Abstract
Purpose
This paper presumes that a public policy document must aim at protecting human rights. The question being raised is- what kind of moral reasoning or grounding can we afford to the idea that human rights are important for the whole framework of public policy (including the implementation of the policy). The paper aims at looking at the moral and political philosophy of Immanuel Kant as we find it in his Groundwork of the Metaphysics of Morals and the Metaphysics of Morals for providing this background.
Method
The paper provides an exegetical account of some of the key concepts in Kant’s moral philosophy and the application of these in socio-political contexts.
Result and Discussion
The processes involved in the framing of the document, the document itself, as well as the persons framing the document must aspire to respect and protect human rights. The implication itself rests on the principle that a moral end cannot be achieved by immoral means and protecting human rights is a moral end that all societies (in whatever form) must seek to achieve. Hence not only the end, which in this case is the policy document itself, but the means, i.e., the processes of framing the documents and intentions of those responsible and accountable for it, must also be moral.
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Notes
The translations referred to are Mary Gregor’s translations for the Groundwork for the Metaphysics of Morals (1997) and the Metaphysics of Morals (1991). Henceforth, the former text is abbreviated as GMM and the latter as MM.
Kant makes this distinction in his Critique of Practical Reason where he distinguishes between morally good and good—bonitas moralis and bonitas pragmatic. See commentary by Beck (1960).
For example what is true of a person qua human being must also be accepted as being true of any other human being qua human being although in many other respects (not related to their being human) they may differ.
The fact, however, remains that an effective public policy must also look at the consequences of implementing it on all stakeholders involved.
The reference is to John Rawls’ notion as found in his A Theory of Justice (1971).
References
Beck, L. W. (1960). A commentary on kant’s critique of practical reason. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
Kant, I. (1785). Groundwork of the metaphysics of morals. Translated by Mary Gregor (1997). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Kant, I. (1797). The metaphysics of morals. Translated by Mary Gregor (1991). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Rawls, J. (1971). A theory of justice. Cambridge, MA: Cambridge University Press.
Wenar, L. (2005). The nature of human rights. In A. Follesdal & T. Pogge (Eds.), Real world justice: Grounds, principles, human rights and social institutions (pp. 285–293). Netherlands: Springer.
Wood, A. W. (1999). Kant’s ethical thought. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Online Resources
Austrian Development Agency, Ludwig Boltzmann Institute of Human Rights. (2010). Human rights manual. Retrieved from: http://www.entwicklung.at/uploads/media/HUMAN_RIGHTS_Manual__July_2010_01.pdf.
Johnson, R. (2014). Kant’s moral philosophy. In The stanford encyclopedia of philosophy. Retrieved from: http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/kant-moral/.
Rauscher, F. (2012). Kant’s social and political philosophy. In The stanford encyclopedia of philosophy. Retrieved from: http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/kant-social-political/.
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Motilal, S., Juyal, D.R. Human Rights and Public Policy Frameworks A Kantian Perspective. J. Indian Counc. Philos. Res. 33, 241–251 (2016). https://doi.org/10.1007/s40961-016-0056-8
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s40961-016-0056-8