Abstract
AbstractMost commentators on Kant emphasize the parallels between morality and right. After all, both involve formal principles legislated by pure practical reason. However, this chapter argues, for Kant, right differs from the moral law in that its content is radically indeterminate without positive, empirical legislation. The rule of right itself needs to be “laid down” by a sovereign. As such, the sovereign is accorded a distinctive form of freedom: an empirical agent has the capacity to make determinate a pure practical law. Political autonomy is thereby a significant and meaningful human activity, even if carried out by self-interested agents. With this understanding of the noble, even sacred purpose of sovereignty, we can make sense of some of Kant’s more puzzling doctrines, such as his condemnation of the right to revolution and strong retributivism in his view of punishment.
Publisher
Oxford University PressNew York
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