Special obligations to compatriots

Ethics

Volumn 107, Issue 3, 1997, Pages 427-446

  Mason, Andrew ^a  

^a NONE

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EID: 0001682044     PISSN: 00141704     EISSN: None     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1086/233743     Document Type: Article

References (66)

1. Many political theorists also suppose that we have an obligation to obey the law which can be understood as a special obligation to compatriots than as a special obligation to the state. This idea has a long pedigree. It is to be found in social contract theories such as Thomas Hobbes's as well as in theories which attempt to ground an obligation to obey the law on a principle of "fair play": that since one has enjoyed the benefits of others' obeying the law, one should accept the burdens of one's own compliance with it. The fair play argument seems first to have been invoked by Socrates in the Crito, when he explained why he should receive the punishment handed to him rather than escape from Athens. John Rawls explicitly proposed the argument in his "Legal Obligation and the Duty of Fair Play," in Law and Philosophy, ed. S. Hook (New York: New York University Press, 1964). I shall not discuss this idea here because of the particular problems it raises, although some of what I say is relevant to it.
2. Although charity is often taken to refer to actions that are beyond the call of duty rather than those which are obligatory.
3. Bhikhu Parekh, "A Misconceived Discourse on Political Obligation," Political Studies 41 (1993): 236-51, p. 243.
4. See, e.g., Quentin Skinner, "The Idea of Negative Liberty: Philosophical and Historical Perspectives," in Philosophy in History, ed. Richard Rorty, J. B. Schneewind, and Quentin Skinner (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1984); Richard Bellamy, "Citizenship and Rights," in Theories and Concepts of Politics: An Introduction, ed. Richard Bellamy (Manchester: Manchester University Press, 1993), p. 63. Civic republicans often prefer to talk about the virtues of citizens rather than the obligations or duties of citizenship, but it is clear that they regard the fulfillment of such obligations as partially constitutive of what it is to be a good citizen. Compare Stephen Macedo, Liberal Virtues: Citizenship, Virtue, and Community in Liberal Constitutionalism (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1990), pp. 272-74.
5. See, e.g., Quentin Skinner, "The Idea of Negative Liberty: Philosophical and Historical Perspectives," in Philosophy in History, ed. Richard Rorty, J. B. Schneewind, and Quentin Skinner (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1984); Richard Bellamy, "Citizenship and Rights," in Theories and Concepts of Politics: An Introduction, ed. Richard Bellamy (Manchester: Manchester University Press, 1993), p. 63. Civic republicans often prefer to talk about the virtues of citizens rather than the obligations or duties of citizenship, but it is clear that they regard the fulfillment of such obligations as partially constitutive of what it is to be a good citizen. Compare Stephen Macedo, Liberal Virtues: Citizenship, Virtue, and Community in Liberal Constitutionalism (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1990), pp. 272-74.
6. See, e.g., Quentin Skinner, "The Idea of Negative Liberty: Philosophical and Historical Perspectives," in Philosophy in History, ed. Richard Rorty, J. B. Schneewind, and Quentin Skinner (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1984); Richard Bellamy, "Citizenship and Rights," in Theories and Concepts of Politics: An Introduction, ed. Richard Bellamy (Manchester: Manchester University Press, 1993), p. 63. Civic republicans often prefer to talk about the virtues of citizens rather than the obligations or duties of citizenship, but it is clear that they regard the fulfillment of such obligations as partially constitutive of what it is to be a good citizen. Compare Stephen Macedo, Liberal Virtues: Citizenship, Virtue, and Community in Liberal Constitutionalism (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1990), pp. 272-74.
7. See, e.g., Amitai Etzioni, The Spirit of Community: The Reinvention of American Society (New York: Simon & Schuster, 1993). David Selbourne (The Principle of Duty [London: Sinclair-Stevenson, 1994], pp. 156, 230-31) argues that citizens have an obligation to sustain the civic bond, which includes an obligation to inform themselves about the nature of the civic order to which they belong, and an obligation to participate in local civic affairs.
