It is common for philosophers and legal theorists to bemoan the proliferation of the language of rights in popular discourse.1 In a wide range of contemporary public political and ethical debates, disputants are quick to appeal to the existence of rights that support their position – the ‘human rights’ of innocent victims of war, animals’ noninterference rights, individuals’ and businesses’ rights to economic freedom. It is often maintained, with some plausibility, that these public disputes involve (...) hasty and undefended reliance on assumptions that certain specific rights exist, and that such profligacy with the language of rights does little to clarify and enhance public debate. By contrast, the two prominent theoretical analyses of the concept ‘a right’ – the Will Theory and the Interest Theory – are both revisionary theories which, if widely adopted, would require people to revise their usage of the term ‘a right’. The Will Theory is an explicitly revisionary theory, according to which rights can be held only by beings capable of waiving their rights (and hence rights cannot be held by animals or young children).2 I shall argue that traditional versions of the Interest Theory would also require revisions of popular usage of the term ‘a right’ (by implying that certain property rights and promissory rights cannot genuinely qualify as rights). Such revisionary analyses of the concept ‘a right’ might be applauded for aiming to enhance the conceptual clarity of public debate. However, my stance in this paper is avowedly non-revisionary. My aims are to seek an analysis of the concept ‘a right’ that accords with the multifarious ways in which this term is used in everyday ethical and political debates, and to argue that philosophers and legal theorists would benefit from adopting such a non-revisionary approach. (shrink)

The Great Recession has brought with it a renewed interest in Hayek's business-cycle theory, which holds that loose monetary policy generates an unsustainable boom characterized by a lengthening of the capital structure. Hayek's theory has received robust criticism for decades, although the criticisms have varied in quality. Various empirical disconfirmations pose the most serious challenge. The small empirical literature on the subject generally confirms Hayek's predictions about variations in the capital structure, but has not persuasively linked the (...) capital structure to the business cycle. A better option, then, may be to abandon Hayek's business-cycle theory, preserve his capital theory, and graft it onto a Keynesian or monetarist understanding of the business cycle that is more consistent with modern macroeconomics. (shrink)

Despite being a seemingly straightforward moral concept (that all humans have certain rights by virtue of their humanity), human rights is a contested concept in theory and practice. Theorists debate (among other things) the meaning of “rights,” the priority of rights, whether collective rights are universal, the foundations of rights, and whether there are universal human rights at all. These debates are of relatively greater interest to theorists; however, a given meaning (...) of “human rights” implies a corresponding theory of change and through that can be an important guide to the practice of human rights activists and their funders. In practice, any organization can describe their work as “rights based.” This article clarifies the practices of human rights activists and their funders that are consistent with a theory of human rights as (1) universal, (2) interdependent across groups and categories of people, (3) indivisible across issue areas and claims, and (4) measured by the enjoyment of rights. (shrink)

In this volume, F.M. Kamm explores how theories as well as hypothetical and practical cases help us understand rights and their limits. The book begins by considering moral status and its relation to having rights (including whether non-human animals have rights and what rights future persons have). The author then considers whether rights are grounded in duties to oneself, which duties are correlative to rights, and whether neuroscientific and psychological studies can help determine what (...) rights we have. Kamm next investigates the contours of the right not to be harmed by considering critiques of deontological distinctions, the costs that must be undertaken to avoid harming, and a proposal for permissibly harming someone (that allows for resisting the harm) in the Trolley Problem. Additional chapters cover possible implications of the Trolley Problem for such practical issues as correctly programming self-driving cars, providing medical treatments, and enacting redistributive economic policy. Kamm concludes the book by comparing the use of case-based judgments about extreme cases in moral versus aesthetic theory, and by exploring the significance of the right not to be harmed for morally correct policies in the extreme cases of torture and a pandemic. Where pertinent, Kamm considers the views of Derek Parfit, Tom Regan, Christine Korsgaard, Shelly Kagan, Ronald Dworkin, Amartya Sen, Allan Gibbard, Joshua Greene, Arthur Danto, and Judith Thomson, among others."--Provided by publisher. (shrink)

