Individual Sovereignty and Political Legitimacy

Bibliographic Details
Main Author: Maloberti, Nicolas
Language:English
Published: Bowling Green State University / OhioLINK 2007
Subjects:
Online Access:http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=bgsu1181593400
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spelling ndltd-OhioLink-oai-etd.ohiolink.edu-bgsu11815934002021-08-03T05:28:20Z Individual Sovereignty and Political Legitimacy Maloberti, Nicolas natural rights liberalism anarchy samaritanism political legitimacy justification of the state Natural rights liberalism configures individuals’ areas of moral freedom in terms of both ownership and enforcement rights. These rights are taken to entail not only liberties or permissions to act in particular ways, but also obligations on the part of others not to interfere with such liberties. The state, however, threatens its subjects with the infliction of harm should they decide to exercise the full range of their enforcement rights. The state also taxes its subjects in order to fund the costs involved in the collective provision of enforcement services. Thus, within natural rights liberalism, the problem of political legitimacy amounts to the problem of explaining why the state’s characteristic infringements upon individuals’ rights could be morally permissible. The theoretical challenge lies in the fact that, according to natural rights liberalism, the areas of moral freedom defined by individuals’ natural rights are taken to have especially stringent borders. Those borders are immune, in particular, to consequentialist and paternalistic rationales of infringement. This dissertation argues that this challenge is best met by an appeal to individuals’ “samaritan” rights. The holders of these particular rights are individuals who, by no fault of their own, face a perilous situation, and they hold their rights against those who have the capacity to place them out of peril at a reasonable cost. Christopher Wellman has already noted the implications of individuals’ samaritan rights for the problem of political legitimacy. The purpose of this dissertation is to further develop Wellman’s insights, and argue that the resulting moral framework is a promising approach for dealing with the problem of political legitimacy, particularly within the tradition of natural rights liberalism. 2007-06-12 English text Bowling Green State University / OhioLINK http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=bgsu1181593400 http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=bgsu1181593400 unrestricted This thesis or dissertation is protected by copyright: all rights reserved. It may not be copied or redistributed beyond the terms of applicable copyright laws.
collection NDLTD
language English
sources NDLTD
topic natural rights liberalism
anarchy
samaritanism
political legitimacy
justification of the state
spellingShingle natural rights liberalism
anarchy
samaritanism
political legitimacy
justification of the state
Maloberti, Nicolas
Individual Sovereignty and Political Legitimacy
author Maloberti, Nicolas
author_facet Maloberti, Nicolas
author_sort Maloberti, Nicolas
title Individual Sovereignty and Political Legitimacy
title_short Individual Sovereignty and Political Legitimacy
title_full Individual Sovereignty and Political Legitimacy
title_fullStr Individual Sovereignty and Political Legitimacy
title_full_unstemmed Individual Sovereignty and Political Legitimacy
title_sort individual sovereignty and political legitimacy
publisher Bowling Green State University / OhioLINK
publishDate 2007
url http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=bgsu1181593400
work_keys_str_mv AT malobertinicolas individualsovereigntyandpoliticallegitimacy
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