8. See, e.g., Amitai Etzioni, The Spirit of Community: The Reinvention of American Society (New York: Simon & Schuster, 1993). David Selbourne (The Principle of Duty [London: Sinclair-Stevenson, 1994], pp. 156, 230-31) argues that citizens have an obligation to sustain the civic bond, which includes an obligation to inform themselves about the nature of the civic order to which they belong, and an obligation to participate in local civic affairs.
9. See H. L. A. Hart, "Are There Any Natural Rights?" in Political Philosophy, ed. Anthony Quinton (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1967), pp. 55-56, reprinted from Philosophical Review 64 (1955): 175-91.
10. See H. L. A. Hart, "Are There Any Natural Rights?" in Political Philosophy, ed. Anthony Quinton (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1967), pp. 55-56, reprinted from Philosophical Review 64 (1955): 175-91.
11. See John Rawls, A Theory of Justice (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1971), pp. 111-12.
12. Compare John Horton, Political Obligation (London: Macmillan, 1993), p. 156.
13. See Alan Gewirth, "Ethical Universalism and Particularism," Journal of Philosophy 85 (1988): 283-302, pp. 284-85.
14. Michael Walzer argues that political justice requires that long-term "guest" workers be given the opportunity to become citizens: "The processes of self-determination through which a democratic state shapes its internal life, must be open, and equally open, to all those men and women who live within its territory, work in the local economy, and are subject to local law" (Spheres of Justice: A Defence of Pluralism and Equality [Oxford: Martin Robertson, 1983], p. 60). Two useful collections of papers address the morality of immigration controls: Free Movement: Ethical Issues in the Transnational Migration of People and Money, ed. Brian Barry and Robert E. Goodin (Brighton: Wheatsheaf, 1992); and Justice in Immigration, ed. Warren F. Schwartz (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1995).
15. Michael Walzer argues that political justice requires that long-term "guest" workers be given the opportunity to become citizens: "The processes of self-determination through which a democratic state shapes its internal life, must be open, and equally open, to all those men and women who live within its territory, work in the local economy, and are subject to local law" (Spheres of Justice: A Defence of Pluralism and Equality [Oxford: Martin Robertson, 1983], p. 60). Two useful collections of papers address the morality of immigration controls: Free Movement: Ethical Issues in the Transnational Migration of People and Money, ed. Brian Barry and Robert E. Goodin (Brighton: Wheatsheaf, 1992); and Justice in Immigration, ed. Warren F. Schwartz (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1995).
16. Michael Walzer argues that political justice requires that long-term "guest" workers be given the opportunity to become citizens: "The processes of self-determination through which a democratic state shapes its internal life, must be open, and equally open, to all those men and women who live within its territory, work in the local economy, and are subject to local law" (Spheres of Justice: A Defence of Pluralism and Equality [Oxford: Martin Robertson, 1983], p. 60). Two useful collections of papers address the morality of immigration controls: Free Movement: Ethical Issues in the Transnational Migration of People and Money, ed. Brian Barry and Robert E. Goodin (Brighton: Wheatsheaf, 1992); and Justice in Immigration, ed. Warren F. Schwartz (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1995).
17. Gewirth, "Ethical Universalism," p. 291.
18. Alan Gewirth, Reason and Morality (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1978), esp. chaps. 2-3.
19. Gewirth, "Ethical Universalism," p. 292.
20. Ibid., p. 299.
21. Ibid., pp. 298-302.
22. In the first part of his article Gewirth says that his argument "will uphold, for the most part, the . . . thesis that ethical universalism, in the form of a principle of human rights, can show that certain kinds of ethical particularism are morally required or mandatory" (ibid., p. 289), but in the body of the article he doesn't make any explicit case for saying that the forms of ethical particularism he discusses are morally required.