The chapter's concern is meta‐theoretical and pertains to the nature of human rights theory. Interestingly, most human rights theorists do not spend much time stating what their theory is a theory of, and hence what kind of theory it should be. The chapter argues in favour of taking the legal dimension of human rights more seriously and, more specifically, for a legal theory of human rights. Making human rights law the (...) object of human rights theory has two advantages: one substantive and the other methodological. First of all, it makes for a deeper understanding of the nature of human rights as a practice, and hence of many questions in human rights theory. A second benefit lies in the resources of legal theorizing, and in particular the latter's experience in explaining and evaluating normative practises. A related contribution of the proposed legal human rights theory is that it can bridge the gap that has grown within existing human rights theories between human rights practice and human rights standards, and so‐doing reconcile so‐called “political” and “ethical” human rights theories out of their sterile opposition. (shrink)

While there may be several practical concerns regarding the practice of corporate lobbying of government officials, there is the more basic question of a corporation’s moral right to do so. I argue that group agents such as corporations have no moral rights, and thereby cannot have the right to lobby. There may be a basis for some legal rights for corporations, but I argue that lobbying cannot be one of the legal rights, even by reference to the (...) rights of the individuals that make up the corporation. I end the paper by a discussion of how this argument applies to all private organizations, including public interest organizations. (shrink)

Hayek's philosophy of law has Kantian features, but he offers indirect utilitarian arguments for them. Hayek's argument might be strengthened by considering that the utilitarian has an interest in issues of truth and falsity and thus in the individual as the bearer of critical judgments. Individuals might thus be accorded?dialogue rights?; upon a episte?mological basis, an idea which is further strengthened by the consideration that dialogue may be extended to the appraisal of the validity of utilitarianism. Moreover, such (...) dialogue rights should be interpreted in large part as property rights. (shrink)

Leif Wenar’s kind-desire theory states that an individual holds a claim-right against an agent only because she has reason to desire, as a member of a particular social or natural kind, that the agent fulfil his duty. He argues that the kind-desire theory is superior to the interest theory of claim-rights, which states that an individual holds a claim-right against an agent only because his duty is in some manner beneficial to her. I compare the (...) merits of the kind-desire theory and a justificatory interest theory, and argue that the kind-desire theory does not satisfy two conditions for a satisfactory analysis of claim-rights as well as this justificatory interest theory. (shrink)

This review article discusses the conception of collective rights necessary to ground contemporary entrenchments of minority educational rights, Indigenous rights and collective bargaining rights, as discussed in Miodrag Jovanović’s book, Collective Rights: A Legal Theory. Jovanović argues for a role for value collectivism in elucidating a rationale for the entrenchment of rights held by what he conceives of as pre-legally existing groups with interests not reducible to those of their individual members. This approach (...) can offer an explanation for the entrenchment of minority educational rights and Indigenous rights. The article extols Jovanović’s attempt to grapple with an explanation for rights not explained within standard liberal theory, even in Will Kymlicka’s attempt to justify minority rights within liberalism. The review also critiques the argument offered by Jovanović. First, the review argues that a full-fledged adoption of value collectivism is not necessary to provide a justification for irreducibly collective rights and that the unnecessary adoption of such a theoretical construct may, in practical terms, work counter to the ongoing entrenchment of the rights it seeks to justify, thus becoming what it will categorize as a ‘self-threatening theory’. Second, the review argues that Jovanović’s stark division of rights held by pre-legally existing groups and legally constituted collective entities undermines his account’s ability to explain collective bargaining rights of trade unions that are entrenched in some jurisdictions. (shrink)

