Hobbes and Spinoza on Sovereign Education

Most comparisons of Thomas Hobbes and Baruch Spinoza focus on the difference in understanding of natural right. We argue that Hobbes also places more weight on a rudimentary and exclusive education of the public by the state. We show that the difference is related to deeper disagreements over the prospect of Enlightenment. Hobbes is more sanguine than Spinoza about using the state to make people rational. Spinoza considers misguided an overemphasis on publicly educating everyone out of superstition—public education is important, but modes of superstition may remain and must be offset by institutions and a civil religion. The differences are confirmed by Spinoza’s interest in the philosopher who stands apart and whose flourishing may be protected, but not simply brought about, by rudimentary public education. Spinoza’s openness to a wisdom-loving elite in a democracy also sets up an interesting parallel with Thomas Jefferson’s own commitment to the natural aristocracy needed to sustain republicanism. In demonstrating the 17th century philosopher’s skepticism toward using the state exclusively to promote rationality, even as he recognizes the importance of a sovereign pedagogical role and the protection of philosophy, we move to suggest that Spinoza is relevant to contemporary debates about public education and may reinvigorate moral and political discourse in a liberal democracy.

“An Established Law of Our Nature”

This chapter explores the American clergy’s arguments for political resistance as they developed in the 1770s, as British actions toward the colonists became more aggressive and ultimately intolerable to the colonists. As certain pockets of colonial society suffered greatly under British attempts to coerce submission, the clergy increasingly turned to arguments for self-defense as a basis of justifying resistance. The natural right of self-defense had long been recognized as a legitimate ground for taking up arms and for engaging in defensive warfare. Arguments published in earlier centuries were reprinted in America and encouraged the colonists to understand their expressions of political resistance in terms of self-defense.

Protecting Visually Impaired Peoples’ Rights in Casting Votes in Malaysia

Election is a process to choose an individual or a government by a citizen to manage a country. Freedom of expression is considered a natural right; one which belongs to everyone, by virtue of them being human. This freedom evident especially when one cast a vote in the General Election to choose the best candidate to represent him or her in Parliament. Therefore, there is doubt on such freedom of expression given to disable person especially people visually impairment. The objective of this research is to study about efficiency of Persons with Disabilities Act 2008 and Elections Act 1958 for protecting people with visual impairments’ rights in casting votes. The outcome of this study will help to enhance the existing election process and Acts in order to protect the interests of people visually impairment in Malaysia.

The Metaphysics of Natural Right in Spinoza

In the Theological-Political Treatise (TTP), Spinoza argues that an individual’s natural right extends as far as their power. Subsequently, in the Political Treatise (TP), he offers a revised argument for the same conclusion. This chapter offers an account of the reasons for the revision. In both arguments, an individual’s natural right derives from God’s natural right. However, the TTP argument hinges on the claim that each individual is part of the whole of nature (totius naturae) and for this reason inherits part of the natural right of that whole. Using several analogous cases from the Ethics, it is shown that this form of argument from division is not compatible with Spinoza’s considered metaphysical views. The revised argument, by contrast, avoids the pitfalls of his earlier efforts. It also better reveals the deep roots by which the monistic metaphysics of the Ethics feeds into Spinoza’s conception of natural right.

NATURAL RIGHT AND THE SPIRIT OF THE PEOPLE IN THE TEACHING OF F.K. FON SAVIGNY

Свою правовую концепцию Ф.К. фон Савиньи, прежде всего, противопоставлял традиционной теории естественного права, которая, как он полагал, дедуцировала свои категории из индивидуального разума, а потому не могла обладать качествами всеобщности и необходимости. Напротив, всеобщий разум, воплощенный в «духе народа» как его внутренняя субстанция, содержит в себе всю полноту идей права, признанных народом. Значение творчества законодателя состоит в том, что он устраняет неопределенность в праве, которая содержится в результате исторического развития, не проясненного и не закрепленного законом. Принятые в результате законотворческой деятельности писаные нормы фиксируют достигнутый результат развития права, хотя при этом, как считал Ф.К. фон Савиньи, замедляют сам процесс этого развития. His legal concept F.K. von Savigny first of all contrasted with the traditional theory of natural law, which, he believed, deduced its categories from the individual mind, and therefore could not possess the qualities of universality and necessity. On the contrary, the universal mind, embodied in the "spirit of the people" as its inner substance, contains the entire completeness of the ideas of law recognized by the people. The significance of the legislator's creativity lies in the fact that it removes the uncertainty in law, which is contained as a result of historical development that is not clarified and not enshrined in law. The written norms adopted as a result of legislative activity fix the achieved result of the development of law, although at the same time, as F.K. von Savigny, slow down the very process of this development.

