Among the most pressing philosophical questions occupying those interested in the ethics of the family is why should parents, as opposed to charity workers or state officials, raise children. In their recent Family Values, Brighouse and Swift have further articulated and strengthen their own justification of the parent-child relationship by appealing to its crucial role in enabling the child’s proper development and in allowing parents to play a valuable fiduciary role in the lives of children. In this paper, I argue (...) that the set of interests Brighouse and Swift identify as necessary for the justification of the family fails to account for the different stages and the different cultural settings that mark the parent-child relationship. In particular, I ague that their justification of the family fails to satisfy the following two desiderata: (i) that the justification for the parent-child relationship should ideally track the good-making feature(s) of the relationship that extend across its entire history, and (ii) such justification should ideally explain what is valuable about the parent-child relationship in both liberal and non-liberal family contexts. In light of my critique, I sketch an alternative account of family values, one that appeals directly to the special mode of caring we see in the parent-child relationship, a form of caring that is certainly present in non-liberal societies and that typically extends across a lifetime. (shrink)

I have argued elsewhere that children have a moral right to be loved. Mhairi Cowden challenges my arguments. Among other things, Cowden believes that children do not need to be loved. In this paper, I explain why Cowden’s arguments fail and offer additional evidence for why children need to be loved.

Social interactions and personal relationships are essential for a minimally good life, and rights to such things – social rights – have been increasingly acknowledged in the literature. The question as to what extent social rights are feasible – and properly qualify as rights – however, remains. Can individuals reliably provide each other with love and friendship after trying, for instance? At first glance, this claim seems counterintuitive. This paper argues, contrary to our pre-theoretic intuitions, that individuals can reliably provide (...) each other with such relationships, rendering even “thick” social rights feasible. This conclusion challenges the assumption that such things cannot be reliably provided after trying, and suggests that a surprisingly wide class of social rights are feasible. Claiming relationships characterised by love or friendship as a matter of justice, therefore, is possible, and our theories of justice should appropriately widen to accommodate this fact where appropriate. (shrink)

Do children have a right to be loved? An affirmative answer faces two immediate challenges: (i) a child's basic needs can be met without love, therefore a defence of such a right cannot appeal to the role of love in protecting children's most basic needs, and (ii) since love is non-voluntary, it seems that there cannot be a corresponding duty on the part of parents to love their child. In this essay, I defend an affirmative answer that overcomes both of (...) these challenges. First, I argue that the right of children to be loved is grounded in the value of children leading meaningful lives. Second, I argue that the right of children to be loved gives rise to a duty on the part of the state to do all that it legitimately can to ensure that procreation and parenting follows from a truly voluntary decision on the part of its citizens. -/- . (shrink)

Children are often denied rights on the basis of their incompetence. A theory of rights for children is essential for consideration of the child's political status, yet the debate surrounding children's rights has been characterised by the divisive concept of ‘capacity’ typified in the two leading rights theory, Interest Theory and Will Theory. This article will provide a thorough analysis of the relationship between capacity, competence and rights. Although Interest Theory has successfully dealt with the competence requirement for being a (...) right-holder, the competence requirement still holds for the type of rights a child holds. Children's interests are determined sufficiently strong to found a right when the claim-holder has the competence to realise the benefit to which that interest pertains. This allows us to recognise children as right-holders while constraining the types of rights they hold according to their developing competencies. (shrink)

The aim of this paper is to argue that the normative significance of the inner aspects of filial piety – in particular, filial love – is better captured when we understand filial love as part of the virtue of filial piety rather than as an object of duty. After briefly introducing the value of filial love, I argue that the idea of a duty to love one's loving parents faces serious difficulties in making sense of the normative significance of filial (...) love. Then I show why the virtue-ethical approach to filial love, which views filial love as a constitutive part of the virtue of filial piety, can do justice to its normative significance while avoiding the difficulties. (shrink)