Many liberals cannot help distrusting deliberative democracy theory. In their view, the theory offers no sufficient guarantee that the outcomes of democratic deliberation will be respectful of individual interests generating what they conceive as basic moral rights. The purpose of this text is to provide one argument showing that liberal rights are sufficiently protected within deliberative democracy theory. The argument does not rest on the idea of moral rights or material justice. It rests on (...) the conditions of legitimate law deliberative democracy theory presupposes, namely, the conditions that make concrete the idea of legitimacy as “actual public justification.”. (shrink)

Classical natural law theory derives moral conclusions from the essentialist and teleological understanding of nature enshrined in classical metaphysics. The paper argues that this understanding of nature is as defensible today as it was in the days of Plato, Aristotle, Augustine, and Aquinas. It then shows how a natural law theory of the grounds and content of our moral obligations follows from this understanding of nature, and how a doctrine of natural rights follows in turn from the (...) theory of natural law. With this background in place, the implications of the theory for questions about property rights and taxation are explored. It is argued that classical natural law theory entails the existence of a natural right of private property, and that this right is neither so strong as to support laissez faire libertarianism, nor so weak as to allow for socialism. Though the theory leaves much of the middle ground between these extremes open to empirical rather than moral evaluation, it is argued that there is a strong natural law presumption against social democratic policies and in favor of free enterprise. (shrink)

"The growing interest in human rights has recently brought the question of their philosophical foundation to the foreground. Theorists of human rights often assume that their ideal can be traced to the philosophy of Immanuel Kant and his view of humans as ends in themselves. Yet, few have attempted to explore exactly how human rights should be understood in a Kantian framework. The scholars in this have gathered to fill this gap. Divided in three parts, firstly (...) the Kantian notion of human rights is explored, with particular emphasis on how it applies to levels of government beyond the state. The second part explores the scope of human rights, including the contentious questions of whether it includes welfare rights and freedom of speech across borders. The topic of the final section is human rights institutions, with a special focus on the legitimacy of international human rights courts. Human rights have become a force to reckon with in international politics. This book, written by an international team of specialists on Kant and human rights, contributes to understanding a major political development of our times"--. (shrink)

Richard Tuck’s book reconstructs the historical debate that led ultimately to the modern concept of natural right. His study has the virtue of supplying a critical perspective often missing in the current controversy over the nature and status of rights.

All the above views are statements of or from the so-called emotive theory of value, or are closely related to that theory. Where causal primacy lies or whether all these theories and views are effects of a more deep-laid cause is difficult to determine. Nevertheless, the common bonds between the various views are evident; the views themselves are prevalent. Any work which challenges the current subjective intuitionism in matters of "right," "good," and the like stands out in illuminated (...) relief. Such a work is Natural Right and History by Leo Strauss. (shrink)

In Experiment, Right or Wrong, Allan Franklin continues his investigation of the history and philosophy of experiment presented in his previous book, The Neglect of Experiment. Using a combination of case studies and philosophical readings of those studies, Franklin again addresses two important questions: (1) What role does and should experiment play in the choice between competing theories and in the confirmation or refutation of theories and hypotheses? (2) How do we come to believe reasonably in experimental results? Experiment, Right (...) or Wrong makes a significant contribution to an important area in contemporary history and philosophy of science. Philosophers and historians of science, physicists, and advanced students in these areas will find much of interest in this engaging study. (shrink)

We have controversial intuitions about the rightness of retributive punishment, keeping promises for its own sake, and pushing the heavy man off of the bridge in the footbridge trolley case. How do these intuitions relate to ethical theories? Should ethical theories aim to fit with and explain them? Or are only uncontroversial intuitions relevant to explanatory ethical theorising? I argue against several views that we might hold about the relationship between controversial intuitions and ethical theories. I then propose and defend (...) the view that ethical theories should only aim to fit with and explain the intuitions that almost all people (who minimally understand the relevant issues) share. I argue that this view has interesting and important implications for ethical theorising and theorising about justice and equality. (shrink)

