The Ethics of Capital Punishment: A Philosophical Investigation of Evil and its Consequences

KRAMER, Matthew H.

OUP Oxford

This book is an uncompromising defense of legal positivism that insists on the separability of law and morality. After distinguishing among three facets of morality, Kramer explores a variety of ways in which law has been perceived as integrally connected to each of those facets. The book concludes with a detailed discussion of the obligation to obey the law--a discussion that highlights the strengths of legal positivism in the domain of political philosophy as much as in the domain of jurisprudence.

In Defense of Legal Positivism: Law without Trimmings

Politics & Social Sciences

Philosophy

Oxford University Press

Torture and Moral Integrity tackles a concrete moral problem that has been hotly debated by governments, scholars, and the media: the morality of interrogational torture. It discusses multiple types of torture with great philosophical acuity and seeks to explain why interrogational torture and other types of torture are always and everywhere morally wrong. At the same time, it rigorously plumbs the general structure of morality and the intricacies of moral conflicts and probes some of the chief grounds for the moral illegitimacy of various modes of conduct. It defends a deontological conception of morality against the subtle critiques that have been mounted over the past few decades by proponents of consequentialism. Kramer's recommendations concerning the legal consequences of the perpetration of torture by public officials or private individuals, for example, are based squarely on his more abstract accounts of the nature of torture and the nature of morality. His philosophical reflections on the structure of morality are a vital background for his approach to torture, and his approach to torture is a natural outgrowth of those philosophical reflections.

Torture and Moral Integrity: A Philosophical Enquiry

Ethics & Professional Responsibility

During the past several decades, political philosophers have frequently clashed with one another over the question whether governments are morally required to remain neutral among reasonable conceptions of excellence and human flourishing. Whereas the numerous followers of John Rawls (and kindred philosophers such as Ronald Dworkin) have maintained that a requirement of neutrality is indeed incumbent on every system of governance, other philosophers -- often designated as 'perfectionists' -- have argued against the existence of such a requirement.  Liberalism with Excellence enters these debates not by plighting itself unequivocally to one side or the other, but instead by reconceiving each of the sides and thus by redirecting the debates that have occurred between them.On the one hand, the book rejects the requirement of neutrality by contending that certain subsidies for the promotion of excellence in sundry areas of human endeavour can be proper and vital uses of resources by governments. Advocating such departures from the constraint of neutrality, the book presents a version of liberalism that can rightly be classified as 'perfectionist'. On the other hand, the species of perfectionism espoused in  Liberalism with Excellence diverges markedly from the theories that have usually been so classified. Indeed, much of the book assails various aspects of those theories. What is more, the aspirational perfectionism elaborated in the closing chapters of the volume is reconcilable in most key respects with a suitably amplified version of Rawlsianism. Hence, by reconceiving both the perfectionist side and the neutralist side of the prevailing disputation,  Liberalism with Excellence combines and transforms their respective insights.

Liberalism with Excellence

Freedom of Expression as Self-Restraint provides a novel justificatory foundation for the principle of freedom of expression. As the book argues, such a principle is absolute in that it is exceptionless; it imposes general duties that are binding always and everywere on every system of governance. In addition to injecting a new level of philosophical sophistication into the debates over freedom of expression, the book ties the principle to an ideal of governmental self-restraint, and it shows how that ideal connects to the paramount moral responsibility of every system of governance: the responsibility to bring about the political, social, and economic conditions under which every member of society can be warranted in harbouring an ample sense of self-respect. In short, compliance by a system of governance with the principle of freedom of expression is integral to the fulfilment of that paramount responsibility.

Freedom of Expression as Self-Restraint

Legal Theory & Systems

In his provocative new book, Matthew Kramer offers a systematic theory of freedom that challenges most of the other major contemporary treatments of the topic.

The Quality of Freedom

How are law and morality connected, how do they interact, and in what ways are they distinct? Matthew Kramer argues that moral principles can enter into the law of any jurisdiction, yet reaffirms the legal positivist argument that law and morality are separable. Through a variety of discussions, Where Law and Morality Meet highlights both some surprising affinities and some striking divergences between morality and law.

Where Law and Morality Meet

Foreign & International Law

At least since the publication of Isaiah Berlin's famous essay "Two Concepts of Liberty" nearly half a century ago, political philosophers have argued vigorously over the relative merits of "positive" and "negative" accounts of freedom. Matthew Kramer writes squarely within the negative-liberty tradition, but he incorporates a number of ideas that are quite often associated with theories of positive liberty. Much of The Quality of Freedom is devoted to elaborating the necessary and sufficient conditions for the existence of particular freedoms and unfreedoms; however, the book's cardinal objective is to establish the measurability of each person's overall freedom and of each society's aggregate freedom. On the one hand, Kramer contends that the existence of any particular instance of liberty or unfreedom is a matter of fact that can be confirmed or disconfirmed without any reliance on evaluative or normative considerations. On the other hand, he argues that the extent of each person's overall freedom or unfreedom cannot be ascertained entirely in the absence of evaluative assumptions. By combining those two positions and developing them in detail, Kramer pits himself against all positive accounts of liberty and most negative accounts. In the course of so doing, he aims to demonstrate the rigorous measurability of overall liberty--something that many writers on freedom have casually dismissed as impossible. Although Kramer concentrates principally on constructing a systematic analysis of sociopolitical freedom, he engages critically with the work of many of the leading contemporary writers on the topic.

See the best price to sell, buy, or rent books by KRAMER, Matthew H.. BookScouter helps to compare book prices from 25+ online bookstores and 30+ buyback vendors with a single search.

Books by KRAMER, Matthew H.

See the best price to sell, buy, or rent books by KRAMER, Matthew H.. BookScouter helps to compare book prices from 25+ online bookstores and 30+ buyback vendors with a single search.

The Ethics of Capital Punishment: A Philosophical Investigation of Evil and its Consequences

In Defense of Legal Positivism: Law without Trimmings

Torture and Moral Integrity: A Philosophical Enquiry

Liberalism with Excellence

Torture and Moral Integrity: A Philosophical Enquiry

Freedom of Expression as Self-Restraint

The Quality of Freedom

In Defense of Legal Positivism: Law without Trimmings

Where Law and Morality Meet

The Quality of Freedom