What are rights?
- Background [Glendon]
- History and Analysis [Finnis, Feinberg, Waldron]
- Criticism of Natural Rights [Locke, Maritain, MacDonald]
- Lecture notes
- Locke handout [pdf]
- Choice Theory [Hart]
- Interest Theory [Raz]
- Outline
- Necessary and sufficient conditions (this will help with Raz, trust me)
- Lecture notes
- Additional reading
- What do Rights Add? [Feinberg]
Rights and Duties
- Absolute Rights [Gewirth]
- Absolutism and Utilitarianism [Nagel]
- Rights as Side Constraints [Nozick]
- Scheffler’s criticism of Nozick [Scheffler]
- Basic Rights [Cranston, Shue]
- Basic Rights and Duties [Shue]
- Positive and Negative Rights [O’Neill, Wellman]
- Additional reading on positive and negative rights. (29 Nov.)
Relativism and Foundationalism
- Moral Relativism [Anthropologists, Williams, Waldron]
- Foundationalism: Gewirth
- Lecture notes
- Gewirth handout [pdf]
- Critical Discussion of Gewirth [Danto, Gewirth]
About the notes
It’s rare to learn things the first time out, therefore, I summarize the main points of each lecture. Repetition can help even the best of us. More selfishly, sometimes I want to pursue a point that I did not have time to discuss in the lectures. That sort of thing will be of interest to students who just can’t get enough. Finally, I have occasionally outlined especially difficult articles and given some references to further reading.