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What are rights? Do your rights make you free? What are the differences among political rights, civil rights, human rights, natural rights, individual rights, group rights, cultural rights, and constitutional rights? What are the philosophical foundations for these different kinds of rights, and what ends do they serve? What do they assume or imply about human identity and human reason? How do different conceptions of rights influence the structure of political society, and how do they reflect different understandings of the purposes of politics? Although some concept of rights is common to all theories of liberalism, not all theories of rights are the same. This course surveys four different conceptions of rights within the tradition of class ical liberalism, including those of (a) Hobbes and Locke, (b) Kant, (c) Montesquieu and Tocqueville, and (d) J.S. Mill. In addition, we will consider several different treatments of rights from the current political theory literature, and evaluate them in relation to several contemporary debates in American public life.
COURSE FORMAT: Discussion
Level: UGRD Credit: 1 Gen Ed Area Dept: SBS GOVT Grading Mode: Graded
Prerequisites: NONE
Last Updated on MAR-24-2000
Copyright Wesleyan University, Middletown, Connecticut, 06459