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The chapters contained in this dissertation are three essays on the nature of practical authority, and the role it plays in the thought and action of those subject to it. In chapter 1, I criticize a recent and influential philosophical theory of authority, Joseph Raz’s service conception, and argue that it is inadequate because it does not recognize that authority thwarts an obedient subject’s ability to express her personality and character traits in action. In chapter 2, I argue that, in cases of personal authority, the issuing of a command involves the authority supplying the content of an intention to act to the subject, and that this breaks down the self-other asymmetries which theorists of self-knowledge have assumed exist with respect to the ‘privileged access’ one is said to have to one’s own mind. In chapter 3, I argue that in cases of both personal and non-personal (e.g., institutional) authority, there is a further problem in exercising and obeying authority which has gone unrecognized. I draw on recent work in social psychology to show that authoritative directives fix a subject’s understanding of her own actions across time and thus thwart the otherwise dynamic process of the development of the subject’s self-conception. I show that these arguments constitute a new burden in justifying authority and therefore revive the anarchist objection that authority and autonomy are conceptually incompatible. / text

Esta é uma pesquisa sobre a identificação de divergências inconciliáveis. Joseph Raz é um dos principais expositores contemporâneos do positivismo jurídico, porém sua tese não apenas é controversa, como também mal compreendida. Nesta pesquisa, defendo o argumento de que a má compreensão deve-se ao fato de ser ignorada uma premissa ontológica adotada por Raz. O filósofo supõe que práticas sociais não se referem a nada mais do que fatos socialmente praticados e, portanto, não as reconhece como fonte de normatividade. Com base nesse pressuposto, a natureza do direito não poderia ser investigada do mesmo modo como se investigaria a natureza de um jogo lúdico: aos olhos de Raz, ambos possuem estruturas lógicas e normativas completamente distintas. Com isso em vista, sustento que a divergência a respeito dessa questão de ordem ontológica gera um impasse insolúvel no debate a respeito da normatividade do direito. Para testar o argumento, examino as críticas que Dennis Patterson, Gerald Postema, Kenneth E. Himma, Nicos Stavropoulos, Ronald Dworkin e Stephen Perry fazem à teoria do direito de Joseph Raz. / This is a research on the grounds of irreconcilable disagreements. Joseph Raz is one of the leading authors of legal positivism, whose theory generated a lot of controversy, matched only by the same degree of misapprehension. This research argues that this is due to the fact that an ontological premise held by Raz has been largely ignored. The philosopher considers that social practices are nothing more than socially practiced facts and, therefore, do not acknowledge them as a source of normativity. Furthermore, on that token, laws nature cannot be known and investigated in the same way games are known: according to Raz, both have completely different logical and normative structures. I sustain that there cannot be any fruitful debate regarding the normativity of law, until this ontological matter is not approached. This thesis was tested on the criticism made to the razian theory by Patterson, Gerald Postema, Kenneth E. Himma, Nicos Stavropoulos, Ronald Dworkin and Stephen Perry.

Esta é uma pesquisa sobre a identificação de divergências inconciliáveis. Joseph Raz é um dos principais expositores contemporâneos do positivismo jurídico, porém sua tese não apenas é controversa, como também mal compreendida. Nesta pesquisa, defendo o argumento de que a má compreensão deve-se ao fato de ser ignorada uma premissa ontológica adotada por Raz. O filósofo supõe que práticas sociais não se referem a nada mais do que fatos socialmente praticados e, portanto, não as reconhece como fonte de normatividade. Com base nesse pressuposto, a natureza do direito não poderia ser investigada do mesmo modo como se investigaria a natureza de um jogo lúdico: aos olhos de Raz, ambos possuem estruturas lógicas e normativas completamente distintas. Com isso em vista, sustento que a divergência a respeito dessa questão de ordem ontológica gera um impasse insolúvel no debate a respeito da normatividade do direito. Para testar o argumento, examino as críticas que Dennis Patterson, Gerald Postema, Kenneth E. Himma, Nicos Stavropoulos, Ronald Dworkin e Stephen Perry fazem à teoria do direito de Joseph Raz. / This is a research on the grounds of irreconcilable disagreements. Joseph Raz is one of the leading authors of legal positivism, whose theory generated a lot of controversy, matched only by the same degree of misapprehension. This research argues that this is due to the fact that an ontological premise held by Raz has been largely ignored. The philosopher considers that social practices are nothing more than socially practiced facts and, therefore, do not acknowledge them as a source of normativity. Furthermore, on that token, laws nature cannot be known and investigated in the same way games are known: according to Raz, both have completely different logical and normative structures. I sustain that there cannot be any fruitful debate regarding the normativity of law, until this ontological matter is not approached. This thesis was tested on the criticism made to the razian theory by Patterson, Gerald Postema, Kenneth E. Himma, Nicos Stavropoulos, Ronald Dworkin and Stephen Perry.

