Description
Book SynopsisRespect for and promotion of human rights have come to be seen as the basis of legitimacy of modern Western civilization. There is nevertheless a striking contrast between our common view on the importance of rights and our profound disagreement on their meaning and content. This disagreement has become increasingly sharp in the last decades, due to the emergence of controversial "new rights". The author gives an in-depth account of the most important moral debates, exploring the ethical and political foundations underlying the different understandings of rights. In the first part, he focuses on the role played by the ideas of "good" and "reason" in the Thomistic-Aristotelian and Kantian traditions; and he compares those concepts with the main currents of contemporary liberalism, which, among other things, focus on our emancipation from the limits of nature. The book attempts to show the dehumanizing effects of denying the relevance of integral human good in defining the scope of human rights and liberties, and offers an alternative way forward for our understanding of human rights in a pluralistic society.
Trade ReviewBetween Desire and Reason is a very important and original contribution to what might be best called the ‘natural-law civil liberties’ project, inaugurated in effect by John Finnis’ Natural Law and Natural Rights in 1980, and probably best exemplified by Robert P. George’s 1993 Making Men Moral. Simón’s book is, in my judgment, the best book-length full-orbed treatment of contemporary problems in constitutional theory from this basic perspective since George’s magisterial text of 1993. The incorporation of key European court decision distinguishes it (in a welcome way) from even the best of the Anglo works of its kind. -- Gerard V. Bradley, Professor of Law, University of Notre Dame
This is an unfailingly clear and fair-minded, as well as deep and novel, critique of modern liberalism. The quality of Simón’s scholarship is high: I have learned a great deal from the book about both the classical tradition, and about the theories of Rawls, Dworkin, Singer, and Habermas. Simón’s objections to the modern liberal theories, grounded in a frankly teleological conception of human nature and in the work of Robert Spaemann, pose a challenge that is not easily set aside, demonstrating that they all rely on a paradoxically ‘ateleological teleology.’ -- Robert C. Koons, Professor of Philosophy, University of Texas at Austin
Fernando Simón’s book helps us understand where our deepest divergences lie, in order to build bridges that allow us to guarantee the stability of the liberal project of a well-ordered society. It is a book at the center of practical reason, in the place where philosophy, politics and law converge. -- José Juan Moreso, Professor of Legal Philosophy at Pompeu Fabra University of Barcelona
Table of ContentsPreface: A possible framework for understanding / Part I: Good and reason in two classical political traditions / 1. The Aristotelian-Thomistic tradition / 2. Immanuel Kant / Part II: Antiperfectionist liberalism and the desire principle / 3. "Free and equals": John Rawls's political philosophy / 4. "Equal concern and respect": Ronald Dworkin's philosophy of rights / 5. Goods and processes: Jürgen Habermas's ethical-political project / Part III: The dehumanization of human rights / 6. Mutual disinterest and civil liberties / 7. Desireless life and undesirable life / 8. Playing God? Promethean desires / Part IV. Constructive proposals / 9. Teleology of civil liberties / 10. Perfectionist liberalism and restriction of the rights discourse / Bibliography
