and large joins conceptually paternalistic intervention by the government and paternalistic intervention by private individuals.