Responsible Citizens, Irresponsible States

Responsible Citizens, Irresponsible States
Author: Avia Pasternak
Publisher: Oxford University Press
Total Pages:
Release: 2021-08-13
Genre: Philosophy
ISBN: 0197541054

States are often held responsible for their wrongdoings. States pay compensation for their unjust wars, as did Iraq in the aftermath of its invasion of Kuwait. States pay reparations for their historical wrongdoings, as did Chile to the victims of the Pinochet Regime, or Germany to Israel and other countries because of the Holocaust. Some argue that they should pay punitive damages for their international crimes as well. But state responsibility has a troubling feature: states are corporate agents, comprising flesh and blood citizens. When they turn to the public purse to finance their corporate liabilities, it is their citizens who pay the price. Even citizens who protested against their state's policies, did not know about them, or had no influence on policy makers end up sharing the burden. Why should these citizens pay for their state's wrongdoings, if they don't carry the blame? Responsible Citizens, Irresponsible States develops a fresh justification for citizens' duties to share the burden of their state's wrongdoings. This justification revolves around citizens' participation in their state: drawing on recent debates in the philosophy of collective action, Avia Pasternak shows that citizens are acting together in their state and that their state policies are the product of this collective action. Given this participation, citizens ought to share the burden of remedying harmful wrongs their state policies bring about. However, she also argues that not all citizens in all states are participating in their state. In many authoritarian states, citizens' participation in the state is highly restricted or coerced. Here, ordinary citizens do not share responsibility for their state policies and should not be forced to pay for them. These conclusions carry significant real-world implications for the way domestic international law holds various types of states, and their citizens, responsible for their wrongdoings. This work is essential for political theorists and philosophers grappling with citizen responsibility and duty.

Responsible Citizens, Irresponsible States

Responsible Citizens, Irresponsible States
Author: Avia Pasternak
Publisher: Oxford University Press
Total Pages: 265
Release: 2021
Genre: Philosophy
ISBN: 0197541038

"International and domestic laws commonly hold states responsible for their wrongdoings. States pay compensation for their unjust wars, and reparations for their historical wrongdoings. Some argue that states should incur punitive damages for their international crimes. But there is a troubling aspect to these practices: States are corporate agents, comprised of flesh and blood citizens. When the state uses the public purse to finance its corporate liabilities, the burden falls on these citizens, even if they protested against the state's policies, did not know about them, or entirely lacked channels of political influence. How can this "distributive effect" of state-level responsibly be justified? The book develops an answer to this question, which revolves around citizens' participation in their state. It argues that citizenship can be a type of massive collective action, where citizens willingly orient themselves around the authority of their state, and where state policies are the product of this collective action. While most ordinary citizens are not to blame for their participation in their state, they nevertheless ought to accept a share of the remedial obligations that flow from their state's wrongful policies. However, the distributive effect cannot be justified in all states. Specifically, in (some) non-democratic states most citizens are not participating in their state in the full sense, and should not pay for their state's wrongdoings. This finding calls then for a revision of the way we hold states responsible in both the domestic and international levels"--

Not In Their Name

Not In Their Name
Author: Holly Lawford-Smith
Publisher: Oxford University Press
Total Pages: 193
Release: 2019-02-14
Genre: Philosophy
ISBN: 0192570331

There are many actions that we attribute, at least colloquially, to states. Given their size and influence, states are able to inflict harm far beyond the reach of a single individual. But there is a great deal of unclarity about exactly who is implicated in that kind of harm, and how we should think about responsibility for it. It is a commonplace assumption that democratic publics both authorize and have control over what their states do; that their states act in their name and on their behalf. In Not In Their Name, Holly Lawford-Smith approaches these questions from the perspective of social ontology, asking whether the state is a collective agent, and whether ordinary citizens are members of that agent. If it is, and they are, there's a clear case for democratic collective culpability. She explores alternative conceptions of the state and of membership in the state; alternative conceptions of collective agency applied to the state; the normative implications of membership in the state; and both culpability (from the inside) and responsibility (from the outside) for what the state does. Ultimately, Lawford-Smith argues for the exculpation of ordinary citizens and the inculpation of those working in public services.

Irresponsible Citizenship

Irresponsible Citizenship
Author: Jean-François Caron
Publisher: Peter Lang Us
Total Pages: 76
Release: 2021
Genre: COVID-19 pandemic, 2020-
ISBN: 9781433189081

The Covid-19 pandemic has revealed the serious crisis of political authorities that liberal societies are currently experiencing. Indeed, a significant number of individuals living in these societies did not hesitate to defy the sanitary rules enacted by their government which has made it difficult for them to stop the virus from spreading. What can explain such a situation? This is what this book is discussing. Whether it is the growing popularity of conspiracy theories, the distrust towards governments or cultural and religious beliefs that take precedence over the respect of governments' directives, all these factors that have led so many individuals to act in an irresponsible way during the pandemic find their roots in the liberal tradition as it originated in the 18th century and in its more recent development which has had the effect of decentralizing the individual from his collective responsibilities in favor of an almost unlimited enjoyment of his individual freedom. This health crisis has revealed the urgency for liberal societies to establish a better balance between collective interest and individual freedom through responsible citizenship capable of protecting its citizens against the adoption of draconian measures when they will be struck again by upcoming pandemics that appear to be unfortunately inevitable.

