At the basis of modern natural law theories, the concept of the suum, or what belongs to the person (in Latin, his, her, its, their own), has received little scholarly attention despite its importance both in explaining and justifying not only the genealogy of property, but also that of morality and war.1 In this paper I examine Hugo Grotius's what it is, what things it includes, what rights it gives rise to and how it is extended in the transition from (...) the state of nature to civil society. I then briefly point out how bringing this concept back to the fore could help to illuminate the current discussion on the foundations of basic human rights, and to evaluate cases where these seem to clash with property rights. (shrink)

From the end of the twelfth century until the middle of the eighteenth century, the concept of a right of necessity –i.e. the moral prerogative of an agent, given certain conditions, to use or take someone else’s property in order to get out of his plight– was common among moral and political philosophers, who took it to be a valid exception to the standard moral and legal rules. In this essay, I analyze Samuel Pufendorf’s account of such a right, founded (...) on the basic instinct of self-preservation and on the notion that, in civil society, we have certain minimal duties of humanity towards each other. I review Pufendorf’s secularized account of natural law, his conception of the civil state, and the function of private property. I then turn to his criticism of Grotius’s understanding of the right of necessity as a retreat to the pre-civil right of common use, and defend his account against some recent criticisms. Finally, I examine the conditions deemed necessary and jointly sufficient for this right to be claimable, and conclude by pointing to the main strengths of this account. Keywords: Samuel Pufendorf, Hugo Grotius, right of necessity, duty of humanity, private property. (shrink)