One of the core issues in contemporary political philosophy is concerned with `political obligation.' Stated in an overly simplified way, the question being asked when one investigates political obligation is, "What, if anything, do citizens owe to their government and how are these obligations generated if they do exist?" The majority of political philosophers investigating this issue agree that a political obligation is a moral requirement to act in certain ways concerning political matters (e.g. a moral requirement to obey the laws and support one's country). Despite this agreement about the general nature of what is being searched for, a broad division has arisen between political obligation theorists - there are some who take political obligations to actually exist ("defenders of political obligation") and there are some who take there to be no general political obligation ("philosophical anarchists"). While there is debate within the camp defending political obligation about what it is that generates the obligations, the common core of all "defender theories" is the fundamental idea that one has a moral requirement(s) to support and obey the political institutions of one's country. Despite utilitarianism's status as one of the major ethical theories, historically, it has largely been dismissed by theorists concerned with political obligation. Within the contemporary debate it is generally accepted that utilitarianism cannot adequately accommodate a robust theory of political obligation. The overarching objective of this dissertation is to challenge this general dismissal of a utilitarian account and to build upon the two accounts which have been developed (R.M. Hare's and Rolf Sartorius') in offering a robust utilitarian theory of political obligation which can be considered a competitor to the other contemporary theories (i.e., theories of consent, gratitude, fair play or fairness, membership or association, and natural duty). However, as this utilitarian account of political obligation develops, the possibility will also emerge for a non-antagonistic relationship between the utilitarian theory on offer and the contemporary political obligation debate. The moral reasons posited by the traditional theories of political obligation (i.e., consent, fair play, gratitude, associative, and natural duty) can be included in and accommodated by my utilitarian account. The utilitarian account of political obligation can accept that there are many types of reasons explaining why broad expectations concerning individual and group behavior are created, and each type of reason can be understood as supporting the utilitarian claim that there are moral reasons for following the laws and supporting legitimate political authorities. Taken all together, my arguments will take the form of a three tiered response to the prevailing opinion that any utilitarian attempt to account for political obligations is doomed. The first tier contends that the utilitarian can consistently claim that there are moral reasons to follow the law. This is not a particularly strong claim, but it is one which has been denied by the vast majority of political theorists. The second tier of my argument addresses this apparent issue by contending that even the traditional deontological accounts of political obligation are not offering more than this. Lastly, it is contended that, given the contingent features of humans (i.e., intellectual fallibility, selfish biases, and the way moral education is tied to rules), the strength of the utilitarian political obligations is comparable to other accounts' analyses of the obligations.

The widespread practice of discarding dead fish is believed to negatively affect the sustainability of fish stocks. Between 2015-2019 a landing obligation, aiming to gradually eliminate this practice, is introduced in all EU fisheries. The Landing Obligation (LO) forces fishers to land all catch and requires monitoring at sea rather than on land, it is therefore anticipated to be particularly difficult to enforce. Based on this, the perceived legitimacy of the policy among fishers is believed to be of greatest importance to ensure successful implementation.    To create an understanding of fishers’ commitment to uphold the LO, this study examines Swedish demersal West Coast fishers’ perceived legitimacy of the LO through qualitative interviews. In the interviews Swedish fishers expressed a dual commitment towards upholding the LO. On the one hand, the fishers are overall highly committed to avoiding unwanted catch, which is shown by a positive attitude towards the use and development of selective gear. On the other hand, many are sceptical to the practical formation of the LO, which is at times perceived as incoherent with the fishers’ ecological understanding, as well as with individual fishing practices and policy aims. Finally there are indications of a lack of trust from fishers in the knowledge and intentions of fishery managers, which creates a barrier for commitment to any fishery policy.   For the LO to succeed it is important that fishers develop their practices to avoid unwanted catch. Therefore, it is important to facilitate fishers’ commitment to the policy’s aim rather than merely focusing on compliance with the policy rules.

