The Withdrawal of Rights

Abstract

The framework within which this study takes place, considers rights as valid claims, that is, claims that are justified within a system of rules. The validity of these claims is grounded on a certain description, which is held sufficient for justifying the claims, of those who fit this description.¹³⁸ In this sense, the possessor of rights can simply be considered as the person holding a set of qualifications, which certifies her status as a right-holder. The way I describe a possessor of rights entails the possession of some individual mental capacities, together with some normative requirements, that are part of the agent’s membership of the moral community. Both individual (or “agent-relative”, or “Kantian”) and communitarian requirements, so lexically ordered, create justifying grounds, which is not only the necessary but also the sufficient condition, for ascribing moral agency to someone. Of course, both kinds of requirements need to coexist, since the moral agency results from the existence of an aggregate of characteristics, whose combination creates the moral agency. Each of these sets of characteristics can be considered as a necessary condition, but only their conjunction creates the validity of the claims, or the justifying grounds for possessing rights.