The Realm of Rights

For some 20 years now, Judith Jarvis Thomson has written penetrating, insightful and scrupulously argued essays on controversial issues involving rights. The most important of these were collected and edited by William Parent in a volume entitled Rights, Restitution, and Risk . In an Afterword, reflecting on these essays, she lists a number of things that she felt were lacking from her discussions. Three of them are particularly important: a clear account of what it is to have a right, a clear statement of what rights we have and a clear statement of the role that detailed discussions of controversial cases play in moral theory construction. The volume under review expands and refines her earlier work on rights, and provides a more systematic treatment by, among other things, filling these three gaps. Those familiar with her work will not be disappointed: the new book is as lucid, challenging, illuminating and vigorously argued as her earlier essays, but now affords an overview of the realm of rights, as well as a delineation and location of “the territory of rights” on “the continent of morality” (p. 3)

Environmental ethics · Epistemology · Human rights · Law and economics · Morality · Political science · Realm · Restitution · Sociology · Statement (logic) · Law · Philosophy · Political Philosophy and Ethics