Hostname: page-component-cd9895bd7-jn8rn Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-12-25T20:33:47.087Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Beyond Normative Control: Against the Will Theory of Rights

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  23 January 2020

Joseph Bowen Open the ORCID record for Joseph Bowen [Opens in a new window]
Joseph Bowen*
Affiliation:
Department of Philosophy, University of St Andrews, St Andrews, UK, and Department of Philosophy, University of Stirling, Stirling, UK
*
Email: jb324@st-andrews.ac.uk
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

The Will Theory of Rights says that having control over another’s duties grounds rights. The Will Theory has commonly been objected to on the grounds that it undergenerates right-ascriptions along three fronts. This paper systematically examines a range of positions open to the Will Theory in response to these counterexamples, while being faithful to the Will Theory’s focus on normative control. It argues that of the seemingly plausible ways the defender of the Will Theory can proceed, one cannot both be faithful to the theory’s focus on normative control as the grounds of rights and achieve extensional adequacy.

Keywords

Rightsdirected dutiesWill Theoryautonomycontrol
Type
Article
Information
Canadian Journal of Philosophy , Volume 50 , Issue 4 , May 2020 , pp. 427 - 443
Copyright
© The Author(s) 2020. Published by Canadian Journal of Philosophy

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Cornell, Nicolas. 2015. “Wrongs, Rights, and Third Parties.” Philosophy & Public Affairs 43 (2): 109–43.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Cruft, Rowan. 2004. “Rights: Beyond Interest Theory and Will Theory?” Law and Philosophy 23 (4): 347–97.Google Scholar
Cruft, Rowan. 2013. “Why Is It Disrespectful to Violate Rights?” Proceedings of the Aristotelian Society 113 (2): 201–24.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Cruft, Rowan. 2019. Human Rights, Ownership, and the Individual. Oxford: Oxford University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Darwall, Stephen. 2013. “Bipolar Obligation.” In Morality, Authority, and Law, edited by Stephen, Darwall, 20–39. Oxford: Oxford University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Fabre, Cécile. 2000. Social Rights under the Constitution: Government and the Decent Life. Oxford: Oxford University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Feinberg, Joel. 1980. “The Nature and Value of Rights.” In Rights, Justice, and the Bounds of Liberty, edited by Joel, Feinberg, 159–84. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Graham, Paul. 1996. “The Will Theory of Rights: A Defence.” Law and Philosophy 15 (3): 257–70.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hart, H. L. A. 1955. “Are There Any Natural Rights?” The Philosophical Review 64 (2): 175–91.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hart, H. L. A. 1982. Essays on Bentham: Studies in Jurisprudence and Political Theory. Oxford: Clarendon Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hohfeld, Wesley Newcomb. 1919. Fundamental Legal Conceptions as Applied in Judicial Reasoning. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press.Google Scholar
Kramer, Matthew H. 2000. “Rights without Trimmings.” In A Debate Over Rights: Philosophical Enquiries, edited by Kramer, Matthew H., Simmonds, N. E., and Steiner, Hillel, 7–112. Oxford: Oxford University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Kramer, Matthew H. 2010. “Refining the Interest Theory of Rights.” The American Journal of Jurisprudence 55 (1): 31–39.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Kramer, Matthew H. 2013. “Some Doubts about Alternatives to the Interest Theory of Rights.” Ethics 123 (2): 245–63.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Kramer, Matthew H., and Steiner, Hillel. 2007. “Theories of Rights: Is There a Third Way?” Oxford Journal of Legal Studies 27 (2): 281–310.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
MacCormick, Neil. 1977. “Rights in Legislation.” In Law, Morality, and Society: Essays in Honour of H. L. A. Hart, edited by Hacker, P. M. S. and Raz, Joseph, 189–209. Oxford: Clarendon Press.Google Scholar
MacCormick, Neil. 1982. “Children’s Rights: A Test-Case for Legal Rights.” In Legal Right and Social Democracy: Essays in Legal and Political Philosophy, 154–66. Oxford: Clarendon Press.Google Scholar
May, Simon Căbulea. 2012. “Moral Status and the Direction of Duties.” Ethics 123 (1): 113–28.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Owens, David. 2012. Shaping the Normative Landscape. Oxford: Oxford University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Rainbolt, George W. 2006. The Concept of Rights. Dordrecht, Nether.: Springer.Google Scholar
Raz, Joseph. 1986. The Morality of Freedom. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Simmonds, N. E. 1995. “The Analytical Foundations of Justice.” The Cambridge Law Journal 54 (2): 306–41.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Skorupski, John. 2010. The Domain of Reasons. Oxford: Oxford University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Sreenivasan, Gopal. 2005. “A Hybrid Theory of Claim-Rights.” Oxford Journal of Legal Studies 25 (2): 257–74.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Sreenivasan, Gopal. 2010. “Duties and Their Direction.” Ethics 120 (3): 465–94.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Steiner, Hillel. 1994. An Essay on Rights. Oxford: Blackwell.Google Scholar
Steiner, Hillel. 2000. “Working Rights.” In A Debate Over Rights: Philosophical Enquiries, edited by Kramer, Matthew H., Simmonds, N. E., and Hillel, Steiner. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Steiner, Hillel. 2007. “Moral Rights.” In The Oxford Handbook of Ethical Theory, edited by Copp, David. https://www.oxfordhandbooks.com/view/10.1093/oxfordhb/9780195325911.001.0001/oxfordhb-9780195325911-e-17.Google Scholar
Sumner, L. W. 1987. The Moral Foundation of Rights. Oxford: Clarendon Press.Google Scholar
Tadros, Victor. 2016. Wrongs and Crimes. Oxford: Oxford University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Thompson, Michael. 2004. “What Is It to Wrong Someone? A Puzzle about Justice.” In Reason and Value : Themes from the Moral Philosophy of Joseph Raz, edited by Wallace, R. J., Pettit, Phillip, Scheffler, Samuel, and Smith, Michael, 333–84. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Van Duffel, Siegfried. 2012. “The Nature of Rights Debate Rests on a Mistake.” Pacific Philosophical Quarterly 93 (1): 104–23.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Wellman, Carl. 1985. A Theory of Rights: Persons under Laws, Institutions, and Morals. Totowa, NJ: Rowman & Allanheld.Google Scholar
Wenar, Leif. 2005. “The Nature of Rights.” Philosophy & Public Affairs 33 (3): 223–52.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Wenar, Leif. 2013. “The Nature of Claim-Rights.” Ethics 123 (2): 202–29.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Wenar, Leif. 2015. “Rights.” In The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, edited by Zalta, Edward N.. Stanford, CA: Metaphysics Research Lab, Stanford University. https://plato.stanford.edu/archives/fall2015/entries/rights.Google Scholar