Collective Evils, Harms, and the LawThe Moral Limits of the Criminal Law, Vol 1. Harm to Others. Jeffrey AlexanderThe Moral Limits of the Criminal Law, Vol 2. Offense to Others. Joel Feinberg

Ethics ◽  
1987 ◽  
Vol 97 (2) ◽  
pp. 414-440 ◽  
Author(s):  
Gerald J. Postema
Keyword(s):  
Criminal Law ◽  
Joel Feinberg ◽  
Harm To Others ◽  
Moral Limits

FEINBERG AND THE FAILURE TO ACT

Legal Theory ◽  
2005 ◽  
Vol 11 (3) ◽  
pp. 237-250 ◽  
Author(s):  
Patricia Smith
Keyword(s):  
Criminal Law ◽  
Joel Feinberg ◽  
Harm To Others ◽  
Moral Limits

In Chapter 4 of his famous work, Harm to Others, Joel Feinberg, with characteristic clarity and insight, outlined the major problems associated with analyzing the foundations of responsibility for the failure to act. In that chapter he made a number of controversial claims supported by arguments that have generated debate ever since he made them in 1984. His analysis led him to conclude that liability (or responsibility) for the failure to act falls within the moral limits of the criminal law in cases in which a random bystander could easily rescue a seriously imperiled stranger.

HARM AND THE VOLENTI PRINCIPLE

2011 ◽  
Vol 29 (1) ◽  
pp. 309-321 ◽  
Author(s):  
Gerald Dworkin
Keyword(s):  
Criminal Law ◽  
The State ◽  
The Other ◽  
Legal Moralism ◽  
Great Work ◽  
Joel Feinberg ◽  
Offense Principle ◽  
Moral Limits

AbstractThis is an essay on the limits of the Criminal Law. In particular, it is about what principles, if any, determine whether it is legitimate for the state to criminalize certain conduct. Joel Feinberg in his great work on the moral limits of the criminal law argues that we need only two principles. One is a principle regulating harm to other people and the other is an offense principle regulating certain kinds of offensive conduct. I explore various aspects of his argument. In particular I concentrate on his use of the Volenti Principle: He who consents cannot be wrongfully harmed by conduct to which he has fully consented. Feinberg uses the principle to argue that certain kinds of consensual conduct cannot be forbidden unless we adopt some kind of legal moralism, i.e., conduct can be forbidden on the grounds that it is immoral even though the conduct harms no other person. I explore the possibility of avoiding legal moralism by limiting the use of the Volenti Principle.

Harm to Others: The Moral Limits of the Criminal Law, Vol. I

1985 ◽  
Vol 4 (3) ◽  
pp. 423
Author(s):  
Michael D. Bayles ◽  
Joel Feinberg
Keyword(s):  
Criminal Law ◽  
Harm To Others ◽  
Moral Limits

Risking One’s Life: ‘Soft Paternalism’ and Feinberg’s Account of Legal Liberalism

1995 ◽  
Vol 8 (2) ◽  
pp. 311-324 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ian Hunt
Keyword(s):  
Political Philosophy ◽  
Criminal Law ◽  
The Other ◽  
Joel Feinberg ◽  
Moral Basis ◽  
Soft Paternalism ◽  
Legitimate Concern ◽  
Harm To Others ◽  
Social Gain ◽  
Personal Harm

In his The Moral Limits of the Criminal Law: Harm To Self, one volume in what is arguably the most impressive and thorough statement of liberal political philosophy to date, Joel Feinberg claims that there is a problem of reconciling the reasonableness of our concern for people who endanger themselves with our repugnance for paternalism:preventable personal harm (setback interest) is universally thought to be a great evil, and... such harm is no less harmful when self-caused... If society can substantially diminish the net amount of harm to interests from all sources, that would be a great social gain. If that prospect provides the moral basis underlying the harm to others principle, why should it not have application as well to self-caused harm and thus support equally the principle of legal paternalism?... On the other hand, we are challenged to reconcile, somehow, our legitimate concern with diminishing overall harm with the threatened proliferation of criminal prohibitions enforcing a “Spartan like regime” of imposed prudence

JOEL FEINBERG AND THE JUSTIFICATION OF HARD PATERNALISM

Legal Theory ◽  
2005 ◽  
Vol 11 (3) ◽  
pp. 259-284 ◽  
Author(s):  
Richard J. Arneson
Keyword(s):  
Criminal Law ◽  
Moral Philosophy ◽  
Good Reason ◽  
Joel Feinberg ◽  
Voluntary Choice ◽  
Moral Limits

Joel Feinberg was a brilliant philosopher whose work in social and moral philosophy is a legacy of excellent, even stunning achievement. Perhaps his most memorable achievement is his four-volume treatise on The Moral Limits of the Criminal Law, and perhaps the most striking jewel in this crowning achievement is his passionate and deeply insightful treatment of paternalism. Feinberg opposes legal paternalism, the doctrine that “it is always a good reason in support of a [criminal law] prohibition that it is probably necessary to prevent harm (physical, psychological, or economic) to the actor himself.” Against this doctrine Feinberg asserts that when an agent's sufficiently voluntary choice causes harm to herself or risk of harm to herself, this category of harm-to-self is never a good reason in support of criminal law prohibition of that type of conduct.

1. An introduction to the criminal law

2021 ◽  
pp. 3-25
Author(s):  
David Ormerod ◽  
Karl Laird
Keyword(s):  
Human Rights ◽  
Criminal Law ◽  
Common Law ◽  
European Convention ◽  
Eu Law ◽  
The Public ◽  
Moral Wrong ◽  
Public Nuisance ◽  
Harm To Others

It is neither easy to define crime nor identify the aims of criminal law but some characteristics may be universal to every crime, including that it involves public wrongs and moral wrongs. ‘Public wrongs’ reflect the important role of the public in punishing crimes. A crime incorporating a moral wrong implies that a ‘wrong’ is done or harm to others is involved but experience suggests that morality and criminal law are not coextensive. The chapter introduces students to thinking about criminalization and the need to guard against overcriminalization. It also examines the principal sources of criminal law: common law, statute, EU law, international law and the European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR). Problematically, important and serious offences and most defences in English law derive from common law rather than statute, and some offences—from public nuisance to gross negligence manslaughter—have been challenged recently on grounds of certainty and retrospectivity.

Offense to Others: The Moral Limits of the Criminal Law.

1989 ◽  
Vol 98 (2) ◽  
pp. 239
Author(s):  
Gerald Dworkin ◽  
Joel Feinberg
Keyword(s):  
Criminal Law ◽  
Moral Limits
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