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Books from the Center: Guantanomo Bay and the Judicial-Moral Treatment of the Other “Suggesting that the American detention center at Guantanamo Bay is a moral failure of American Empire, Butler (philosophy, Purdue U.) presents nine papers examining legal and philosophical questions raised by US "enemy combatant" detention policy. Topics addressed include the establishment of Guantanamo and executive power in the United States, constitutional and international law arguments against Guantanamo, the sufficiency of existing international humanitarian law for dealing with the threat of terrorism, the legal failures of Guantanamo military tribunals, Guantanamo as a product of a general American moral malaise, Guantanamo as a symptom of a more wide- ranging legal-philosophic exclusion of the other that is epitomized also by post-9/11 immigration and refugee policy, establishment of a global living wage as a tool to fight the growth of terrorism, and the possible contribution of academic ethics to debates over Guantanamo.” Reference & Research Book News
Human Rights Ethics: A Rational Approach The Review of Metaphysics, June 2009, John Ahrens BUTLER, Clark. Human Rights Ethics: A Rational Approach. West Lafayette, Ind.: Purdue University Press, 2008. xiii 299 pp. Paper, $39.95--This book recommends itself most urgently, perhaps, to the person who wants to avoid metaphysical and epistemological abstractions in favor of a more down-to-earth and practical discussion of human rights. Butler's approach to the justification of universal equal human rights is reminiscent of David Gauthier's effort to justify moral constraints in Morals by Agreement (Oxford University Press, 1986). Gauthier argued that the acceptance of moral constraints on one's actions is rational hot merely from the perspective of some hypothetical state of nature or original position of ignorance, but for real people embedded in real situations and facing real conflicts and contingencies. Similarly, Butler wishes to justify human rights to those who are being asked to respect them, like those who must constrain their behavior in accordance with such rights. And also like Gauthier, Butler refuses to appeal to abstract metaphysical justifications of human rights. Instead, he argues that rights only exist to the extent that they are respected; when they are not respected, they are merely ideal. The task of justification is to provide a good reason for rejecting relations of domination and submission and replacing them with a commitment to respect and enhance human rights. Two themes--instruction and legitimation--shape Butler's justification of human rights. The first becomes effective when someone surprises himself "in the discovery and correction of error despite himself with the help of another's criticism" (p. 121). This can lead to the realization that one cannot presumptively justify excluding anyone from the conversations by which one discovers the truth and thereby furthers one's own projects. Anyone may, for all we can know a priori, teach us something. Thus, we cannot rationally insist on the truth of our own views while silencing some potential critics or excluding them from the conversation. This, in turn, can lead to a commitment to respect and enhance the rights to freedom of thought and discussion. In a like manner, elites wish to have their dominance affirmed by those over whom they exercise it. However, this affirmation is only genuine, and thus can only serve to legitimate an elite, if it is possible to withhold it. Again, this realization can lead to a commitment to respect and enhance human rights. In particular, both these arguments lead to a right to freedom of thought and discussion. Absent freedom of thought, I cannot be sure that others will be able to make the best possible criticism of my own beliefs or my elite status. Absent freedom of discussion, I cannot be confident that others are giving me their true thoughts on these matters. Thus, the freedom of thought and discussion becomes the foundation of all human rights. In fact, for Butler, freedom of thought and discussion is the only human right; all other putative rights are just applications of this original one. Thus, the justification of human rights requires not the justification of a myriad of different rights, but only of this one (p. 185). This apparent reduction of all human rights to one launches an expansion of rights that is, seemingly, without limit. Once I recognize that freedom of thought and speech are necessary to the confirmation of my beliefs and the legitimation of my elite status, I see immediately that a negative right to freedom of speech--a right merely of noninterference--is not enough. If I want the best criticism from others, I must do whatever is necessary to maximize their ability to think and to participate in the discussion. Thus, the catalogs of rights found in such documents as the Universal Declaration of Human Rights are to be understood as an account of the causally necessary conditions for the maximally effective exercise of the right to freedom of thought and speech. And we should expect that there will be more, perhaps many more, such conditions that we have yet to discover. No doubt some readers will find this implication of Professor Butler's argument troubling. In the course of developing his argument, Professor
Butler provides useful discussions of natural law-based human
rights theories, the place of human rights in utilitarian and
Kantian moral theories, and the issues that surround the institutionalization
and enforcement of equal human rights on a global scale. Even
aside from the controversial nature of its central argument, Professor
Butler's book is a worthwhile read for any student of normative
ethics.--John Ahrens, Hanover College.
“Human Rights Ethics makes an important contribution to contemporary philosophical and political debates concerning the advancement of global justice and human rights. Butler’s book also lays claim to a significant place in both normative ethics and human rights studies in as much as it seeks to vindicate a universalistic, rational approach to human rights ethics. Butler’s innovative approach is not based on murky claims to “natural rights” which supposedly hold wherever human beings exist; nor does it succumb to the traditional problems of justification associated with utilitarianism, Kantianism, and other procedural approaches to human rights studies. Instead, Butler proposes “a dialectical justification of human rights by indirect proof” that claims not to be question begging. Very much in the spirit of Hegel and Habermas, Butler proposes to vindicate a “totally rational account of human rights,” but one that depends concretely and historically on a dialectically constructed “right to freedom of thought in its universal modes. If successful, Butler’s account would also expand a non-circular justification of human rights into a justification of human rights ethics, with rules grounded in “no other obligation but the obligation to respect the right to freedom of thought.” Butler argues persuasively that freedom of thought/ speech must be recognized as “the one basic right in human rights ethics” and as “the necessary condition of justifying anything, including any other ethical theory.” Having established human rights ethics out of what Butler sees as the historically constructed “story of freedom,” and through “the self-criticism emerging in the pursuit of any final chosen standard other than full dialogical rationality,” Butler then examines the complex relation between human rights and international law. He concludes his study by applying “human rights ethics” to the contemporary international scene and to a number of contemporary world problems, and he explores the distinction between what he sees as the “increasingly present world governance” and the absence of an effective world government. Human Rights Ethics aims to appeal to a wide audience, not just to specialists, and it should prove invaluable to anyone who seeks a deeper, more comprehensive understanding of the important issues surrounding human rights education and the advancement of global justice.” Steven Hicks, Department of Philosophy, Queens College, City University of New York
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