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This chapter addresses Knauer’s proportionalism as a consequentialist misinterpretation of double effect. It considers anti-consequentialist alternatives to DER, specifically Alan Donagan’s casuistry of material guilt and Frances Kamm’s non-absolutist Principle of Permissible Harm. Recent accounts of double effect, specifically those of Warren Quinn and the trio of Finnis, Grisez, and Boyle are found wanting.

This chapter examines the thought of the late John Rawls about the nature of the relationship between citizenship and religious belief and identity in liberal societies. In particular, it takes issue with Rawls's rejection of a teleological or perfectionist theory of citizenship, casting doubt on the success of political liberalism in rescuing the normative basis of citizenship from comprehensive theories that invoke some definite conception of the human good. Instead, the chapter suggests that a more promising approach is to be found in the ‘natural law’ thinking of Alan Gewirth and John Finnis, which argues for general human goods that are the common preconditions of any comprehensive doctrine.

Starts with an overview of the problem of capability and valuation in the context of Amartya Sen's capability approach. It describes the book as an attempt to operationalize the capability approach, and takes as a focal problem the need for a methodology by which Oxfam field staff in Pakistan could identify which ‘valuable’ capabilities a development activity had expanded or contracted. The rest of the chapter identifies the problem more precisely: Sen's capability approach is introduced, and several salient criticisms of it are reviewed; the need for a framework is discussed; and the approach taken by John Finnis summarized. Finally, the key terms and sources used in the book are introduced, and the structure of the book is outlined, showing the relation of each chapter to the overall topic. The chapters are tethered to the problem of how to identify, obtain, and process the information that is required to implement the capability approach in the assessment of poverty reduction initiatives at the micro‐economic level.

Each of the four chapters of Part I of the book synthesizes one aspect that must be specified in the operationalization of the capability approach, then proposes a framework for doing so. The issue of this second chapter is how one ‘specifies’ the dimensions of valuable functioning or capability. Martha Nussbaum's work on central human capabilities and John Finnis's work on basic human reasons for action are both presented, and then alternative accounts of universal human needs and values are briefly considered. The theoretical conception of basic human values that has been developed by Finnis is proposed as being a conception that enables and requires participatory dialogue in application, has objective foundations, and can also coherently engage with and be refined by the large and growing empirical literatures on happiness, subjective well‐being, quality of life indicators, and views of the poor—which have not been well‐integrated with poverty reduction approaches. This conception can also mesh well with methodological literatures on participation, and be used by persons with diverse philosophical approaches and opinions. Ends with a table listing the dimensions of human development from 39 different disciplines.

Each of the four chapters of Part I of the book synthesizes one aspect that must be specified in the operationalization of the capability approach, then proposes a framework for doing so. This third chapter considers the kind of ethical rationality that accompanies the capability approach, in which free choice between plural ends is given central place, and the information required to complete rational comparisons of diverse human development initiatives. The chapter proposes ingredients for making substantive and value judgements in dialogue with Amartya Sen's writings and concerns on related subjects. It is argued that the wider conception of rationality identified by Sen and John Finnis offer systematic ways of approaching substantive and value judgements that retain the fundamental incompleteness of the capability approach and do not impose a comprehensive doctrine of good. The different sections of the chapter are: Multidimensionality and Evaluation; Ethical Rationality in Poverty Reduction; Sen's Informational Pluralism; Sen's Principle Pluralism; Finnis's Principle Pluralism; Ethical Rationality Reconsidered; and Operational Considerations.

This chapter offers Thomas Aquinas's natural law as a useful way to define the higher law. Aquinas argues that there is and ought to be a necessary connection between law and Justice — the connection thesis. Natural law, Aquinas argues, is the way that humans participate in the eternal law through their use of reason. Just as Plato argued that we all possess a sense of Justice, Aquinas argues that we manifest that sense of Justice through the natural law.

This chapter reviews three theories that defend descriptivism about law. Jules Coleman offers an argument inspired by social science. It is rejected for introducing the methods of practical rationality for what is supposedly a matter for theoretical rationality. The same problem appears in John Finnis' constructive jurisprudence, which is best understood not as a descriptive pursuit but a project of practical reason. Similar problems cast doubt on Joseph Raz's suggestion of evaluative but detached descriptive jurisprudence. Raz's theory is compared to the hermeneutic philosophy of H. G. Gadamer and Charles Taylor. Nevertheless, it fails to show that the argument is descriptive. None of these arguments show jurisprudence to be a theoretical project. They all rely directly on practical premises and fail as theoretical pursuits because of this reliance. Hart's distinction between analytical and normative jurisprudence was mistaken from the start. Jurisprudence is a task of practical reason.

This chapter examines the key problem in liberal constitutional theory. It attempts to develop some theological understanding of the issues of constitutional and political theory connected with the judicial review of legislation, with special reference to the introduction of a Bill of Rights into British domestic law. It discusses Ronald Dworkin's defence of judicial review and John Finnis' criticism on Dworkin's position. This chapter also aims to produce a general theological account of the relation of the legislature and the judiciary.

Both John Finnis and Robert Alexy hold that law that lacks an adequate rational basis for compliance is defective as law. But only Alexy offers the right sort of argument to sustain this thesis. To defend natural law jurisprudence, however, is to defend the view that such non-defectiveness conditions play a central role in explaining law's existence conditions. It is thus crucial for natural law jurisprudence that it follow Alexy's rather than Finnis's lead.

