Visa A J Kurki
Biographic Data
| ID | 1746504 |
|---|---|
| NAME | Visa A J Kurki |
| GIVEN NAMES | Visa A J |
| FAMILY NAME | Kurki |
| SIGNATURE | KURKI V A J |
| AFFILIATIONS | University of Helsinki |
| ORCID | 0000-0002-1308-6398 |
| VERIFIED | Yes |
| TOTAL WORKS | 9 |
| TOTAL CITATIONS | 14 |
| AUTHOR COUNT | 9 |
| EDITOR COUNT | 0 |
| FIRST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2016 |
| LATEST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2024 |
| H-INDEX | 2 |
A Bird's‐Eye View of Animals in the Law
The article develops an analytic account of nonhuman animals’ current legal status. Animals are often characterised as legal things and property, but this characterisation is both simplistic and, in some cases, incorrect. The article seeks to dispel a number of orthodoxies regarding the legal status of animals and offer a more nuanced and contextual account. The emphasis is on Western law, with a particular focus on European jurisdictions. The ar…
Does a Person Have a Right to Attention? Depends on What She is Doing
It has been debated whether the so-called attention economy , in which the attention of agents is measured and sold, jeopardizes something of value. One strand of this discussion has focused on so-called attention rights, asking: should attention be legally protected, either by introducing novel rights or by extending the scope of pre-existing rights? In this paper, however, in order to further this discussion, we ask: How is attention already pr…
Can Nature Hold Rights? It's Not as Easy as You Think
The Rights of Nature movement has recently achieved significant successes in using legal personhood as a tool for environmental protection. Perhaps most famously, the Whanganui River in Aotearoa New Zealand was accorded legal personhood in 2017. These kinds of development have attracted plenty of scholarly interest, but few have scrutinized a foundational underlying question: Can natural areas, such as rivers, or other non-sentient natural entiti…
The Interest Theory of Rights
In two recent papers, Mark McBride has attacked the interest theory of rights, both introducing new arguments and claiming that interest theorists have not successfully deflected Gopal Sreenivasan's earlier arguments. This essay replies to all of McBride's criticisms, showing them to be mistaken
Legal Personhood and Animal Rights
A relatively recent form of animal activism is lawsuits intended to declare some animals as legal persons. A pioneer of this approach is the U.S.-based Nonhuman Rights Project (NhRP). This organization’s primary strategy has been to invoke the writ of habeas corpus, which protects the right to personal freedom of “persons.” The article criticizes the notion of legal personhood that the NhRP is employing and explains how an alternative understandi…
Active but not independent
This article seeks to contribute to a theoretical framework for understanding the status of children as legal persons in Western legal systems. Analytic legal philosophers have done much work in analysing concepts relevant for understanding the legal status of children. However, they have usually not approached childhood as a topic that warrants investigation in its own right, distinct from both infancy and adulthood. The article presents two mai…
A Theory of Legal Personhood
Legal personhood is a foundational concept of Western legal thought. It has recently become highly topical, underpinning contemporary debates over the legal status of animals, corporations, foetuses, natural objects, and artificial intelligences. The notion is furthermore crucial in explaining the historical legal statuses of women and slaves. Rather than addressing who or what should be a legal person, this book examines the concept itself. The …
Animals, Slaves, and Corporations
The Article analyzes the notion of legal "thinghood" in the context of the person-thing bifurcation. In legal scholarship, there are numerous assumptions pertaining to this definition that are often not spelled out. In addition, one's chosen definition of "thing" is often simply taken to be the correct one. The Article scrutinizes these assumptions and definitions. First, a brief history of the bifurcation is offered. Second, three possible defin…
Hohfeldian Infinities
Hillel Steiner has recently attacked the notion of inalienable rights, basing some of his arguments on the Hohfeldian analysis to show that infinite arrays of legal positions would not be associated with any inalienable rights. This essay addresses the nature of the Hohfeldian infinity: the main argument is that what Steiner claims to be an infinite regress is actually a wholly unproblematic form of infinite recursion. First, the nature of the Ho…
Can Nature Hold Rights? It's Not as Easy as You Think
The Rights of Nature movement has recently achieved significant successes in using legal personhood as a tool for environmental protection. Perhaps most famously, the Whanganui River in Aotearoa New Zealand was accorded legal personhood in 2017. These kinds of development have attracted plenty of scholarly interest, but few have scrutinized a foundational underlying question: Can natural areas, such as rivers, or other non-sentient natural entiti…
