This Philosophy Compass article continues the comparison between Confucian and mainstream Western views of personhood and their connection with ethics begun in Confucianism and Ethics in the Western Philosophical Tradition I: Fundamental Concepts , by focusing on the Western self conceived as an independent agent with moral and political rights. More specifically, the present article briefly accounts for how the more strictly and explicitly individualistic notion of self dominating Western philosophy has developed, leading up to a recent debate in modern (...) Western rights theory between Herbert Fingarette and Henry Rosemont, Jr., two contemporary Western philosophers who are both steeped in Confucian thought as well as moral and political philosophy. This discussion elucidates how Confucianism can be compared to, and even contrasted with some basic principles of modern Western rights theory and the more individualistic view of self they entail. In the end, a new view of personhood and "free will"? is offered that synthesizes insights from the Confucian treatment of persons as being essentially interdependent with the Western treatment of persons as being essentially independent. (shrink)

This paper offers a few elements of an answer to the question to what extent drug patents can be morally justified. Justifications based on natural rights, distributive justice and utilitarian arguments are discussed and criticized. The author recognizes the potential of the patents to benefit society but argues that the system is currently evolving in the wrong direction, particularly in the field of drugs. More than a third of the world’s population has no access to essential drugs. The working of (...) the patent system is an important determinant of access to drugs. This paper argues that drug patents are not easily justified and that the ‘architecture’ of the patent system should be rethought in view of its mission of benefiting society. (shrink)

Since the 1980s, developed countries, led by the United States and the countries of the European Union, have sought to incorporate intellectual property rights provisions into global trade agreements. These countries successfully negotiated the World Trade Organization's 1994 Agreement on Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights (TRIPS), which required developing countries to adopt intellectual property provisions comparable to developed countries. In this manuscript, we review the policy controversy surrounding TRIPS and examine the two main ethical arguments articulated in its support (...) — a theory of natural rights and a utilitarian argument. We contend that these theories provide insufficient bases for an intellectual property rights regime that compromises access to essential medicines in the developing world. While the policy community has engaged in active debate around the policy effects of TRIPS, scholars have not thoroughly considered the full ethical underpinnings of those policy arguments. We believe that a more robust understanding of the ethical implications of the agreement should inform policy discussions in the future. (shrink)

In recent decades, advances in information technology have given rise to a post-industrial society in which emphasis on the manufacture of material goods has been supplanted by the creation of intellectual property. Indeed, this new “knowledge economy” can be tracked by the exponential growth in patented products across a range of sectors since the 1980s. According to the United States Patent and Trademark Office, the number of annual patent applications submitted grew from 112,379 to 520,277 over the past three decades, (...) a 464% increase.The transformation in the industrial markets has been accompanied by the rise of a new, global institution for coordinating intellectual property rights : the World Trade Organization. (shrink)

Distributive justice relies on metaphors about spatial distribution. Modelling cross-temporal relations on cross-spatial relations in this way obscures how earlier groups become the later ones. Procedural justice metaphors rely on metaphors of contract and thereby on impartial reasoning. Their dominance is already problematic in the case of contemporary relations, but is even more so in the case of relations across time, where the conditions for later parties are controlled and created by earlier ones. Future generations should not be thought of (...) as a distinct group living at a different temporal “location,” but as who we will become. Thus, the frame of “justice” is much less appropriate for our relations to them than the frame of “care”. (shrink)

Distributive justice relies on metaphors about spatial distribution. Modelling cross-temporal relations on cross-spatial relations in this way obscures how earlier groups become the later ones. Procedural justice metaphors rely on metaphors of contract and thereby on impartial reasoning. Their dominance is already problematic in the case of contemporary relations, but is even more so in the case of relations across time, where the conditions for later parties are controlled and created by earlier ones. Future generations should not be thought of (...) as a distinct group living at a different temporal “location,” but as who we will become. Thus, the frame of “justice” is much less appropriate for our relations to them than the frame of “care”. (shrink)

The neutrality of the art and architecture of courtrooms and courthouses has dominated the public perception in the Indian context. The courtroom design and the visual artistic elements present within these judicial places have very often been considered to be insignificant to the notions of law and justice that they reflect. As art and architecture present certain historical narratives, reflect political allegories and have significant impact on the perceptions of their viewers, they have critical socio-political ramifications. This makes it pertinent (...) to explore them and investigate the paradox of their deployment and interpretation in today’s increasingly mediatized world. Through an ethnographic study of the Supreme Court of India, this paper interprets its art and architecture, and, the symbolism and semiotics reflected through them. Arguing against their neutrality and insignificance, the paper demonstrates how they reflect nationalism, certain ideologies and power-space dynamics. It further argues that they act as evidence of political metaphors related to justice, power and democracy. With a conversation between law, architecture and semiotics, the paper investigates the historical and spatial dimensions of its architecture and artistic elements. Mapping the Court’s architectural elements, I examine how the visual representation of ‘justice as virtue’ finds translation in its design through transfer of certain images, including the image of the ‘scales of justice’, into it, while absenting the notion of ‘justice as struggle’—to contemplate on how legal architecture gives evidence to the vexed relationship between law and justice and also of the break from the colonial past. (shrink)

Whatever else liberalism involves, it involves the idea that it is objectionable, and often wrong, for the state, or anyone else, to intervene, in certain ways, in certain choices. This article aims to evaluate different possible sources of support for this core liberal idea. The result is a pluralistic view. It defends, but also stresses the limits of, some familiar elements: that some illiberal interventions impair valuable activities and that some violate rights against certain kinds of invasion. More speculatively, it (...) points to two further sources of support for liberalism, each of which represents a certain kind of social standing: a self-sovereignty compromised simply by being subject to certain kinds of commands and a relational equality compromised by the condemnation of choices with which one’s group is identified. (shrink)