CHAPTER 18: IMMANUEL KANT’S THEORY OF RIGHTS
It is common for Kant's rights-based liberalism to be contrasted with the communitarian
authoritarianism of the later Fichte and of Hegel, and it is the concept of autonomy that is
generally regarded as the theoretical fount of Kant's theory of natural rights, providing the
analytical link between Kant's moral philosophy and his political and legal theory. The author
argues that this view is erroneous: The notion of autonomy ultimately remains content less and
incapable of providing practical political and legal prescriptions without Kant's substantive
account of human nature, an account specifying both the proper moral ends that humans should
strive for and the anthropological limits of human perfectibility. Kant's theory of rights is informed
by both sets of considerations. Contrary to the received view, Kant develops a socially sensitive
account of the self in his later writings, and comes to believe that individual autonomy depends
in large measure on the realization of certain propitious sociocultural and political arrangements.
For Kant, natural rights, like individual freedom, are not ahistorical, universal standards of
political justice but the historical outcome of the long process of enlightenment. As such, what is
right will depend on what is timely. Here Kant is much closer to Fichte and Hegel than is
generally acknowledged.
LEARNING OUTCOMES
After this lesson, the student should be able to:
1. articulate the rights theory;
2. differentiate a legal and a moral right; and
3. make use of the rights theory.
Kant, unlike Mill, believed that certain types of actions (including murder, theft, and lying)
were absolutely prohibited, even in cases where the action would bring about more happiness
than the alternative. For Kantians, there are two questions that we must ask ourselves
whenever we decide to act: (i) Can I rationally will that everyone act as I propose to act? If the
answer is no, then we must not perform the action. (ii) Does my action respect the goals of
human beings rather than merely using them for my own purposes? Again, if the answer is no,
then we must not perform the action. (Kant believed that these questions were equivalent).
Kant’s theory is an example of a deontological moral theory–according to these
theories, the rightness or wrongness of actions does not depend on their consequences but on
whether they fulfill our duty.
Kant believed that there was a supreme principle of morality, and he referred to it
as The Categorical Imperative. The CI determines what our moral duties are.
Morality and imperatives: What does it mean for one's duty to be determined by the
categorical imperative?
What is an imperative? An imperative is a command. So, "Pay your taxes!" is an imperative,
as are "Stop kicking me!" and "Don't kill animals!"
Hypothetical Imperatives: these imperatives command conditionally on your having a relevant
desire. E.g. “If you want to go to medical school, study biology in college.” If you don’t want to
go to medical school, this command doesn’t apply to you. Another example, your father says,
"if you are hungry, then go eat something!" - if you aren't hungry, then you are free to ignore the
command.
Categorical Imperatives: These command unconditionally. E.g. “Don’t cheat on your
taxes.” Even if you want to cheat and doing so would serve your interests, you may not cheat.
What is the connection between morality and categorical imperatives? Morality must be
based on the categorical imperative because morality is such that you are commanded by it,
and is such that you cannot opt out of it or claim that it does not apply to you.
How does the categorical imperative work? The categorical imperative has three different
formulations. That is to say, there are three different ways of saying what it is. Kant claims that
all three do in fact say the same thing, but it is currently disputed whether this is true. The
second formulation is the easiest to understand, but the first one is most clearly a categorical
imperative. Here is the first formulation.
1) First formulation (The Formula of Universal Law): "Act only on that maxim through which you
can at the same time will that it should become a universal law [of nature]."
a) What is a maxim? A maxim is the rule or principle on which you act. For example, I might
make it my maxim to give at least as much to charity each year as I spend on eating out, or I
might make it my maxim only to do what will benefit some member of my family.
b) Basic idea: The command states, crudely, that you are not allowed to do anything yourself
that you would not be willing to allow everyone else to do as well. You are not allowed to make
exceptions for yourself. For example, if you expect other people to keep their promises, then
you are obligated to keep your own promises.
c) More detail: More accurately, it commands that every maxim you act on must be such that
you are willing to make it the case that everyone always act on that maxim when in a similar
situation. For example, if I wanted to lie to get something I wanted, I would have to be willing to
make it the case that everyone always lied to get what they wanted - but if this were to happen
no one would ever believe you, so the lie would not work and you would not get what you
wanted. So, if you willed that such a maxim (of lying) should become a universal law, then you
would thwart your goal - thus, it is impermissible to lie, according to the categorical imperative.
It is impermissible because the only way to lie is to make an exception for yourself.
Kant on Moral Worth
The Moral Worth of Persons: Kant also has something to say about what makes someone a
good person. Keep in mind that Kant intends this to go along with the rest of his theory, and
what one's duty is would be determined by the categorical imperative. However, one can treat
this as a separate theory to some extent, and consider that one's duty is determined by some
other standard. Keep in mind that what is said below has to do with how one evaluates people,
not actions. A person's actions are right or wrong, a person is morally worthy or lacks moral
worth (i.e., is morally base). A person's actions determine her moral worth, but there is more to
this than merely seeing if the actions are right or wrong.
a) Background concepts: This chart should help explain the basics.
Our Perfect duties (duties of justice) are negative in that they require that
we never perform certain types of actions, and can only be fulfilled in very specific ways.
-Our Imperfect duties (duties of virtue) are positive in that they require that
we sometimes perform certain types of actions.
Illustration: We have a perfect duty not to murder. This means that we must never murder
under any circumstances. We have an imperfect duty to help the needy. This means that we
should do so on occasion, where this does not conflict with our perfect duties.