Animals, Slaves, and Corporations
The Article analyzes the notion of legal "thinghood" in the context of the person-thing bifurcation. In legal scholarship, there are numerous assumptions pertaining to this definition that are often not spelled out. In addition, one's chosen definition of "thing" is often simply taken to be the correct one. The Article scrutinizes these assumptions and definitions. First, a brief history of the bifurcation is offered. Second, three possible defin…
Hohfeldian Infinities
Hillel Steiner has recently attacked the notion of inalienable rights, basing some of his arguments on the Hohfeldian analysis to show that infinite arrays of legal positions would not be associated with any inalienable rights. This essay addresses the nature of the Hohfeldian infinity: the main argument is that what Steiner claims to be an infinite regress is actually a wholly unproblematic form of infinite recursion. First, the nature of the Ho…
Animals, Slaves, and Corporations
The Article analyzes the notion of legal "thinghood" in the context of the person-thing bifurcation. In legal scholarship, there are numerous assumptions pertaining to this definition that are often not spelled out. In addition, one's chosen definition of "thing" is often simply taken to be the correct one. The Article scrutinizes these assumptions and definitions. First, a brief history of the bifurcation is offered. Second, three possible defin…
A Theory of Legal Personhood
Legal personhood is a foundational concept of Western legal thought. It has recently become highly topical, underpinning contemporary debates over the legal status of animals, corporations, foetuses, natural objects, and artificial intelligences. The notion is furthermore crucial in explaining the historical legal statuses of women and slaves. Rather than addressing who or what should be a legal person, this book examines the concept itself. The …
The Interest Theory of Rights
In two recent papers, Mark McBride has attacked the interest theory of rights, both introducing new arguments and claiming that interest theorists have not successfully deflected Gopal Sreenivasan's earlier arguments. This essay replies to all of McBride's criticisms, showing them to be mistaken
Legal Personhood and Animal Rights
A relatively recent form of animal activism is lawsuits intended to declare some animals as legal persons. A pioneer of this approach is the U.S.-based Nonhuman Rights Project (NhRP). This organization’s primary strategy has been to invoke the writ of habeas corpus, which protects the right to personal freedom of “persons.” The article criticizes the notion of legal personhood that the NhRP is employing and explains how an alternative understandi…
Active but not independent
This article seeks to contribute to a theoretical framework for understanding the status of children as legal persons in Western legal systems. Analytic legal philosophers have done much work in analysing concepts relevant for understanding the legal status of children. However, they have usually not approached childhood as a topic that warrants investigation in its own right, distinct from both infancy and adulthood. The article presents two mai…
Can Nature Hold Rights? It's Not as Easy as You Think
The Rights of Nature movement has recently achieved significant successes in using legal personhood as a tool for environmental protection. Perhaps most famously, the Whanganui River in Aotearoa New Zealand was accorded legal personhood in 2017. These kinds of development have attracted plenty of scholarly interest, but few have scrutinized a foundational underlying question: Can natural areas, such as rivers, or other non-sentient natural entiti…
Does a Person Have a Right to Attention? Depends on What She is Doing
It has been debated whether the so-called attention economy , in which the attention of agents is measured and sold, jeopardizes something of value. One strand of this discussion has focused on so-called attention rights, asking: should attention be legally protected, either by introducing novel rights or by extending the scope of pre-existing rights? In this paper, however, in order to further this discussion, we ask: How is attention already pr…
A Bird's‐Eye View of Animals in the Law
The article develops an analytic account of nonhuman animals’ current legal status. Animals are often characterised as legal things and property, but this characterisation is both simplistic and, in some cases, incorrect. The article seeks to dispel a number of orthodoxies regarding the legal status of animals and offer a more nuanced and contextual account. The emphasis is on Western law, with a particular focus on European jurisdictions. The ar…
Law (7 works) · Political science (7 works) · Sociology (7 works) · Epistemology (5 works) · Law and economics (5 works) · Personhood (4 works) · Philosophy (4 works) · Environmental law and policy (3 works) · Free Will and Agency (3 works) · Legal principles and applications (3 works)