Without consent: Principles of justified acquisition and duty-imposing powers

Philosophical Quarterly

Volumn 59, Issue 237, 2009, Pages 618-640

  Breakey, Hugh ^a  

^a UNIVERSITY OF QUEENSLAND   (Australia)

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EID: 73949150325     PISSN: 00318094     EISSN: None     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1111/j.1467-9213.2008.571.x     Document Type: Review

References (44)

1. H.L.A. Hart, 'Are There Any Natural Rights?', in J. Waldron (ed.), Theories of Rights (Oxford UP, 1984), pp. 77-90, at p. 84
2. J. Waldron, The Right to Private Property (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1988), p. 265
3. L. Wenar, 'Original Acquisition of Private Property', Mind, 107 (1998), pp. 799-819, at p. 807
4. A. Gibbard, 'Natural Property Rights', in H. Steiner and P. Vallentyne (eds), Left-Libertarianism and its Critics (Basingstoke: Palgrave, 2000), pp. 23-30, at p. 25
5. See Waldron, The Right to Private Property, ch. 7 and pp. 390-2
6. R. Nozick, Anarchy, State, and Utopia (Oxford: Blackwell, 1974), pp. 90-5
7. Hart, 'Are There Any Natural Rights?', p. 85
8. J.J. Thomson, 'A Defense of Abortion', Philosophy and Public Affairs, 1 (1971), pp. 47-66
9. See, e.g., D.A. Lloyd Thomas, Locke on Government (London: Routledge, 1995), ch. 2
10. The key terms here derive from Hohfeld's classification of rights: W.N. Hohfeld, 'Fundamental Legal Conceptions as Applied in Judicial Reasoning', Yale Law Journal, 26 (1917), pp. 710-69
11. cf. Wenar, 'The Nature of Rights', Philosophy and Public Affairs, 33 (2005), pp. 223-52
12. E.g., the power to marry: see L.C. Becker, Property Rights: Philosophic Foundations (London: Routledge, 1977), p. 14
13. This classification is a 'capacious' theory of rights; see R. Cruft, 'Why Aren't Duties Rights?', The Philosophical Quarterly, 56 (2006), pp. 175-92, at pp. 177-81
14. I have added this condition regarding expectations and advantages (alternative accounts might refer to interests or reasons). Several commentators argue that some such provision is itself a necessary condition of normative powers: see, e.g., J. Raz and N. MacCormick, 'Voluntary Obligations and Normative Powers', Proceedings of the Aristotelian Society, Supp. Vol. 46 (1972), pp. 59-102, at pp. 80-1
15. G.F. Gaus and L.E. Lomasky, 'Are Property Rights Problematic?', The Monist, 73 (1990), pp. 483-503, at p. 492
16. A.J. Simmons, 'Original-Acquisition Justifications of Private Property', Social Philosophy and Policy, 11 (1994), pp. 63-84, at p. 83
17. See J. English, 'What Do Grown Children Owe Their Parents?', in W. Ruddick and O. O'Neil (eds), Having Children: Philosophical and Legal Reflections (Oxford UP, 1979), pp. 351-6. In my discussion of foisting in §V below I address the question of when an acceptance might have the same force as a request
18. A. Ryan, Property and Political Theory (Oxford: Blackwell, 1984), p. 73
19. E. Feser, 'There Is No Such Thing as an Unjust Initial Acquisition', Social Philosophy and Policy, 22 (2005), pp. 56-80, at p. 64 fn. 19
20. cf. F.A. Hayek, 'The Use of Knowledge in Society', American Economic Review, 35 (1945), pp. 519-30
21. H. Steiner, 'Justice and Entitlement', Ethics, 87 (1977), pp. 150-2, at p. 151
22. Locke, Two Treatises of Government (New York: Hafner, 1947), II 27, 33, 36
23. There is a voluminous exegetical literature on this point. Broadly, my interpretation is defended in A.J. Simmons, The Lockean Theory of Rights (Princeton UP, 1992), ch. 5
24. Feser, pp. 65-6; J. Narveson, 'Property Rights: Original Acquisition and Lockean Provisos', Public Affairs Quarterly, 13 (1999), pp. 205-27, at pp. 214-16
25. A pertinent anthology is P. Vallentyne and H. Steiner (eds), The Origins of Left-Libertarianism (New York: St Martin's Press, 2000)
26. Steiner, An Essay on Rights (Oxford: Blackwell, 1994), pp. 268-72
27. Raz, The Morality of Freedom (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1986), pp. 168-70
28. E.g., Narveson, 'Contracting for Liberty', in T.R. Machan and D. Rasmussen (eds), Liberty for the Twenty-First Century (Lanham: Rowman & Littlefield, 1995), pp. 19-41, at pp. 20-4
29. E.g., Rousseau, 'Discourse on the Origins of Inequality', in Collected Writings of Rousseau, Vol. v (New England UP, 1992), p. 43. Even Locke (II 45-51) seems to suggest that some levels of material inequality require special justification (tacit consent to money)
30. G.A. Cohen, Self-Ownership, Freedom and Equality (Cambridge UP, 1995), pp. 82-3, 86-7
31. Becker, pp. 42-3; Ryan, Property (Open UP, 1987), pp. 63-4
32. This proviso may be attributed to Locke: Ryan, Property and Political Theory, p. 47
33. Simmons, The Lockean Theory of Rights, p. 293;
34. and also to Rousseau: Ryan, Property, pp. 48-9
35. E.g., Locke, II 42; H. Grotius, De Jure Belli ac Pacis Libri Tres, tr. F.W. Kelsey, Classics of International Law (Washington: Carnegie Institution, 1913), II, ch. 2, §vi
36. Marx, 'Critique of the Gotha Programme', in Marx/Engels Selected Works (Moscow: Progress, 1970), Vol. 111, pp. 13-30, http://www.marxists. org/archive/marx/works/1875/gotha/index.htm
37. The following analysis borrows heavily from Wendy Gordon's comprehensive exploration of the tort of misappropriation. Gordon canvasses concerns with officiousness, autonomy, worsening, comparative contribution, and macro-level considerations: W. Gordon, 'On Owning Information: Intellectual Property and the Restitutionary Impulse', Virginia Law Review, 78 (1992), pp. 149-281
38. P. Birks, Unjust Enrichment (Oxford UP, 2003), pp. 66-72
39. S. Worthington, Equity (Oxford UP, 2003), pp. 136-42
40. As, arguably, occurred in the very case that gave rise to the tort of misappropriation: International News Serv. v. Associated Press, 248 U.S. 215 (1918)
41. Kant-inspired will-theories of rights may understand rights as protected spheres of freedom: see N.E. Simmonds, 'Rights at the Cutting Edge', in M.H. Kramer, N.E. Simmonds and H. Steiner (eds), A Debate over Rights: Philosophical Enquiries (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1998), pp. 112-232, at p. 126
42. For the claims of self-expression, see Hegel, Hegel's Philosophy of Right, tr. T.M. Knox (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1952), pp. 40-57
43. cf. D. Knowles, Hegel and the Philosophy of Right (London: Routledge, 2002), pp. 112-20
44. Guidance, its importance and its limitations, becomes apposite in analysing that most invidious of duty-impositions, the retrospective creation of law. See C.J.G. Sampford et al., Retrospectivity and the Rule of Law (Oxford UP, 2006)