Examples:
Duties Perfect Imperfect
To Others tell truth assist others in need
don’t break promises help others achieve goals
don’t steal, murder, enslave
To Self no suicide or
develop talents
other forms of self-destruction
b) The basic idea: Kant argues that a person is good or bad depending on the motivation of
their actions and not on the goodness of the consequences of those actions. By "motivation" I
mean what caused you to do the action (i.e., your reason for doing it). Kant argues that one can
have moral worth (i.e., be a good person) only if one is motivated by morality. In other words, if
a person's emotions or desires cause them to do something, then that action cannot give them
moral worth. This may sound odd, but there is good reason to agree with Kant.
c) Why motivation is what matters: Imagine that I win the lottery and I'm wondering what to
do with the money. I look around for what would be the most fun to do with it: buy a yacht,
travel in first class around the world, get that knee operation, etc.. I decide that what would be
really fun is to give the money to charity and to enjoy that special feeling you get from making
people happy, so I give all my lottery money away. According to Kant, I am not a morally worthy
person because I did this, after all I just did whatever I thought would be the most fun and there
is nothing admirable about such a selfish pursuit. It was just lucky for those charities that I
thought giving away money was fun. Moral worth only comes when you do something because
you know that it is your duty and you would do it regardless of whether you liked it.
d) Why consequences don't matter: A reason why Kant is not concerned with consequences
can be seen in the following example. Imagine two people out together drinking at a bar late
one night, and each of them decides to drive home very drunk. They drive in different directions
through the middle of nowhere. One of them encounters no one on the road, and so gets home
without incident regardless of totally reckless driving. The other drunk is not so lucky and
encounters someone walking at night, and kills the pedestrian with the car. Kant would argue
that based on these actions both drunks are equally bad, and the fact that one person got lucky
does not make them any better than the other drunk. After all, they both made the same
choices, and nothing within either one's control had anything to do with the difference in their
actions. The same reasoning applies to people who act for the right reasons. If both people act
for the right reasons, then both are morally worthy, even if the actions of one of them happen to
lead to bad consequences by bad luck.
e) The wrong interpretation: Consider the case described above about the lottery winner
giving to charity. Imagine that he gives to a charity and he intends to save hundreds of starving
children in a remote village. The food arrives in the village but a group of rebels finds out that
they have food, and they come to steal the food and end up killing all the children in the village
and the adults too. The intended consequence of feeding starving children was good, and the
actual consequences were bad. Kant is not saying that we should look at the intended
consequences in order to make a moral evaluation. Kant is claiming that regardless of intended
or actual consequences, moral worth is properly assessed by looking at the motivation of the
action, which may be selfish even if the intended consequences are good.
f) Kant does not forbid happiness: A careful reader may notice that in the example above
one of the selfish person's intended consequences is to make himself happy, and so it might
seem to be that intended consequences do matter. One might think Kant is claiming that if one
of my intentions is to make myself happy, that my action is not worthy. This is a mistake. The
consequence of making myself happy is a good consequence, even according to Kant. Kant
clearly thinks that people being happy is a good thing. There is nothing wrong with doing
something with an intended consequence of making yourself happy, that is not selfishness. You
can get moral worth doing things that you enjoy, but the reason you are doing them cannot be
that you enjoy them, the reason must be that they are required by duty. Also, there is a
tendency to think that Kant says it is always wrong to do something that just causes your own
happiness, like buying an ice cream cone. This is not the case. Kant thinks that you ought to
do things to make yourself happy as long as you make sure that they are not immoral (i.e.,
contrary to duty), and that you would refrain from doing them if they were immoral. Getting ice
cream is not immoral, and so you can go ahead and do it. Doing it will not make you a morally
worthy person, but it won't make you a bad person either. Many actions which are permissible
but not required by duty are neutral in this way.
g) Summary: According to Kant a good person is someone who always does their duty
because it is their duty. It is fine if they enjoy doing it, but it must be the case that they would do
it even if they did not enjoy it. The overall theme is that to be a good person you must be good
for goodness sake. According to him, perfect duties (duties of justice) can appropriately be
enforced by means of the public, juridical use of coercion, and the remainder are imperfect
duties (duties of virtue), which are fit subjects for moral assessment but not coercion.
ASSESSMENT
On a separate sheet of paper, do the following activities as directed:
1. Sanda is a ten-year old girl who is suffering from Polio. As days go by, the doctor decided to
isolate Sanda because of a pulmonary complication and needs to be brought to a secluded
place somewhere in the middle of a farm the family owns. Her mother disapproves of the
doctor’s decision as this would affect the girl physically and emotionally. Assess and
decide the mother’s act using Kant’s Theory of Rights.
2. Draw a table showing the similarities and differences of legal and moral right.
3. Francisca, a sales agent, offered a house and lot to her friends who are newly married,
which the latter agreed to buy on the condition that the property will be paid for 5 years on
installment basis. After three years, the couple failed to pay the remaining balance because
the wife had an ailment which made them prioritize hospitalizations and other medical-
related needs. The sales agent decided to continue the payment without the couple’s
consent and later forced them to sign a waiver for the subject property asserting that the
same is stipulated in the agreement. The agent successfully transferred the property in her
name without paying the couple all the previous payments already made. She explained
that there is need to transfer the property so that ownership will not be returned to Jerica
Real State Company. Write an Analysis Paper highlighting why the option taken by the
agent may be legal but not moral.
Reference
Kant, Immanuel, :Categorical Imperative”. In Groundwork of the Metaphysics of Morals,
translated by H.J. Paton, 162-76. New York: Harper and Row Publishers Inc., 1964