23. Gewirth could argue that states usually provide various protections through diplomacy to citizens living abroad. But these protections by their nature are much more limited than those mere residents receive through the impartial enforcement of the criminal law.
24. Of course, Gewirth thinks it mistaken to put any faith in ordinary moral intuitions, so he could simply deny the existence of a demanding obligation to participate in public life. My purpose, however, is to see what moral theory is required in order to account for the two special obligations I described earlier; I do not assume that Gewirth's account is defective because it cannot do so.
25. Richard Dagger, "Rights, Boundaries, and the Bond of Community: A Qualified Defense of Moral Parochialism," American Political Science Review 79 (1985): 436-47.
26. Robert E. Goodin, "What Is So Special about Our Fellow Countrymen?" Ethics 98 (1988): 663-86, pp. 676-78.
27. Ibid., p. 678.
28. Goodin's account should also be of interest to nonconsequentialists of various stripes, for (as he argues) it is compatible with standard forms of nonconsequentialism (Robert E. Goodin, Protecting the Vulnerable: A Reanalysis of Our Social Responsibilities [Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1985], pp. 115 ff.).
29. By 'long-term resident', I just mean to exclude tourists.
30. See David Miller, On Nationality (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1995), p. 63.
31. Compare Goodin, "What Is So Special about Our Fellow Countrymen?" p. 685.
32. Ronald Dworkin, Law's Empire (London: Fontana, 1986), p. 193.
33. Jeremy Waldron, "Special Ties and Natural Duties," Philosophy and Public Affairs 22 (1993): 3-30, p. 13.
34. Ibid., p. 16.
35. Yael Tamir, Liberal Nationalism (Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 1993), p. 99; see also George P. Fletcher, Loyalty: An Essay on the Morality of Personal Relationships (New York: Oxford University Press, 1993), p. 16;
36. Yael Tamir, Liberal Nationalism (Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 1993), p. 99; see also George P. Fletcher, Loyalty: An Essay on the Morality of Personal Relationships (New York: Oxford University Press, 1993), p. 16;
37. David Miller, "The Ethical Significance of Nationality," Ethics 98 (1988): 647-62, esp. p. 650, although for a more refined view see On Nationality, pp. 68-70.
38. David Miller, "The Ethical Significance of Nationality," Ethics 98 (1988): 647-62, esp. p. 650, although for a more refined view see On Nationality, pp. 68-70.
39. See Tamir, p. 102. This also seems to be Fletcher's view, p. 35 and chap. 8, passim.
40. See Simon Caney, "Individuals, Nations and Obligations," in National Rights and International Obligations, ed. Simon Caney, David George, and Peter Jones (Boulder, Colo.: Westview, 1996), p. 127. Admittedly, however, intuitions are not an especially clear guide in cases like this, for it is hard for them to distinguish between a conflict of obligations where one of the obligations easily overrides and a case where only one obligation is active.
41. See Horton, pp. 156-57.
42. See A. John Simmons, "Associative Political Obligations," Ethics 106 (1996): 247-73, pp. 256-57.
43. Tamir, p. 102.
44. I do not mean to suggest that Raz's account of how friendship justifies special obligations is the best model for all special obligations. I agree with Samuel Scheffler that it is difficult for any single model to account for all special obligations, given their apparent diversity ("Families, Nations and Strangers," The Lindley Lecture, University of Kansas, 1994, p. 3).
45. See Joseph Raz, "Liberating Duties," Law and Philosophy 8 (1989): 3-21, pp. 18-21.
46. Raz uses 'intrinsic value' to mean noninstrumental value, and I shall follow him in this usage.
47. Raz employs the language of duty rather than the language of obligation, but I don't think that anything turns on this, since he has elsewhere treated them as equivalent. (He does, however, maintain that there are reasons to distinguish between 'A has an obligation or duty to X' and 'A ought to X', and for assigning the former a special role.) See Joseph Raz, "Promises and Obligations," in Law, Morality, and Society: Essays in Honour of H. L. A. Hart, ed. P. M. S. Hacker and J. Raz (Oxford: Clarendon, 1977), pp. 210-28.