This chapter argues that people have a human right to immigrate to other states. People have essential interests in being able to make important personal decisions and engage in politics without state restrictions on the options available to them. It is these interests that other human rights, such as the human rights to internal freedom of movement, expression and association, protect. The human right to immigrate is not absolute. Like other human freedom rights , it can be (...) restricted in certain extreme circumstances. Outside these circumstances, however, immigration restrictions are unjust. Having presented the argument for a human right to immigrate, the chapter responds to objections from distributive justice, culture and scarcity. (shrink)

Most rights claims are capable of being analysed in terms of both the competing theories of rights, the will theory and the interest theory. Discussion hitherto has concentrated on particular instances of rights claims which are easily accommodated by the one theory but accommodated only with difficulty (if at all) by the other. Such problematic examples have served to illuminate what is at stake between the rival theories. However, in the case of the (...) right to a public trial, I argue that neither theory is capable of accommodating that particular ‘right’. (shrink)

This collection of essays further develops, clarifies, and applies the moral philosophy Gewirth presented in Reason and Morality. Nine of the fourteen essays have been written since the publication of that book. And there is a 38 page introduction that gives an overview of Reason and Morality and these essays. Although there is redundancy, this book is a welcome elaboration and application of his theory of human rights. The clarity and force of his ideas are perhaps even more (...) evident here than in the earlier work. (shrink)

What sorts of things can individuals have rights to? In this paper I consider one influential negative claim: that individuals cannot have rights to so-called “participatory goods”. I argue that this claim is mistaken. There are two kinds of counter-examples, what I call “actualization rights” and “conditional rights”. Although the scope for individual actualization rights to participatory goods may be relatively narrow, individual conditional rights to participatory goods are both common and important: they are (...) one of the main vehicles that the realm of rights has for protecting and promoting the interests that individuals have in participatory goods. (shrink)

Business actors create and operate in global production networks that bring them in contact with regulatory frameworks across multiple levels and domains. Importantly, they also participate in shaping those regulatory frameworks. But what are the specific interests they pursue in their involvement in regulation? Traditionally, scholars tended to assume that the focus of business actors is primarily on avoiding (stringent) public regulation. Recent developments have highlighted a broader range of business interests, however. Accordingly, this paper investigates business positions on the (...) ascription of duties and rights in regulation, specifically in the fields of due diligence, supply chain liability, and extraterritorial jurisdiction. The paper explores these issues in the context of business regulation in the field of Human Rights, looking at the United Nations Guiding Principles on human rights, their German implementation in the ‘Nationaler Aktionsplan Wirtschaft und Menschenrechte’ and the associated processes, in particular. (shrink)

In this paper I bring together self-defense theory and animal rights theory. The extension of self-defense theory to animals poses a serious problem for proponents of animal rights. If, in line with orthodox self-defense theory, a person is a legitimate target for third-party self-defensive violence if they are responsible for a morally unjustified harm without an acceptable excuse; and if, in line with animal rights theory, people that consume animal products are responsible (...) for unjustified harm to animals, then many millions, if not billions, of otherwise law abiding and decent people will be legitimate targets for third-party self-defense violence on behalf of animals. I call this problem: the multiple inappropriate targets problem for animal rights. (shrink)

In this paper the author focuses on Australian land management and in particular on the environmental management issues that could have been prompted by the High Court recognition in 1996 (in Wik Peoples v. The State of Queensland) that native title to land and pastoral leaseholdings can co‐exist. Drawing on themes of self‐determination and co‐existence, the paper looks at more specific topics such as aboriginal title to land—what has been called land rights or native title in Australia—and some implications (...) of that for land, sea and resource management. Central to this analysis are competing theories of Aboriginal land management and links between Aboriginal traditional knowledge and conservation of species. These are illustrated through the marine mammal, the dugong. The Australian debates lead to the Canadian debates and then to Scandinavia and the role of the Sami people in protection and management of the Arctic region. Issues of indigenous self determination inevitably provide an overall theme to these discussions. As a matter of global concern, the paper asks, but does not decide, whether indigenous peoples may manage fragile eco‐systems more effectively than outsiders. It maintains that what is important in this context is a broader question. This concerns how culturally inclusive land and resource management can emerge from recognition of indigenous land and human rights and how comparative developments can provide crucial cross‐jurisdictional information for future developments and opportunities in the interests of environmental conservation. (shrink)

