The issues surrounding civil disobedience have been discussed since at least 399 BC and, in the wake of such recent events as the protest at Tiananmen Square, are still of great relevance. By ...presenting classic and current philosophical reflections on the issues, this book presents all the basic materials needed for a philosophical assessment of the nature and justification of civil disobedience. The pieces included range from classic essays by leading contemporary thinkers such as Rawls, Raz and Singer. Hugo Adam Bedau's introduction sets out the issues and shows how the various authors shed light on each aspect of them.
In The Death Penalty in America: Current Controversies, Hugo Adam Bedau, one of our preeminent scholars on the subject, provides a comprehensive sourcebook on the death penalty, making the process of ...informed consideration not only possible but fascinating as well. No mere revision of the third edition of The Death Penalty in America--which the New York Times praised as the most complete, well-edited and comprehensive collection of readings on the pros and cons of the death penalty--this volume brings together an entirely new selection of 40 essays and includes updated statistical and research data, recent Supreme Court decisions, and the best current contributions to the debate over capital punishment. From the status of the death penalty worldwide to current attitudes of Americans toward convicted killers, from legal arguments challenging the constitutionality of the death penalty to moral arguments enlisting the New Testament in support of it, from controversies over the role of race and class in the judicial system to proposals to televise executions, Bedau gathers readings that explore all the most compelling aspects of this most compelling issue.
Experts on both side of the issue--including Paul Cassell, Alexander Kozinski, Louis Pojman, Stephen Bright, Hugo Bedau, Bryan Stevenson, Joshua Marquis, and Governor George Ryan--speak out both for ...and against capital punishment and the rationale behind their individual beliefs.
When news breaks that a convicted murderer, released from prison, has killed again, or that an innocent person has escaped the death chamber in light of new DNA evidence, arguments about capital ...punishment inevitably heat up. Few controversies continue to stir as much emotion as this one, and public confusion is often the result. This volume brings together seven experts--judges, lawyers, prosecutors, and philosophers--to debate the death penalty in a spirit of open inquiry and civil discussion. Here, as the contributors present their reasons for or against capital punishment, the multiple facets of the issue are revealed in clear and thought-provoking detail. Is the death penalty a viable deterrent to future crimes? Does the imposition of lesser penalties, such as life imprisonment, truly serve justice in cases of the worst offences? Does the legal system discriminate against poor or minority defendants? Is the possibility of executing innocent persons sufficient grounds for abolition? In confronting such questions and making their arguments, the contributors marshal an impressive array of evidence, both statistical and from their own experiences working on death penalty cases. The book also includes the text of Governor George Ryan’s March 2002 speech in which he explained why he had commuted the sentences of all prisoners on Illinois’s death row. By representing the viewpoints of experts who face the vexing questions about capital punishment on a daily basis, Debating the Death Penalty makes a vital contribution to a more nuanced understanding of the moral and legal problems underlying this controversy.
Bedau, the leading authority on the endlessly complex topic of capital punishment, delivers a revision of his celebrated 1982 edition, which the New York Times called the most complete, well-edited ...and comprehensive collection of readings on the pros and cons of the death penalty. Featuring 40 new essays and updated statistical and research data, this landmark volume offers the most authoritative perspectives on this divisive issue.
Le présent article se centre sur un argument dirigé contre la peine capitale, l'argument d'interférence minimale, qui remonte à Beccaria. Une défense est offerte des prémisses essentielles de cet ...argument, à savoir la légitimité générale de l'existence d'un système pénal, la violence supérieure de la peine capitale par rapport à la peine d'emprisonnement et l'aptitude au moins égale de l'emprisonnement à servir les objectifs poursuivis par la peine capitale. Deux objections sont ensuite rejetées, la première prétendant que la peine capitale dispose d'un pouvoir dissuasif supérieur à celui de la peine d'emprisonnement, la seconde reposant sur une conception rétributiviste de la peine. Le rejet de la première recourt à une réduction à l'absurde et celui de la seconde repose sur l'argument selon lequel, à supposer même que l'on adopte une approche rétributiviste, celle-ci ne justifierait pas nécessairement la peine capitale. Beccaria (et après lui Bentham) avaient donc raison. This article is centred on an argument against capital punishment, namely the argument of minimum interference, which goes back to Beccaria. The essential premises of this argument are defended, namely the general legitimacy of the existence of a penal system, the greater violence of capital punishment over imprisonment, and the thesis that imprisonment is at least equally suited towards achieving the goals aimed at by capital punishment. Two objections are then rejected, fïrstly the view that capital punishment is a greater deterrent than imprisonment, and secondly, the interpretation of punishment as retribution. In the first case, the argument is based on a reductio ad absurdum, and in the second, on the argument that, even if punishment is seen as retributive, such an approach does not necessarily justify capital punishment. Thus Beccaria (and later Bentham) were right..
Most professors and administrators are aware that academic freedom is in danger of being brushed aside by a public that has little understanding of what is at stake. They may be only marginally aware ...that the defense of academic freedom is endangered by certain confusions concerning the nature of academic freedom, the criteria for its violation, and the structure of an adequate justification for claims to it. These confusions were enshrined in some of the central documents on the subject, including the 1940 Statement on Academic Freedom and Tenure, agreed upon by the American Association of University Professors and the Association of American Colleges and endorsed by many professional organizations. Careful analysis of them will not do away with debate; it will bring the debate into focus, so that attacks on academic freedom can be appraised as near or far away from the center of the target and can then be appropriately answered. Nearly all the contemporary writing on academic freedom consists of attack or defense. The Concept of Academic Freedom is the first book to deal exclusively with fundamental conceptual issues underlying the battle. In the discussion of these issues, certain philosophical positions crystallize: radical versus liberal conceptions of the status and function of university teachers, specific versus general theories of academic freedom, consequential versus nonconsequential theories of justification. Partisans (and enemies) of academic freedom would do well to decide on which side of these divisions they stand, or how they would mediate between sides. Otherwise many questions will remain unclear: What is under discussion—a special right peculiar to academics or a general right that is especially important to academics? Is justification of that right possible? Can the right be derived from other rights, or from the theory of justice or of democratic society? Or is the argument for academic freedom one that more properly turns on the consequences for society as a whole if that freedom is not protected? The essays in this book explore these and other problems concerning the defense of academic freedom by radicals, the justification for disruption on campus, and the control of research. Contributors to the volume include Hugo Adam Bedau, Bertram H. Davis, Milton Fisk, Graham Hughes, Alan Pasch, Hardy E. Jones, Alexander Ritchie, Amelie Oksenberg Rorty, Rolf Sartorius, T. M. Scanlon, Richard Schmitt, John R. Searle, Judith Jarvis Thomson, and William Van Alstyne. All are outstanding in their fields. Many have had practical experience in the legal profession or with the American Association of University Professors on the issue of academic freedom.