48. See Lawrence Blum, Friendship, Altruism and Morality (London: Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1980), chap. 4.
49. Here it needs to be emphasized that much of what is valuable about friendship cannot be understood in terms of the recognition of obligations or duties. Indeed it would often be appropriate for one friend to be offended by another if they discovered that they had acted from a sense of duty rather than because they cared about them. The language of responsibility is perhaps more appropriate here because to say that one acted on behalf of a friend because one felt responsible for them carries with it no conversational implication that one's actions were not done out of concern for the friend.
50. Raz, "Liberating Duties," p. 21.
51. On the importance of the cultural context of choice, see Will Kymlicka, Liberalism, Community and Culture (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1989), esp. chap. 8. See also Avishai Margalit and Joseph Raz, "National Self-Determination," Journal of Philosophy 87 (1990): 439-61, esp. pp. 448-50.
52. On the importance of the cultural context of choice, see Will Kymlicka, Liberalism, Community and Culture (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1989), esp. chap. 8. See also Avishai Margalit and Joseph Raz, "National Self-Determination," Journal of Philosophy 87 (1990): 439-61, esp. pp. 448-50.
53. See Brian Barry, Democracy, Power, and Justice (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1989), p. 170.
54. David Miller, who defends special obligations to fellow nationals and sees them as derived from the nation's public culture and traditions, appears to accept this conclusion; see On Nationality, pp. 68-70.
55. I mean to leave it an open question whether citizens may possess equal status even when some of them enjoy special rights. On certain assumptions special rights can be reconciled with a fundamental equality of status. See Kymlicka, esp. chap. 9; Iris Marion Young, Justice and the Politics of Difference (Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 1990), chap. 6.
56. Thomas Pogge, "Cosmopolitanism and Sovereignty," Ethics 103 (1992): 48-75, p. 58.
57. I do not mean to suggest that friendship and citizenship are analogous in all important respects. Clearly there are important differences between them. Friendship (in general) is a voluntary relationship, whereas citizenship (in general) is nonvoluntary; a person may cease to be a friend by persistently failing to fulfill the obligations of friendship, whereas a person does not cease to be a citizen of a state simply by neglecting her duties. The core of the analogy is unaffected by these observations, however. Citizenship, like friendship, is intrinsically valuable, and obligations of citizenship, like obligations of friendship, are part of the good of that relationship as well as being justified by that good.
58. For helpful distinctions between different models of citizenship, and a defense of the republican one, see David Miller, "Citizenship and Pluralism," Political Studies 43 (1995): 432-50.
59. Doesn't this make my account vulnerable to the objection I leveled against Tamir's that it sanctions special obligations between racists? My account avoids this difficulty by maintaining that only relationships which have intrinsic value can generate special obligations in this way. A relationship founded upon shared racial prejudice cannot have such value. If racists are friends, then their friendship may create special obligations, but those special obligations would exist between them qua friends rather than qua racists. Since Tamir argues that special obligations can be generated simply from constitutive attachments, she must allow that special obligations can exist between two racists qua racists since it may be racism that binds them together.
60. Tamir, p. 102. As I noted in the second section, Waldron has provided a potential response to this point in "Special Ties and Natural Duties."
61. Robert E. Goodin and Philip Pettit, "The Possibility of Special Duties," Canadian Journal of Philosophy 16 (1986): 651-76.
62. Ibid., p. 655.
63. Ibid., p. 656.
64. Ibid., p. 661.
65. Ibid., pp. 659-62, 671.
66. The account I am suggesting may still be compatible with broadly consequentialist approaches since it can allow that ultimately harms and benefits to noncitizens count the same as those to citizens, and that they can be weighed against one another.