In Jean Baudrillard and Radical Education Theory: Turning Right to Go Left, the authors argue that Baudrillard has been underappreciated in philosophical and theoretical work in education. They introduce him here as an important figure in radical thought who has something to add to theoretical lines of inquiry in education. The book does not offer an introduction to Baudrillard. Rather, his corpus is mined in order to describe how it functions as a counter to the code of education, rational (...) thought, critical reason, etc. In effect, they establish that Baudrillard advocates for a counter-path to thinking that can shake us out of our ready-made thoughts and realize the radical potential for change. (shrink)

Over the last few years we have had a debate regarding the role of government in providing healthcare. There has been a question as to whether or not the state's proper role requires protection of its subjects from the calamities associated with a lack of healthcare. In this article, I will argue that straightforward Hobbesian principles require the state to provide healthcare. It might seem odd that such a positive right can be justified by a philosopher who famously conceives of (...) individuals as motivated by self-interest. Nonetheless, Hobbes's political theory provides the framework for such a right. (shrink)

Many argue that, given the all-subjected principle, non-temporary immigrants should have access to citizenship, challenging differences in rights between denizens and citizens. This article reassesses this conclusion by examining the case for a pathway to citizenship for denizens and asking whether former denizens, now citizens, can be denied some rights existing citizens have. It reconstructs Hart’s distinction between general and special rights, demonstrating with reference to Kant how the special right to political citizenship stems from general (...) class='Hi'>rights. This elucidates why denizens are entitled to a path to political citizenship. The article further explores how the exercise of citizenship can lead to additional special rights, scrutinizing whether these must also accrue to new citizens. It discusses conditions under which these further special rights might justify a distinction between citizens. The conclusion argues that reserving certain rights for some citizens is interesting for rethinking democratic theory in light of increasing mobility, less for justifying different rights for citizens and former denizens. (shrink)

This volume provides an up-to-date overview of the emerging debates over the role of language rights and linguistic diversity within political theory. Thirteen chapters, written by many of the leading theorists in the field, identify the challenges and opportunities that linguistic diversity raises for contemporary societies.

Information theorists often construe new Information and Communication Technologies (ICTs) as leveling mechanisms, regulating power relations at a distance by arming stakeholders with information and enhanced agency. Management theorists have claimed that transparency cultivates stakeholder trust, distinguishes a business from its competition, and attracts new clients, investors, and employees, making it key to future growth and prosperity. Synthesizing these claims, we encounter an increasingly common view: If corporations voluntarily adopted new ICTs in order to foster transparency, trust, and growth, while (...) embracing the redistributions of power they bring about, both corporations and stakeholders would benefit. The common view is short-sighted, however. In order to realize mutual benefit, transparency can not be conceived merely as efficient or economical. The implementation and use of new ICTs will be morally unsatisfactory unless they stably protect stakeholders. Moreover, without such protections, transparency is unlikely to produce lasting trust and growth. More specifically, corporate disclosures ought to be guided by a theory of stakeholder rights to know about threats or risks to stakeholders’ basic interests. Such rights are necessary moral protections for stakeholders in any business environment. Respect for transparency rights is not simply value added to a corporation’s line of goods and services, but a condition of a corporation’s justifiable claim to create value rather than harm, wrong, or injustice in its dealings. (shrink)

Some rights are so important for human autonomy and well-being that many scholars insist they should not be waived, traded, or abandoned. Privacy is a recent addition to this list. At the other end of the spectrum is the belief that privacy is a mere unimportant interest or preference. This paper defends a middle path between viewing privacy as an inalienable, non-waivable, non-transferrable right and the view of privacy as a mere subjective interest. First, an account of (...) privacy is offered that clarifies the concept and demonstrates how privacy is directly related to human health and well-being. Second, along with considering and rejecting several accounts for why privacy might be considered an inalienable right, an argument is offered for why it is morally permissible to waive, transfer, abandon, or alienate privacy. (shrink)

