Ratio Juris 26 (1):16-46 (2013)
Authors | |
Abstract |
Legal positivism lacks a comprehensive theory of legal obligation. Hart's account of legal obligation, if successful, would explain only how the rule of recognition obligates officials. There is nothing in Hart's account of social obligation and social norms that would explain how the legal norms that govern citizen behavior give rise to legal obligations. However, we cannot give a theoretical explanation of the concept of legal obligation without a theoretical explanation of the concept of obligation. If legal, social and moral obligations are three instances of the kind defined by “obligation,” then we cannot successfully explicate the nature of legal, social or moral obligations without a successful general conceptual theory of obligation. In what follows, I attempt to develop what I take to be the central elements of the general concept of obligation. I argue that obligations are (1) associated with mandatory prescriptions; (2) reasons for action; (3) exclusionary in the sense that certain reasons are excluded as an excuse of justification for non-performance; and (4) “binding” in the sense that they have a special normative force. At the end of the paper, I briefly argue that our shared concept of obligation is indeterminate with respect to one theoretically important case, the issue of whether the rules of a crime gang that includes some sort of rule-defining procedures for making rules governing members obligate gang members if accepted as legitimate by the members
|
Keywords | No keywords specified (fix it) |
Categories | (categorize this paper) |
DOI | 10.1111/raju.12001 |
Options |
![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() |
Download options
References found in this work BETA
Morality as a System of Hypothetical Imperatives.Philippa Foot - 1972 - Philosophical Review 81 (3):305-316.
View all 14 references / Add more references
Citations of this work BETA
The Institutionality Of Legal Validity.Kenneth M. Ehrenberg - 2020 - Philosophy and Phenomenological Research 100 (2):277-301.
Ontology and Reason Giving in Law.Kenneth M. Ehrenberg - 2016 - In Pawel Banas, Adam Dyrda & Tomasz Gizbert-Studnicki (eds.), Metaphilosophy of Law. Hart. pp. 147-158.
Vernunft Und Verbindlichkeit. Moralische Wahrheit in Dem Natur- Und Völkerrecht der Deutschen Aufklärung.Katerina Mihaylova - 2015 - In Simon Bunke, Katerina Mihaylova & Daniela Ringkamp (eds.), Das Band der Gesellschaft. Tübingen, Deutschland: pp. 59-78.
La práctica Del alterum non laedere.Diego M. Papayannis - 2014 - Isonomía. Revista de Teoría y Filosofía Del Derecho 41:19-68.
Similar books and articles
Justice: Legal and Moral Debt in Aquinas.Stephen Theron - 2004 - American Catholic Philosophical Quarterly 78 (4):559-571.
Was Austin Right After All? On the Role of Sanctions in a Theory of Law.Frederick Schauer - 2010 - Ratio Juris 23 (1):1-21.
The Feasibility of Collectives' Actions.Holly Lawford-Smith - 2012 - Australasian Journal of Philosophy 90 (3):453-467.
Legal Obligation as a Duty of Deference.Kimberley Brownlee - 2008 - Law and Philosophy 27 (6):583 - 597.
Legal Validity as Doxastic Obligation: From Definition to Normativity. [REVIEW]Giovanni Sartor - 2000 - Law and Philosophy 19 (5):585-625.
What is Political About Political Obligation? A Neglected Lesson From Consent Theory.Dorota Mokrosińska - 2013 - Critical Review of International Social and Political Philosophy 16 (1):88-108.
Military Service and Moral Obligation.Hugo Adam Bedau - 1971 - Inquiry: An Interdisciplinary Journal of Philosophy 14 (1-4):244 – 266.
The Moral Limits of Law: Obedience, Respect, and Legitimacy.Ruth C. A. Higgins - 2004 - Oxford University Press.
Analytics
Added to PP index
2013-03-01
Total views
34 ( #332,938 of 2,499,228 )
Recent downloads (6 months)
1 ( #418,195 of 2,499,228 )
2013-03-01
Total views
34 ( #332,938 of 2,499,228 )
Recent downloads (6 months)
1 ( #418,195 of 2,499,228 )
How can I increase my downloads?
Downloads