10 research outputs found
Why Group Membership Matters; A Critical Typology
The question of why group-differentiated rights might be a requirement of justice has been a central focus of identity politics in recent decades. I attempt to bring some clarity to this discussion by proposing a typology to track the various ways in which individuals can be harmed or benefited as a consequence of their membership in social groups. It is the well-being of individuals that group-differentiated rights should be understood as protecting, and so clarity on the relationship between group membership and well-being is vital. One of the problems with the way in which such justifications have often been formulated in the past has been that they inadvertently position the group as a handicap to be overcome, rather than a value to be protected. I seek to overcome this limitation by clearly specifying the circumstances under which group membership is a liability, and the circumstances under which it has value. While this distinction is important, in both cases there is a relevant interest at stake, and thus the groundwork can be laid for a defence of group-differentiated rights
Autonomy and Dignity
Like the ‘thoughts and prayers’ so commonly offered by politicians in the aftermath of disaster,
it is incredibly common to hear ‘autonomy and dignity’ invoked together in response to some
threat to human wellbeing. As such, it seems natural to assume they must bear some kind of
relation to one another. But are they merely two core human interests, that happen to be
vulnerable to the same kinds of threat? Or are they interrelated in a deeper way? What I aim to
do in this chapter is draw on the philosophical literature on both concepts to consider how they
might be connected, and explore whether certain ways of connecting them are more fruitful
than others. I argue that the two most prominent connections drawn in the philosophical
literature – that dignity is grounded in autonomy, and that respect for dignity is synonymous
with respect for autonomy – are both highly problematic. Instead, I suggest we see autonomy
and dignity as mutually supportive. Doing so has both practical and theoretical benefits: it can
help us identify threats to both autonomy and dignity; and it exposes theoretical lacunae,
especially within the autonomy literature
An Evaluation Schema for the Ethical Use of Autonomous Robotic Systems in Security Applications
'I <i>am </i>a man':countering oppression through appeal to kind membership
All too often, social kinds function as sites of oppression. To be a woman, to be Black, to be trans – each, in its own way, situates someone at the lower end of a social hierarchy. Membership in such groups thus constitutes a liability: notwithstanding the goods people draw from sharing in these identities, they also stand at perpetual risk of those same identities exposing them to significant harm. What, if anything, can members of oppressed groups do to counter that oppression? In this article I explore one possible strategy: people can – and do – strategically invoke their membership in what I call ‘anti-oppressive kinds’, in order to contest the oppression they face qua members of oppressed groups. Focusing on one particularly salient anti-oppressive kind, the human, I first offer an explanation as to how and why its invocation might be politically effective, before considering some hazards with its use.</p
The Woody Allen Puzzle: How 'Authentic Alienation' Complicates Autonomy
Theories of autonomy commonly make reference to some form of endorsement: an action is autonomous insofar as the agent has a second-order desire towards the motivating desire, or takes it to be a reason for action, or is not alienated from it. In this paper I argue that all such theories have difficulty accounting for certain kinds of agents, what I call ‘Woody Allen cases’. In order to make sense of such cases, I suggest, it is necessary to disambiguate two distinct forms of endorsement, both of which contribute to autonom
Autonomy and the Problem of Socialization
One of the more intractable problems in the debate over autonomy is how we should distinguish autonomy-enhancing from autonomy-compromising forms of socialization. In this paper I first survey a range of theories of autonomy, from the procedural through to the substantive, and argue that none offers sufficient resources to resolve the problem of socialization. In the second half of the paper I develop an alternative theory that can both differentiate benign from pernicious socialization and, more importantly, provide an explanation for the means by which pernicious socialization compromises autonom
A Metaphysics of Dehumanization
Most contemporary accounts of dehumanization construe it either as a psychological phenomenon of seeing the other as non-human, or as as an interpersonal phenomenon of failing to treat the other as they are entitled qua moral agent. In this paper I offer an alternative way of thinking about dehumanization. Drawing on recent work in social metaphysics, I argue that we can productively think of the human as a social kind, and correspondingly of dehumanization as a process of excommunication from that social kind. Such an approach, I show, is better equipped to explain the variety of phenomenon that constitute dehumanization,and the range of processes through which dehumanization can occur
The Human in Human Rights
This chapter interrogates the human in human rights. It first takes issue with the common
assumption that to be human just is to be a member of the species homo sapiens, and that
this suffices for possession of human rights. Such an assumption is problematic because it
presupposes a unique ‘essence’ possessed by all and only human beings, which in turn
functions to exclude certain individuals from the realm of the human, and presents a
culturally-specific vision of humanity as if it were universal. As an alternative, this chapter
develops a conception of the human as a social construct. Analogous to the sex/gender
distinction common to feminist theory, it posits a homo sapiens/human distinction,
whereby the human refers to the network of social norms, political status, privileges and
burdens that are conferred on people because they are (taken to be) members of the
species homo sapiens