Democracy against Popular Sovereignty? (Faces of Power of the People: Theoretic Reconstruction)

In the article, on the basis of the classical political philosophers, the author distinguishes between three ideal-typical modi of political superiority of the people: “democracy”, “popular sovereignty” and “the natural right of the people to vindicate the supreme power”. Differen ces between them are drawn according to the criteria of (a) the distance between the holder of the supreme power and the holder of power that allows the routine management of the state, and (b) the degree to which the former controls the latter. The theoretic reconstruction of the modi of the political superiority of the people is based on identifying three ways to assert political superiority, expressed in the concepts of κράτος, sovereignty and vindication. This approach makes it possible to trace the specifics of each of the identified modi: “democracy” in its original (ancient Greek) sense is the power of the people, based on the obvious superiority (over the nobility) in their strength, in their excess of power, thanks to which the people are able to effectively implement their will in the public sphere; “popular sovereignty” makes the people a key political agent not by referring to their excess of power, but by securing their legal position as a source of laws and any public power; finally, “the natural right of the people to vindicate the supreme power” asserts the moral and teleological primacy of the people’s good over that of the rulers. According to the author’s conclusion, the three modi of the political superiority of the people differ from each other primarily in the extent to which the people are involved in the political process. Under “democracy” this extent is maximal, in the case of the “natural right to vindication” it is minimal, while “popular sovereignty” finds itself in the middle between these two extremes: both threats of the decisive “alienation” of the people from power and its usurpation by the “trustees” and tyranny of the people are absent. The author thinks that this middle ground of the “popular sovereignty” represents one of the reasons why it is this modus that symbolizes the architectonics of the modern democracy.

The Emergence Of Migration Law As A Natural Right In The Central Asia

Historical experience testifies to the fact that migration processes, which represent the harmony of objective needs and subjective interests of people, have a natural character. Population migration has long been dependent on a number of factors. Despite the fact that migration is restricted or strictly controlled by the governments of different countries, these processes have not stopped[1]. Indeed, this phenomenon is inextricably linked not only with the laws of civilization and anthropological development of mankind, but also with the diversity of institutions of migration law.

Relevant Problems of the Correlation Between the Concept and Content of the Right to Freedom of Conscience and Religion

The right to freedom of conscience and religion is a fundamental natural right, which is enshrined in international legal acts and acts of national legislation. At the same time, the different regulation of the mentioned right in distinct acts attracts attention. Variations include the “right to freedom of thought, conscience and religion”, “the right to freedom of conscience and confession” etc. This article analyzes all cases of terminological regulation of the right to freedom of conscience and religion. The content of each of the categories is analyzed, due to which the concept of the right to freedom of conscience and religion is defined and a clear distinction is made between each of the categories. Along with this, the interaction of the content and the concept of the right to freedom of conscience and religion is established. Based on the research conducted within the article, the most successful concept for expressing the content of the right to freedom of conscience and religion is determined. The article also analyzes the rulings of the European Court of Human Rights on the vision of the content and concept of the right to freedom of conscience and religion.

'Victims' of the status quo: Canada's ongoing marginalization of sex workers.

The conflict between a sex worker's natural right to dignity, and the scope of control she can exert over her own body - her rightful property - plays a central part in much of the research and debate surrounding the commercialization of sex, and there is little consensus as to which natural right is of greater fundamental importance. This conflict over the morality and legal rights of sex workers is plainly evident in Canada's own treatment of the issue; spanning a period of over twenty-five years, the research and reports on prostitution commissioned by the federal government constitute several thousand pages of empirical evidence documenting the harm caused by the criminalization of prostitution, yet no changes have been made to the country's Criminal Code provisions since 1986. Throughout these government reports and the testimony of dozens of participants in the 2005 hearings held by the country's Subcommittee on Solicitation Laws, the same conflict of language and ideology is repeated; regardless of the time and location, conversations about prostitution within Canada follow an almost predictable pattern of spinning wheels and little progress. In light of the new opportunity to effect change in Canada's approach to prostitution law, this paper examines the signs and significations evinced in the language of Canada's present laws, and traces the legislative history of sex work in the country as well as the cyclical nature of the observations and conclusions drawn by the many federally-appointed committees charged with addressing the topic. Select witness testimony from hearings conducted by the most recent committee to address the state of prostitution, the Subcommittee on Solicitation Laws, is also reproduced and analyzed. Using the opposing perspectives of victim and rights discourse as a loose framework, particular analytical focus is placed on the language used and ideological beliefs expressed within both the formal reports and testimony. Finally, the core conflicts revealed in Canada's hearings and formal reports on prostitution are placed within a larger body of theory on human agency and the physical body for the purpose of emphasizing the unequivocal necessity of respecting sex workers' autonomy, first and foremost, in any future determination of sex work's place within the social and legal fabric of the country.