This thesis will be concerned entirely with general obligation bonding in the city of Logan, Utah. Many worth-while improvements have been acquired by Logan City through the general obligation bonding method. The question of whether or not to go into debt for a certain project has caused many interesting arguments to be put forth by the Logan populace. A study of these arguments and their results is the object of this thesis. Logan City has never had to default on any debt incurred. Its credit rating is very good. Other cities of comparable size that have had trouble meeting their obligations could profit by considering how Logan has been able to pay its debts and improve the city at the same time. General obligation bonding is a part of the method employed for city improvement. But as before stated, these bonds cannot be issued unless an affirmative vote of those voting is obtained from the property holders. This thesis proposes to study the issues and purposes for which general obligation bonds were needed, to find out whether or not those in favor of the bonds had good foresight. Whether those against the bonds were looking out for the best interest of Logan and the interest shown by the public, as indicated in the number which turned out to vote, will also be studied.

Although political dissent is an idea that perennially receives much public attention, its standing in the academic literature is relatively slight. Very few thinkers engage the idea of dissent outside of its manifestation as an illegal action, and ever fewer dedicate any time to understanding the idea conceptually. A substantial portion of my dissertation aims to address this conspicuous gap. In the remaining portion, I advance a normative claim. My claim is that the very same justificatory considerations that pertain to illegal acts of dissent pertain as well to those acts that ought to be legally protected by a citizen’s right to dissent. Put more simply, I argue that whether or not a dissenting action is done within, or outside of, the law is of no normative effect. The upshot of this argument is that it places the burden on agents to be responsible for all the dissenting actions they undertake. This is so regardless of whether or not those actions find institutional shelter. / Thesis / Doctor of Philosophy (PhD)

Mémoire numérisé par la Direction des bibliothèques de l'Université de Montréal.

Thesis advisor: Liane Young / Thesis advisor: Hiram Brownell / When (moral) psychologists make a claim (e.g., “Participants judged X as morally worse than Y”), how many participants are represented? Such claims are often based exclusively on group-level analyses; here, psychologists often fail to report, or perhaps even investigate, how many participants judged X as morally worse than Y. More troubling, group-level analyses do not necessarily generalize to the person-level. This dissertation first investigates a moral cognition hypothesis about the relation between perceptions of relationship obligations and moral evaluations of helping behavior. It is found that people, on average, judge agents who help strangers as more morally good than agents who help family members, but people also judge agents who help strangers instead of family members as less morally good than agents who help family members instead of strangers. Second, methodological issues with these studies are assessed, fixed, and thus the original psychological effect is retested with better experimental designs, measures, and analyses. Third, it is discovered that the moral cognition hypothesis consistently describes the psychology of only a minority of participants. Moreover, it is discovered that most psychologists misinterpret typical group-level analyses as revealing how prevalent a psychological phenomenon is. Finally, a set of simple and flexible methodological and statistical options are offered to better align typical psychological hypotheses with appropriate analyses, enabling researchers to confront this “group-to-person generalizability” problem in their own work. / Thesis (PhD) — Boston College, 2023. / Submitted to: Boston College. Graduate School of Arts and Sciences. / Discipline: Psychology.

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Le droit commun de la vente, caractérisé par l’effet immédiat du transfert de propriété dès la rencontre des consentements s’est avéré une source de difficultés en matière immobilière au XIXème siècle. Cette simplicité excessive qui rend le transfert de propriété instantané et occulte heurte la réalité et les difficultés inhérentes aux mutations immobilières. Le recours à de nombreuses exceptions dans le Code civil de 1804 a rendu l’économie générale du transfert illisible pour les praticiens, la sécurité des transmissions immobilières nécessitant de reconstituer un instrument de preuve efficace. Si l’opération de transfert réside dans une conception volontariste en se focalisant sur la formation du contrat par une dématérialisation de l’obligation de donner, son efficacité reste tributaire d’aménagements contractuels et de formalités postérieures au contrat. Cette refondation qui se fera sur la notion d’authenticité et qui érige un contrôle de légalité incarné par le notaire aura pour avantage de préserver la fiction consensuelle et de repousser tout schéma dualiste comme les livres fonciers considérés par une majorité de la doctrine française comme contraire à l’esprit du droit français. / Common Sales Law , characterized by the immediate effect of the transfer of ownership from the meeting consents has been a source of difficulties in real estate in the nineteenth century. This excessive simplicity that makes transferring ownership instant hits and occult reality and the difficulties inherent in immovables . The use of many exceptions in the Civil Code of 1804 has made the general economy unreadable transfer practitioners , security estate transmissions requiring reconstitute an effective instrument of evidence. If the transfer operation lies in a deliberate design by focusing on the formation of the contract by a dematerialization of the obligation to give, its effectiveness is dependent on contractual arrangements and post- contract formalities . This overhaul will be done on the notion of authenticity and erects a review of legality embodied by the notary will have the advantage of preserving the consensus fiction and repel any scheme as dualistic land books considered by a majority of the French doctrine as contrary the spirit of French law.

