The law of armed conflict prevents the coerced extraction of information from Prisoners of War (PoWs). We claim, however, that the letter of that law involves too broad a concept of coercion. On a natural reading, there is a sense in which any extraction of information—by any method—is coercive. We respect the notion that PoWs ought not be treated poorly, but we argue “coercion” should not be understood so broadly. With respect to its use in international law, we favor a (...) moralized notion of “coercion,” as opposed to a non-moralized one. We explain what this means, and argue why this is a better reading of the law. We think a moralized notion of coercion is more intuitive, is more in line with both actual practice and the intent of the framers of international law, and has practical benefits as well. (shrink)

Political ethics, a subfield of applied ethics, is concerned with normative questions about voters, politicians, lobbyists, and other individual political agents. Compared with other fields in applied ethics political ethics has not developed into an area of intense interest in academic philosophy. Debates over the main questions in political ethics occur in mainstream news, on social media, in living rooms and neighborhood bars, etc., but for the most part have not bled over into the pages of philosophy journals and books. (...) This volume aims to fill this gap in the philosophical literature. It contains seventeen original papers by a diverse range of leading scholars on central questions in political ethics. (shrink)

Some might argue that a right to access information is problematic, as it requires too much from others. Being a "positive right," the possession of which foists upon others a duty to provide something, an RAI might be thought to contrast with a "negative right," such as the right not to be harmed. Here, other people have duties only to refrain from performing certain actions. The critics this paper is concerned with continue that positive rights are problematic, where negative rights (...) are not, since the former obligate people to do something, which is more taxing than obligating people not to do something. So according to a critic of RAIs, such rights are difficult, if not impossible, to justify.This paper takes no position on whether an RAI is positive or negative. It also does not argue whether positive rights can be justified or not. Instead, it argues that, if an RAI is positive, then so are intellectual property rights . This is significant, as critics of RAIs may hold to IPRs. . This paper argues against that one cannot reject an RAI on the basis of its being a positive right without also losing their justification for IPRs. If this is correct, then, proponents of intellectual property who reject an RAI must find independent justification for the former, which itself will not extend to the latter.This is good news for the defender of RAIs, since the sting is removed from one potential criticism thereof. If people have an RAI, this is not anymore burdensome than other rights currently in effect. (shrink)

Most research in political philosophy focuses on issues related to states and governments. Only rarely do political philosophers focus on the ethical actions of individuals—voters, lobbyists, politicians, party members—acting within large-scale political systems. _Political Ethics _works against the dominant paradigm, offering twenty-one, never before-published essays on the ethics of non-statist political agents. The chapters cover three major areas of political ethics: The Rights and Obligations of Politicians; The Rights and Obligations of Citizens; and Political Parties. The volume is a ground-breaking (...) collection, aiming to alter future direction of political philosophy. (shrink)

This paper is a critique of the current US patent system along general consequentialist lines. I present a pro tanto case against it because of its effects on scientific inquiry. The patent system is often thought to be justified because it provides incentives to innovate. I challenge this concern. Economists and legal scholars have spent a good portion of time analyzing particular aspects of the patent system. I here synthesize their work, showing how it amounts to a pro tanto moral (...) case against patents. This is the case even though patents are said to incentivize innovation, its disclosure, and its transfer to interested parties. I explore all of these possibilities, finding them to only weakly support the institution of patent rights. Juxtaposing this weak case for patents along with various problems that patents cause for science, we find a pro tanto case against our current patent system. To my knowledge, no one has tried to synthesize the various concerns I raise, with particular attention to not only the patent’s system purported ability to incentivize innovation, but also to disclose and transfer technology. (shrink)