This collection of essays is dedicated to the memory of the late Harvard philosopher Robert Nozick, who died in 2002. The publication of Nozick's Anarchy, State, and Utopia in 1974 revived serious interest in natural rights liberalism, which, beginning in the latter half of the eighteenth century, had been eclipsed by a succession of antithetical political theories including utilitarianism, progressivism, and various egalitarian and collectivist ideologies. Some of our contributors critique Nozick's political philosophy. Other contributors examine earlier figures (...) in the liberal tradition, most notably John Locke, whose Second Treatise of Government, published in the late seventeenth century, profoundly influenced the American founders. The remaining authors analyze natural rights liberalism's central doctrines. (shrink)

Moral theory should be simple: the moral theorist attends to ordinary human action to explain what makes some acts right and others wrong, and we need no microscope to observe a human act. Yet no moral theory that is simple captures all of the morally relevant facts. In a set of vivid examples, stories, and cases Judith Thomson shows just how wide an array of moral considerations bears on all but the simplest of problems. She is a philosophical (...) analyst of the highest caliber who can tease a multitude of implications out of the story of a mere bit of eavesdropping. She is also a master teller of tales which have a philosophical bite. Beyond these pleasures, however, she brings new depth of understanding to some of the most pressing moral issues of the moment, notably abortion. Thomson's essays determinedly confront the most difficult questions: What is it to have a moral right to life, or any other right? What is the relation between the infringement of such rights and restitution? How is rights theory to deal with the imposition of risk? (shrink)

This collection of essays is dedicated to the memory of the late Harvard philosopher Robert Nozick, who died in 2002. The publication of Nozick's Anarchy, State, and Utopia in 1974 revived serious interest in natural rights liberalism, which, beginning in the latter half of the eighteenth century, had been eclipsed by a succession of antithetical political theories including utilitarianism, progressivism, and various egalitarian and collectivist ideologies. Some of our contributors critique Nozick's political philosophy. Other contributors examine earlier figures (...) in the liberal tradition, most notably John Locke, whose Second Treatise of Government, published in the late seventeenth century, profoundly influenced the American founders. The remaining authors analyze natural rights liberalism's central doctrines. (shrink)

In the words of Catharine MacKinnon, "a woman is not yet a name for a way of being human." In other words, women are still excluded, as authors and agents, from identifying what it is to be human and what therefore violates the dignity and integrity of humans. Recognition, Responsibility, and Rights is written in response to that failure. This collection of essays by prominent feminist thinkers advances the positive feminist project of remapping the moral landscape by developing (...) class='Hi'>theory that acknowledges the diversity of women. (shrink)

In Morals by Agreement David Gauthier proposes four criteria for classifying a society's advancement toward ‘higher stages of human development.' Significantly, these criteria — material well-being, breadth of opportunity, average life-span, and density of population — do not include as an equally valuable achievement the society's capacity to sustain its standard of living. Nonetheless Gauthier presents three arguments intended to show that a community founded on his distributive theory will view depletionary resource policies as unreasonable and unacceptable. I shall (...) contend that these arguments do not succeed in motivating sustainable rates of resource exploitation. Furthermore, I argue that if truly just and rational resource use policies can be arrived at, such policies could only succeed by employing a conception of property rights substantially different from Gauthier's. (shrink)