The Universal Declaration of Human Rights in the 21st Century

The Universal Declaration of Human Rights in the 21st Century
Author: Gordon Brown
Publisher: Open Book Publishers
Total Pages: 129
Release: 2016-04-18
Genre: Political Science
ISBN: 1783742216

The Global Citizenship Commission was convened, under the leadership of former British Prime Minister Gordon Brown and the auspices of NYU’s Global Institute for Advanced Study, to re-examine the spirit and stirring words of The Universal Declaration of Human Rights. The result – this volume – offers a 21st-century commentary on the original document, furthering the work of human rights and illuminating the ideal of global citizenship. What does it mean for each of us to be members of a global community? Since 1948, the Declaration has stood as a beacon and a standard for a better world. Yet the work of making its ideals real is far from over. Hideous and systemic human rights abuses continue to be perpetrated at an alarming rate around the world. Too many people, particularly those in power, are hostile to human rights or indifferent to their claims. Meanwhile, our global interdependence deepens. Bringing together world leaders and thinkers in the fields of politics, ethics, and philosophy, the Commission set out to develop a common understanding of the meaning of global citizenship – one that arises from basic human rights and empowers every individual in the world. This landmark report affirms the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and seeks to renew the 1948 enterprise, and the very ideal of the human family, for our day and generation.

Our Ageless Constitution

Our Ageless Constitution
Author: W. David Stedman
Publisher: National Book Network
Total Pages: 292
Release: 1987
Genre: Constitutional history
ISBN: 9780937047255

Promoting Justice Across Borders

Promoting Justice Across Borders
Author: Lucia M. Rafanelli
Publisher: Oxford University Press
Total Pages: 281
Release: 2024-01-11
Genre: Law
ISBN: 0197770568

Global political actors, from states and NGOs to activist groups and individuals, exert influence in societies beyond their own in myriad ways--including via public criticism, consumer boycotts, divestment campaigns, sanctions, and forceful intervention. Often, they do so in the name of justice-promotion. While attempts to promote justice in other societies can do good, they are also often subject to moral criticism and raise several serious moral questions. For example, are there ways to promote one's own ideas about justice in another society while still treating its members tolerantly? Are there ways to do so without disrespecting their legitimate political institutions or undermining their collective self-determination? To understand the ethics of justice-promoting intervention, Lucia M. Rafanelli moves beyond the traditional focus of other scholarship in this area on states waging wars or employing other conventional tools of coercive foreign policy. Specifically, Rafanelli constructs a philosophically-grounded and nuanced ethics of intervention to determine when attempts to promote justice in foreign societies are morally permissible. Promoting Justice Across Borders develops ethical standards for justice-promoting intervention that call on us to rethink received notions about the ordinary bounds of politics, and to abandon the thought that politics does and should take place primarily within the state. These ethical standards also give us a model for how to engage in political struggles for justice on a global scale--not only in conditions of supreme emergency, but in the ordinary circumstances of everyday global politics. They therefore form the basis of a cosmopolitanism that is neither premised upon nor aimed at bringing about the end of politics. Ultimately, Rafanelli shows how the promotion of justice everywhere can be the legitimate (political) concern of people anywhere.

The Politics

The Politics
Author: Aristotle
Publisher: Penguin UK
Total Pages: 455
Release: 1981-09-17
Genre: Philosophy
ISBN: 0141913266

Twenty-three centuries after its compilation, 'The Politics' still has much to contribute to this central question of political science. Aristotle's thorough and carefully argued analysis is based on a study of over 150 city constitutions, covering a huge range of political issues in order to establish which types of constitution are best - both ideally and in particular circumstances - and how they may be maintained. Aristotle's opinions form an essential background to the thinking of philosophers such as Thomas Aquinas, Machiavelli and Jean Bodin and both his premises and arguments raise questions that are as relevant to modern society as they were to the ancient world.

From Poverty to Power

From Poverty to Power
Author: Duncan Green
Publisher: Oxfam
Total Pages: 540
Release: 2008
Genre: Social Science
ISBN: 0855985933

Offers a look at the causes and effects of poverty and inequality, as well as the possible solutions. This title features research, human stories, statistics, and compelling arguments. It discusses about the world we live in and how we can make it a better place.

The Responsibility of Intellectuals

The Responsibility of Intellectuals
Author: Noam Chomsky
Publisher: The New Press
Total Pages: 112
Release: 2017-11-07
Genre: Philosophy
ISBN: 1620973642

Selected by Newsweek as one of “14 nonfiction books you’ll want to read this fall” Fifty years after it first appeared, one of Noam Chomsky’s greatest essays will be published for the first time as a timely stand-alone book, with a new preface by the author As a nineteen-year-old undergraduate in 1947, Noam Chomsky was deeply affected by articles about the responsibility of intellectuals written by Dwight Macdonald, an editor of Partisan Review and then of Politics. Twenty years later, as the Vietnam War was escalating, Chomsky turned to the question himself, noting that "intellectuals are in a position to expose the lies of governments" and to analyze their "often hidden intentions." Originally published in the New York Review of Books, Chomsky's essay eviscerated the "hypocritical moralism of the past" (such as when Woodrow Wilson set out to teach Latin Americans "the art of good government") and exposed the shameful policies in Vietnam and the role of intellectuals in justifying it. Also included in this volume is the brilliant "The Responsibility of Intellectuals Redux," written on the tenth anniversary of 9/11, which makes the case for using privilege to challenge the state. As relevant now as it was in 1967, The Responsibility of Intellectuals reminds us that "privilege yields opportunity and opportunity confers responsibilities." All of us have choices, even in desperate times.