The Nature of Rights

The twentieth century saw a vigorous debate over the nature of rights. Will theorists argued that the function of rights is to allocate domains of freedom. Interest theorists portrayed rights as defenders of well-being. Each side declared its conceptual analysis to be closer to an ordinary understanding of what rights there are, and to an ordinary understanding of what rights do for rightholders. Neither side could win a decisive victory, and the debate ended in a standoff. This article offers a new analysis of rights. The first half of the article sets out an analytical framework adequate for explicating all assertions of rights. This framework is an elaboration of Hohfeld’s, designed around a template for displaying the often complex internal structures of rights. Those unfamiliar with Hohfeld’s work should find that the exposition here presumes no prior knowledge of it. Those who know Hohfeld will find innovations in how the system is defined and presented. Any theorist wishing to specify precisely what is at stake within a controversy over some particular right may find this framework useful. The analytical framework is then deployed in the second half of the article to resolve the dispute between the will and interest theories. Despite the appeal of freedom and well-being as organizing ideas, each of these theories is clearly too narrow. We accept rights, which do not (as the will theory holds) define domains of freedom; and we affirm rights whose aim is not (as the interest theory claims) to further the interests of the rightholder. A third theory, introduced here, is superior in describing the functions of rights as they are commonly understood

The syllogistic reasoning: a qualified defence

Conferencia inaugural de la IVa edición del Curso de Especialista Universitario en Argumentación Jurídica, Universidad de Alicante, 21 de mayo de 2007.Este trabajo defiende el papel central del silogismo como estructura del razonamiento jurídico, sin negar la relevancia del razonamiento informal, probabilístico o retórico. En la justificación hay que invocar los enunciados jurídicos universales relevantes (premisas mayores), y los hechos particulares relevantes a la luz de ellos (premisas menores) como ejemplificaciones de esos universales, siendo la pretensión o decisión la conclusión del silogismo. Por supuesto que pueden surgir problemas: de interpretación de la ley, de prueba de los hechos, de calificación de estos como casos particulares del supuesto de la norma (o de su valoración cuando esta incluye estándares valorativos), o de relevancia de la norma (si aplicamos jurisprudencia). Todo ello requiere dar razones a favor de una determinada lectura del silogismo, razones que van más allá de la lógica formal y acaban siendo las decisivas. Pero «el silogismo es lo que proporciona el marco dentro del cual esos otros argumentos cobran sentido como argumentos jurídicos».This paper defends the central role of syllogism as the structure of legal reasoning, without denying the important part played by informal, probabilistic or rhetorical reasoning. To justify, one needs to cite universal legal sentences (major premises), and the particular facts which are relevant to them (minor premises), the claim or decision being the conclusion of the syllogism. To be sure, problems may arise: problems of interpretation of the statute; of proof of the facts; of classification of facts as instances of the universals deployed in the statute (as well as problems of evaluation of facts when the statute contains a value-expression); or problems of relevancy of the norm (when applying precedents). All that requires giving reasons for reading the syllogism in a certain way, a reasoning that falls beyond formal logic and ends up to be decisive. But syllogism «is what provide the framework in which the other arguments make sense as legal arguments»

EL PROCESO CONSTITUCIONAL EUROPEO: UNA VISIÓN TEÓRICA

In 1999, my work as a full-time law professor came to a temporary halt. Shortly before this happened, I brought out a book called Questioning Sovereignty1. This attempted to apply my version of the institutional theory of law to certain urgent contemporary questions in the philosophy of law and political philosophy circulating around the ideas and the roles of law, state, and nation in ‘the European Commonwealth’ (as I there called it). Then, partly by chance, I was elected as one of the eight members of the European Parliament representing Scotland. My theoretical questions thus acquired a directly practical edge. All the more so at the end of 2001, for then I was most fortunately elected to take part in the Convention on the Future of Europe set up by the European Council at Laeken in December of that year.En 1999, suspendí temporalmente mi trabajo como catedrático de derecho. Poco antes de que esto ocurriera, publicaría un libro llamado Questioning Sovereignty1, en el que intentaba aplicar mi propia versión de la teoría institucional del derecho a algunas cuestiones contemporáneas importantes de la filosofía política y la filosofía del derecho, en torno a las ideas y al papel que han de desempeñar el derecho, el estado y la nación en lo que yo en ese momento denominé “la Commonwealth Europea”. Entonces, y casi por casualidad, fui elegido como uno de los ocho miembros para representar a Escocia en el Parlamento Europeo. Mis planteamientos teóricos adquirieron, por tanto, un carácter eminentemente práctico, que se haría notar aún más a finales de 2001, momento en que tuve la suerte de ser elegido para formar parte de la Convención sobre el Futuro de Europa creada por el Consejo Europeo en Laeken, en diciembre de ese mismo año

Justice: An Un-original Position

Human societies are not voluntary associations. At least so far as concerns national societies and states, most human beings do not have a choice to which one they will belong, nor what shall be the law and the constitition of that to which they do belong; especially, their belonging to a given state is not conditional upon their assenting to the basic structure of its organization. Someone who is born into a given state has obviously no choice, no opportunity to stipulate conditions upon which he will accept citizenship. Choice can perhaps be exercised later, when one is an adult, when one may find oneself free to depart from one\u27s native state and to take up residence elsewhere with a view to naturalization as a citizen of the state of one\u27s choice. But in that latter situation one is in a weak position to set conditions for one\u27s joining the chosen society. One accepts the constitution and the laws as they are, or one does not acquire citizenship. What is more, somebody who is thinking of changing his citizenship has an appreciably more restricted range of models open to him than someone thinking of changing his car; and by contrast with that situation, he does not have the option of going without if none appeals to him

Justice: An Un-original Position

Human societies are not voluntary associations. At least so far as concerns national societies and states, most human beings do not have a choice to which one they will belong, nor what shall be the law and the constitition of that to which they do belong; especially, their belonging to a given state is not conditional upon their assenting to the basic structure of its organization. Someone who is born into a given state has obviously no choice, no opportunity to stipulate conditions upon which he will accept citizenship. Choice can perhaps be exercised later, when one is an adult, when one may find oneself free to depart from one\u27s native state and to take up residence elsewhere with a view to naturalization as a citizen of the state of one\u27s choice. But in that latter situation one is in a weak position to set conditions for one\u27s joining the chosen society. One accepts the constitution and the laws as they are, or one does not acquire citizenship. What is more, somebody who is thinking of changing his citizenship has an appreciably more restricted range of models open to him than someone thinking of changing his car; and by contrast with that situation, he does not have the option of going without if none appeals to him