BACKGROUND: There is a growing interest in aggregating more biomedical and patient data into large health data sets for research and public benefits. However, collecting and processing patient data raises new ethical issues regarding patient's rights, social justice and trust in public institutions. The aim of this empirical study is to gain an in-depth understanding of the awareness of possible ethical risks and corresponding obligations among those who are involved in projects using patient data, i.e. healthcare professionals, regulators (...) and policy makers. METHODS: We used a qualitative design to examine Swiss healthcare stakeholders' experiences and perceptions of ethical challenges with regard to patient data in real-life settings where clinical registries are sponsored, created and/or used. A semi-structured interview was carried out with 22 participants (11 physicians, 7 policy-makers, 4 ethical committee members) between July 2014 and January 2015. The interviews were audio-recorded, transcribed, coded and analysed using a thematic method derived from Grounded Theory. RESULTS: All interviewees were concerned as a matter of priority with the needs of legal and operating norms for the collection and use of data, whereas less interest was shown in issues regarding patient agency, the need for reciprocity, and shared governance in the management and use of clinical registries' patient data. This observed asymmetry highlights a possible tension between public and research interests on the one hand, and the recognition of patients' rights and citizens' involvement on the other. CONCLUSIONS: The advocation of further health-related data sharing on the grounds of research and public interest, without due regard for the perspective of patients and donors, could run the risk of fostering distrust towards healthcare data collections. Ultimately, this could diminish the expected social benefits. However, rather than setting patient rights against public interest, new ethical approaches could strengthen both concurrently. On a normative level, this study thus provides material from which to develop further ethical reflection towards a more cooperative approach involving patients and citizens in the governance of their health-related big data. (shrink)

On most accounts of global democracy, human rights are ascribed a central function. Still, their conceptual role in global democracy is often unclear. Two recent attempts to remedy this deficiency have been made by James Bohman and Michael Goodhart. What is interesting about their proposals is that they make the case that under the present circumstances of politics, global democracy is best conceptualized in terms of human rights. Although the article is sympathetic to this ‘human rights approach’, (...) it defends the thesis that human rights are not enough for global democracy. It argues that insofar as we hold on to the general idea of democracy as a normative ideal of self-determination (self-rule) that is, of people determining their own lives and ruling over themselves, the concept of democracy accommodates two necessary conditions, namely, political bindingness and political equality. Further, it argues that neither Bohman's nor Goodhart's accounts fulfills these conditions and that one explanation for this could be traced to a lack of clarity concerning the distinction between democracy as normative ideal and democracy as decision method or rules (for example, institutions, laws and norms) for regulating social interactions. This ambiguity has implications for both Goodhart and Bohman. In Goodhart's work it manifests itself as a vagueness concerning the difference between political agency and democratic agency; in Bohman's work it becomes unclear whether he contributes a normative democratic theory or a theory of democratization. Although this article develops both a conceptual and a normative argument against their proposals, the aim is not to find fault with them but to point to questions that are in need of further elaboration to make them more convincing. (shrink)

Hobbes’s political and ethical theories are rarely viewed as places by which those who protect the weak seek refuge. It would seem odd, then, to suggest that such a theory might be able to protect the weakest among us—non-human animals. In this paper, however, I will defend the possibility of a Hobbesian justification for animal rights. The Hobbesian response to the problem of compliance allows contractarianism to extend (at least some) normative protection to animals. Such protection, as I (...) will argue, has a similar justificational foundation as the protection we offer other humans. (shrink)

Some have argued that Locke's failure to condemn contemporary slavery is best viewed as a personal moral lapse which does not reflect on his political theory. I argue to the contrary.

Many are already familiar with the idea of intersectionality. Intersection Theory can be conceived as encompassing other progressive theories, such as Philosophy of Race and Feminism. In Philosophy of Race, the ultimate explanatory concept is race; in Feminism, the ultimate explanatory term is gender. This discrepancy has given rise to Black Feminism. Intersection Theory can also be contextualized and expanded to include more detailed intersections when there is inequality within intersected groups. But, intersectionality does yet address unpredictable violence, (...) either against blacks or normally advantaged groups, such as United States Jews. For such cases, it is useful to posit a new intersectional factor of regressive violence, to account for counter-revolutionary response to decades of progress for minorities. Overall, the flexibility of Intersection Theory allows for creative analysis. However, not all intersections yield politically viable identities and those that would might require governmental recognition of group rights. (shrink)