L'inexécution de l'obligation par le débiteur constitue un moment crucial dans la « vie » de l'obligation. La force de l'obligation à apporter des remèdes efficaces au créancier se pose avec le plus d'acuité à cet instant. Analyser l'obligation sous l'angle de son efficacité concrète conduit à un constat immédiat. La force obligatoire, omniprésente dans le régime de l'obligation, se voit attribuer une fonction dont l'effectivité est, pourtant, dans le contexte de l'inexécution, résiduelle. Inefficace, à cet instant, la force obligatoire ne saurait, en aucune manière, constituer le fondement de la sanction de l'obligation par l'exécution forcée. Mais, sans lui retirer toute utilité, la force obligatoire permet de causer le paiement spontané de l'obligation en dehors de tout conflit lié à l'exécution. En revanche, tant la définition de sanction que celle de contrainte évoquent la notion de force et d'exécutoire. La force exécutoire embrasse l'obligation dès lors qu'est entreprise l'obtention de son efficacité économique consécutivement au constat de son inexécution. La prise en compte de l'obligation dans le régime exécutoire invite à penser la notion de force exécutoire au-delà de son sens traditionnel : la force exécutoire ne se définit pas exclusivement comme une compétence. Ainsi, matérialisée dans un titre exécutoire, la force exécutoire est, et au delà d'une simple condition de ce titre, une force en rapport avec l'obligation. L'efficacité de la sanction de l'exécution forcée dépend entièrement de l'effectivité de la force exécutoire dont est assorti le titre exécutoire. Le titre exécutoire ne constitue pas un simple instrumentum assorti de la force probante des actes authentiques et de la formule exécutoire, il est aussi un negotium dont l'obligation exécutoire est un élément.Aucune exécution forcée ne peut être poursuivie en l'absence de titre exécutoire, aucun titre exécutoire ne peut être mis en oeuvre sans obligation exécutoire. / The breach of duty by the debtor is a crucial moment in the "life" of the obligation. The force of the obligation to provide effective remedies to the creditor arises with the more acute at this time. Analyze the obligation in terms of its practical effectiveness leads to an immediate conclusion. The obligatory (or binding) force that permeates the system of obligation , is assigned a function whose effectiveness is , however, in the context of the failure , residual . Ineffective , at this moment, the binding force is not, in any way, the basis of assent required by enforcement . But without withdrawing this force any utility, binding force can cause spontaneous payment of the obligation without any conflict related to execution. However, both the definition of punishment that duress evoke the concept of force and enforceability. Enforceable obligation, therefore, appears when economic efficiency is searching consecutively to a finding of non-performance. Taking into account the obligation in its forceable systemen prompt to think the concept of enforceability beyond its traditional meaning : the enforceability is not defined exclusively as a skill. Thus, embodied in an enforceable act , enforceability is, and beyond a simple condition of this act, a force in relation to the obligation. The effectiveness of enforcement depends entirely on the effectiveness of the enforceability of which is attached to the writ of execution. The enforcement act is not a simple instrumentum matching the probative value of authentic instruments and its enforcement, but it is also a negotium, which enforcable obligation is an element.No execution can be implemented in the absence of enforceable , no enforceable act can be implemented without enforceable obligation.