Rights (International Library of Essays in Law and Legal Theory (Second Series).)

This text collects influential essays of the 1970s, 80s and 90s critiquing and defending the liberal rights tradition. Modern "rights critics" have focused on the perceived conflict between liberal rights and progressive or egalitarian political objectives, the preference of liberal states for negative over positive rights, and also the dangers to the community of the overly atomistic conception of human nature, which is arguably at the heart of the liberal rights tradition.