Alasdair Cochrane introduces an entirely new theory of animal rights grounded in their interests as sentient beings. He then applies this theory to different and underexplored policy areas, such as genetic engineering, pet-keeping, indigenous hunting, and religious slaughter. In contrast to other proponents of animal rights, Cochrane claims that because most sentient animals are not autonomous agents, they have no intrinsic interest in liberty. As such, he argues that our obligations to animals lie in ending (...) practices that cause their suffering and death and do not require the liberation of animals. Cochrane's "interest-based rights approach" weighs the interests of animals to determine which is sufficient to impose strict duties on humans. In so doing, Cochrane acknowledges that sentient animals have a clear and discernable right not to be made to suffer and not to be killed, but he argues that they do not have a prima facie right to liberty. Because most animals possess no interest in leading freely chosen lives, humans have no moral obligation to liberate them. Moving beyond theory to the practical aspects of applied ethics, this pragmatic volume provides much-needed perspective on the realities and responsibilities of the human-animal relationship. (shrink)

The author's thesis is that human rights can be substantiated on the basis of discourse theory. The argument has two steps. The first step is the justification of the rules of discourse. The second step consists in the foundation of human rights.

A number of prominent nonconsequentialists support the thesis that we can wrong the dead by violating their moral claims. In contrast, this study suggests that the arguments offered by Thomson, Scanlon, Dworkin, Feinberg and others do not warrant posthumous rights because having claim-grounding interests requires an entity to have the capacity to experience significance. If dead people don't have this capacity, there is no reason to attribute claims to them. Raising doubts about prominent hypothetical examples of ‘no-effect injury’, the (...) study concludes that nonconsequentialists should consider adopting an error theory regarding posthumous claims, and suggests two alternative explanations of the relevant moral domains. (shrink)

In his paper "rights" ("the philosophical quarterly", Volume 15, 1965, Pages 115-127), H j mccloskey maintains that only beings who can possess interests can possess rights; and he goes on to argue that animals cannot satisfy this requirement. In his paper "mccloskey on why animals cannot have rights" ("the philosophical quarterly", Volume 26, 1976, Pages 251-257), Tom regan disputes mccloskey's requirement. First, He queries whether mccloskey's "is" a requirement for the possession of rights; second, He tries (...) to show that animals can nevertheless satisfy it. On both counts, I contend that regan's arguments do not work. I also set out a mccloskey-Like position which is not open to regan's attack upon its legitimacy. I conclude with an example designed to show why regan has failed to establish that animals have interests. (shrink)

This book shows how political argument in terms of rights and natural rights began in medieval Europe, and how the theory of natural rights was developed in the seventeenth century after a period of neglect in the Renaissance. Dr Tuck provides a new understanding of the importance of Jean Gerson in the formation of the theories, and of Hugo Grotius in their development; he also restores the Englishman John Selden's ideas to the prominence they once enjoyed, (...) and shows how Thomas Hobbes's political theory can best be understood against this background. In general, the book enables us to understand more fully the characteristics of the natural rights theories available to the men of the Enlightenment, and thereby to appreciate the complexity and equivocal nature of modern right theories. (shrink)

Lauritz Munch and Björn Lundgren have recently replied to a paper published by us in this journal. In our original paper, we defended a novel version of the so-called ‘control theory’ of the moral right to privacy. We argued that control theorists should define ‘control’ as what we coined ‘Negative Control’. Munch and Lundgren have recently provided a range of interesting and challenging objections to our view. Independently of each other, they give almost identical counterexamples to our definition of (...) Negative Control. In this comment, we show that while the counterexamples are genuine counterexamples, they do not force us to abandon the idea of Negative Control. Furthermore, we reply to two additional objections raised by Lundgren. One of these replies involves giving a new account of what the relation is between the concept of privacy and the right to privacy. (shrink)