Abstract
AbstractThis chapter critiques a recent feminist project aiming to revalue passivity and integrate it into our conception of selfhood and agency. In the course of examining Soran Reader’s and Sarah Buss’s positions regarding the value of passivity in human life, the chapter argues that the forms of passivity they identify are best understood as forms of interactivity and capacitation. Therefore passivity, at least as they understand it, should not be regarded as a central feature of the self or autonomy. Moreover, Reader and Buss claim that their views about passivity enrich our understanding of victimhood and ensure respect for victims of oppression and human rights abuse. In contrast, this chapter argues that overlooking interactivity and capacitation muddles our understanding of victimhood and undermines respect for victims.
Publisher
Oxford University PressNew York
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