In the first part of the article, the author discusses two types of liberalism from the thoughts of prominent philosophers. On the one hand, she analyzes the ideas of Isaiah Berlin and Joseph Raz as examples of perfectionist liberalism and, on the other hand, those of John Rawls and Charles Larmore as examples of political liberalism. He then discusses the notion of comprehensive doctrines in John Rawls’s oeuvre, for from Nussbaum´s perspective, the construction of this notion brings Rawls close to a variant of perfectionist liberalism that he himself would try to avoid. That is why Nussbaum’s proposal is to restore a notion of comprehensive doctrines simply understood as those kinds of doctrines to which reasonable citizens adhere. / En la primera parte del artículo la autora discute dos variantes de liberalismo a partir del pensamiento de destacados filósofos. Por un lado, analiza las ideas de Isaiah Berlin y Joseph Raz como ejemplos de liberalismo perfeccionista y, por el otro, las de John Rawls y Charles Larmore como ejemplos de liberalismo político. A continuación problematiza la noción de doctrinas comprehensivas en la obra de John Rawls, pues desde la perspectiva de Nussbaum, la construcción de dicha noción acerca a Rawls a una variante de liberalismo perfeccionista que él mismo trataría de evitar. Es por ello que la propuesta de Nussbaum consiste en restaurar una noción de doctrinas comprehensivas simplemente como aquel tipo de doctrinas a las que adhieren ciudadanos razonables.

In the first part of this article, the author discusses two types ofliberalism from the thoughts of prominent philosophers. On the one hand, sheanalyzes the ideas of Isaiah Berlin and Joseph Raz as examples of perfectionistliberalism and, on the other, those of John Rawls and Charles Larmore asexamples of political liberalism. It also identifies differences between Berlin’spluralism and Raz’s and between Rawls’ liberalism and Larmore’s. / En la primera parte del presente artículo, la autora discute dos tipos de liberalismo a partir del pensamiento de destacados filósofos. Por un lado, analiza las ideas de Isaiah Berlin y Joseph Raz como ejemplos del liberalismo perfeccionista y, por el otro, las de John Rawls y Charles Larmore como ejemplos del liberalismo político. Asimismo, identifica las diferencias entre el pluralismo de Berlin y el de Raz y entre el liberalismo de Rawls y Larmore.

Two central issues in literature discussing legal authority seems to the the questions of what the law has when it has authority and under what conditions the law can be said to have authority. This thesis analyses an answer to these two questions as it has been developed by legal philosopher Joseph Raz. The analysis is conducted through scrutinizing the relation within and between three central concepts in Raz´s theory on legal authority; authority as normative power, the service conception and the obligation to obey. As for the concept of normative power, Raz seems to alternate between defining normative power as the ability to change protected reasons for action and as being a protected reason for action. The question the thesis aims to answer is whether normative power is best understood as the ability to change protected reasons for action or as being a protected reason for action? Raz does not seem to make a distinction between the two and thus, he regards both definitions as plausible. However, the analysis suggests that while it might be plausible to use both definitions as a definition of normative power, they are not interchangeable, but rather seems to represent two different levels of normative power. The analysis of the second concept, the service conception, examines Raz´s statement that justified exclusionary reasons entail a moral obligation to obey the law. Here the thesis asks if a moral obligation to obey is a plausible consequence of justified exclusionary reasons, given Raz´s own definition of obedience. The analysis suggests that a moral obligation to obey is not a plausible consequence of exclusionary reasons being justified and thus, that there seems to be incoherence between the two. Lastly, the thesis asks about the coherence between Raz´s two statements A. that justified exclusionary reasons entail a moral obligation to obey and B. that there is no moral obligation to obey the law. This last question had to be somewhat revised as the first statement (A) had already been suggested to be incoherent by the previous analysis. As such, this last question was revised into asking how the law can have legitimate authority when its legitimacy is tied to a moral obligation to obey, which is denied by Raz? The analysis suggests that these two statements are incoherent and that, as such, it is implausible that the law has the possibility to have legitimate authority at the same time as there exists no moral obligation to obey, as the former is dependent on the latter. The thesis ends in a number of concluding reflections.