This article examines the nature of the child´s right to be loved. In particular, it argues that besides reasons for ensuring that children are affectively cared for by their parents, we have strong reasons for why children should be loved unconditionally -that is, loved independently of their morally irrelevant features. The article defends this claim by engaging closely with an argument recently formulated by Samantha Brennan and Colin Macleod, according to which the child´s right to be loved would be violated (...) by strongly homophobic parents. I argue that Brennan’s and Macleod’s argument needs to be revised because, while it generates a convincing conclusion in the case of homophobic parents, it fails to do so in other cases. This problem calls for a reconsideration of the nature of the right to be loved. Drawing on Philip Pettit’s analysis of robust goods, I argue that this right is a right to be loved unconditionally and an appeal to unconditional love allows us to accommodate the conviction that strongly racist as well as homophobic parents wrong their children by failing to love them (unconditionally). (shrink)

Beschäftigt man sich systematisch mit der Konzeption von Gerechtigkeit für Kinder bzw. während der Kindheit, ist es hilfreich, drei verschiedene Fragen zu klären, die normalerweise in Hinblick auf Erwachsene diskutiert werden, doch auch für eine genauere Analyse der Ansprüche von Kindern relevant sind. Welche Güter sind für die Gerechtigkeitstheorie relevant? Nach welchen Prinzipien sollen diese Güter verteilt werden? Wer ist dafür verantwortlich, dass die angestrebte Güterverteilung verwirklicht wird? In dieser Einleitung umreißen wir kurz den gegenwärtigen Diskussionsstand, der in diesen drei (...) großen gerechtigkeitsrelevanten Themenfeldern hinsichtlich von Kindern besteht. Zunächst analysieren wir Ressourcen und Fähigkeiten als angemessene Metrik der Gerechtigkeit für Kinder. Hinsichtlich der Verteilungsprinzipien lassen sich vor allem egalitäre und suffizienztheoretische Herangehensweisen unterscheiden. Schließlich werden in Bezug auf die Frage nach den relevanten „Akteuren der Gerechtigkeit“ für Kinder hauptsächlich die Familie bzw. die Eltern und der Staat diskutiert. (shrink)

Three claims about love and justice cannot be simultaneously true and therefore entail a paradox: (1) Love is a matter of justice. (2) There cannot be a duty to love. (3) All matters of justice are matters of duty. The first claim is more controversial. To defend it, I show why the extent to which we enjoy the good of love is relevant to distributive justice. To defend (2) I explain the empirical, conceptual and axiological arguments in its favour. Although (...) (3) is the most generally endorsed claim of the three, I conclude we should reject it in order to avoid the paradox. (shrink)

The dominant philosophical view of gamete donation as morally permissible rests on two premises: parental obligations are triggered primarily by playing a causal role in procreation, not by genetic ties, and those obligations are transferable—that is, they are obligations to make adequate provision for the child’s needs, not necessarily to raise the child oneself. Thus while gamete donors are indeed agent causes of the children that their donation helps to bring into existence, most think that donors’ obligations are discharged insofar (...) as they know that competent others intend to care for those children. In this article, I call into question this dominant view by challenging both of its premises. Challenging the first premise, I argue that genetic parenthood is what primarily triggers parental obligations. Challenging the second premise, I claim that those obligations are non-transferable—i.e., that they are obligations not simply to ensure that someone will raise one’s genetic child, but to raise that child oneself . The implication of my argument is that gamete donation is inherently wrong insofar as it involves acquiring non-transferable obligations that one has no intention of fulfilling. (shrink)

Much has been written about the general moral duty to love one’s neighbors. In this article, I explore the specific application of this moral duty in the work setting. I argue from a secular perspective that individuals have the moral duty to love their stakeholders. Loving one’s stakeholders is an affective valuing of the stake-related values these stakeholders pursue and as such is the real recognition of one’s stakeholders as stakeholders and of oneself as a stakeholder of one’s stakeholders. This (...) moral concept of stakeholder love offers promising contributions to stakeholder theory, leadership theories, and ethical theories in general and business ethics theories in particular. (shrink)

(2012). A need is not a right. Critical Review of International Social and Political Philosophy: Vol. 15, No. 3, pp. 359-362. doi: 10.1080/13698230.2012.679423.