This chapter is a treatment of standard natural law theory (Aquinas, Finnis, Lisska, MacIntyre), assessed in terms of its adequacy as a theistic explanation of moral law. This chapter argues that although natural law theory has flourished within theistic ethics, it is unsatisfactory as a theistic explanation of moral law: most natural law theories in fact have no role at all for theistic facts in their explanation of moral laws, and while there are ways to try to make room for facts about God in their explanations, the role for such facts turns out to be highly mediated. So natural law theory fails as an adequate theistic account of moral law. This chapter also shows that these arguments generalize to other broadly realist theories (utilitarianism, certain forms of Kantianism, virtue ethics) cast in a theistic way, and a fortiori to varieties of constructivism.

This chapter begins by offering positivist reconceptions of major juristic concepts such as formal justice, legal authority, normativity, and obligation. It then rebuts some natural-law arguments propounded by Deryck Beyleveled and Roger Brownsword, John Finnis, and Stephen Perry.

This chapter begins with a review of the Hart/Dworkin and Hart/Raz debates. It then turns to questions of methodology in jurisprudence. It argues for five propositions: first, that Dworkin's constructive interpretivism presents no pertinent challenge to legal positivism, since it is thoroughly question-begging; second, that the pertinent methodological challenge to positivism comes from Finnis, and that Dworkin himself needs Finnis-style argument to motivate interpretivism; third, that positivists can respond to and (with some qualifications) defeat this methodological challenge; fourth, that positivists can also (with some qualifications) rebut Perry's more recent version of Finnis-style arguments; and fifth, that Dickson's attempt to stake out a position (what she calls ‘indirectly evaluative legal theory’) intermediate between the methodological positivism or descriptivism of Hart and Finnis's position is a failure. Finally, the chapter turns to a larger debate about methodology that has come to the fore in epistemology, philosophy of mind, and ethics. It identifies some possible weaknesses of the descriptivist rebuttal to Finnis and argues for a different way of framing the methodology problem in jurisprudence.

The possibility that common sense might tell us what is worthwhile about life is explored further. A series of influential contemporary attempts to answer the question about life’s worth by appeal to intuition are considered; it is argued that they are all unsatisfactory. The chapter presses the claim that common sense and intuition are the wrong places to look for answers to this question, since they are likely to be tainted by collective self-delusions. The great anxiety human beings have about whether their lives are worth living inclines them to collude in affirming illusions that relieve that anxiety. A secular person should therefore treat all common intuitions about the worth of life with suspicion, affirming them only if they can be given further grounding.

The study of the thought of St. Thomas Aquinas draws one into considerations of the distinction and coexistence of reason and revelation, as well as of the divisions, pedagogical sequence and coexistence of the sciences. In the Summa theologiae (ST), St. Thomas insists from the start on the unity of his theological undertaking, while affirming the inclusion of all the philosophical or scientific endeavors, theoretical and practical, within this unity. John Finnis, in his book Natural Law and Natural Rights, calls attention to such issues by the very nature of his project. Finnis wishes to present a genuinely ethical discourse, as distinct from a metaphysical reflection on human action and human sciences, and he wishes to do so by making considerable use of the ethical discourse contained in the writings of Thomas Aquinas. This obliges him to say what he takes to be essential to the ethical discourse of St. Thomas and what he takes to be “speculative appendage added by way of metaphysical reflection to such ethical discourse.” Such judgments obviously comport risks, and this chapter highlights some features of St. Thomas's doctrine of natural law that may be obscured in the Finnis presentation. Concerning Finnis's positions, it focuses on two points: (1) his view of the first principles of practical reason as underived; and (2) the role of our knowledge of God in natural law.

This chapter questions John Finnis's interpretation of Thomas Aquinas, concerning the specifically political common good. It is evident that Thomas limits the zone of human life subject to direction by the human legislator. Not only is God to be obeyed rather than man, but man's jurisdiction over man is not all embracing and leaves room for personal responsibility in such key areas as marriage. Finnis finds Thomas's justification of the limits not altogether clear, and proposes a conception of specifically political society as that of Thomas—a conception that is held to help clarify the situation. The said conception seeks to present political society as something less that a “basic human good.” It is argued that the “society” mentioned in Summa theologiae (ST) 1-2.94.2 is primarily political society; that we have a natural inclination to life in political society; and that the goal of the legislator is the development of virtue in the citizen. Thomas gives good reasons for limiting the role of the legislator, and indeed limits the common good of political society (to merely human virtue). Those limits imply the wider common good of the whole of reality. Thus, the Finnis appeal to private or personal zones is inadequate if the goal is to interpret Thomas.

Philosophers conventionally distinguish between intentional actions and actions which are merely foreseen. The criminal law endorses that distinction, and applies a condition of unreasonableness before any foreseen action is declared reckless. This chapter challenges the standard view that intention has moral primacy and suggests that the difference between intentional and advertent wrongdoing is not to be measured in degrees of culpability, but is instead worked out in terms of what actions may legitimately be invoked to justify wrongdoing. The central moral distinction between intended actions and those merely foreseen is that the foreseen do not lend any favourable weight to the justification of the intended. Before addressing the question of intrinsic moral distinctions, this chapter considers the possibility that there might also be instrumental reasons for the law to distinguish between intention and advertence. It examines A. Kenny's views on actus reus, intention, foresight, and the probability of harm, and John M. Finnis's arguments on incommensurability and justification as well as the moral distinctions between ends, means, and side-effects.

The book’s main concern is with the defense of natural law theory against criticism from various quarters and its application to problems at different levels of philosophical abstractness. The method used is primarily dialectical and the book proceeds by engaging arguments against the positions it seeks to defend and when possible, examines the arguments advanced by scholars who are critical of these positions. The book identifies plausible arguments against the view expressed here and tries to rebut these arguments, when that is not possible. The theory that the book defends and applies was originally adumbrated by Germain Grisez and substantially developed by the latter, often in formal or informal collaboration with Joseph M. Boyle, Jr., John Finnis, and others.