Thesis advisor: Stephen Hudson / There has been a growing consensus within political philosophy that liberalism is the most rational form of political organization. The arguments in favor of liberalism are theoretical and also based on historical observations. The view of liberalism as a moral conception of the good life, however, seems to betray its original historical purpose, namely, to provide a peaceful political forum despite competing comprehensive doctrines. How can liberalism be a thick moral conviction of its own if it was meant to temper such zero-sum convictions? To pose this question more concretely: If historic wars between strong religious convictions were tempered by provisional liberal ceasefires, could we accept the evolution of liberalism into a strong conviction of its own? This paradoxical development of liberalism in history runs parallel with contemporary philosophical debates. Whether the most proper conception of liberalism is comprehensive, and whether it is legitimized upon such comprehensiveness are both hotly debated. Exploring these historical and philosophical avenues uncover what I think is a need for a conception of comprehensive liberalism. It is beyond my scope here to formulate a new conception of liberalism that decisively settles the debate. I do, however, point to reasons why comprehensive liberalism should be the focus of contemporary efforts. First, I find that history shows a trend of liberalism growing into a positive doctrine of its own. Second, I invoke two famous traditional conceptions, one successful and one failed, which fuel our baseline intuitions of liberalism with comprehensive, not political justifications. Finally, I show that while contemporary philosophy surrounding liberalism developed a political conception, it cannot avoid slipping towards comprehensiveness. Taken together, my argument is that any enforceable and useful theory of liberalism must be grounded on thick and comprehensive philosophical premises. / Thesis (MA) — Boston College, 2017. / Submitted to: Boston College. Graduate School of Arts and Sciences. / Discipline: Philosophy.

In political philosophy, perfectionism is the view that it is the job of the state to best enable its citizens to live good or flourishing lives. It claims that certain lives can be judged to be sound, and thus instructs governments to promote those lives using state institutions etc. Anti-perfectionism denies this. It says that it is not the job of the state to promote good lives. Instead it should restrict itself to securing basic rights and duties, a threshold level of resources and so on. Citizens should be left to adopt pursuits however they see fit. For some anti-perfectionists, this is precisely because we cannot judge any putative life to be sound. However, many are not sceptics, and justify state neutrality for other reasons. All accounts of anti-perfectionism must overcome what has been called the asymmetry objection: what justifies the imbalance inherent in anti-perfectionism? Why believe that the state is permitted to act on judgements about justice, but not on judgements about flourishing? My thesis argues that attempts to respond to the asymmetry objection have failed thus far. Further, I offer an account of political morality that can overcome the problem. The first four chapters of the thesis clarify the debate between perfectionists and anti-perfectionists, narrowing the former down into its most plausible form. Chapters five and six focus on two failed attempts to vindicate anti-perfectionism – Brian Barry's argument from scepticism and Jonathan Quong's Rawlsian approach. In the final chapter I put forward a much more promising argument in favour of anti-perfectionism – justice as a set of constraints.

This thesis is about the legitimacy of political authority in general and international legal institutions (ILIs) in particular. It is divided into two parts with three chapters corresponding to each part. The first part presents an account of legitimate political authority that is based on Joseph Raz's service conception of authority but also makes some important modifications to it. The central claim of the first part is that the legitimacy of political authorities in general, as measured by the standard of Raz's Normal Justification Thesis, depends in a crucial way on the ability of the subjects to get involved –more so than Raz is prepared to admit– in the activities that are relevant in the political domain. The thesis offers a general account of legitimate political authority, i.e. one that is valid for any type of political authority. The second part, however, examines the implications of this account for the legitimacy of ILIs. These are non-state authorities, such as the World Trade Organisation or the International Criminal Court, that deal with problems of global political relevance. Because of this global approach, the subjects of ILIs (i.e. those whose reasons are to be served by the ILI) are not confined to the boundaries of regions or states, but distributed across the world. ILIs operate by creating, interpreting, and applying public international law. Despite some striking differences between ILIs and other types of political authority (particularly states), I argue that they all ought to be measured by the same standard of legitimacy, namely the Normal Justification Thesis. But I also argue that the requirements for meeting this standard of legitimacy may vary according to the type of political authority (especially with regard to the requirement of democracy).