Natural Law and Natural Rights (Clarendon Law Series) [Paperback]

John Finnis (Author)

Book Description

ISBN-10: 0198761104 | ISBN-13: 978-0198761105 | Publication Date: March 20, 1980 | Edition: First Edition

This book uses contemporary analytical tools to provide basic accounts of values and principles, community and `common good', justice and human rights, authority, law, the varieties of obligation, unjust law, and even the question of divine authority.

Editorial Reviews

Review

"Anyone in Britain or America who attempts to conduct a graduate course in contemporary political philosophy, fundamental ethics, or the philosophy of law, without having first thoroughly read this book, will be open, with considerable justification, to the charge of incompetence....Deserves a place in current discussions comparable in prominence to the one enjoyed by John Rawls's A Theory of Justice."--The Review of Metaphysics

"The most excellent comprehensive and sensitive work in legal theory to come out of the tradition of analytical jurisprudence."--The Annals of the AAPSS

"Undoubtedly the most significant work on the natural law to appear in modern times."--Theological Studies

"An extremely valuable book that may very well become a standard work in moral theology, moral philosophy, metaethics, jurisprudence, and philosophy."--The Thomist

About the Author

John Finnis is at University College, Oxford.

Product Details

• Paperback: 442 pages
• Publisher: Oxford University Press, USA; First Edition edition (March 20, 1980)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0198761104
• ISBN-13: 978-0198761105
• Product Dimensions: 8.7 x 5.5 x 1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.2 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 3.9 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (8 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #717,066 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

22 of 26 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A comprehensive theory of ethics, politics, and law, November 19, 2002

By 

"ibell21" (Toronto, ON Canada) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Natural Law and Natural Rights (Clarendon Law Series) (Paperback)

Finnis's background is that of a lawyer and legal philosopher, and so this book is ostensibly a contribution to philosophy of law, but in effect it is a wide-ranging treatment of ethical and political theory aimed at supporting a broadly Natural Law conception of the foundations of law. Finnis's starting point is a teleological but anticonsequentialist ethical theory originally developed by Germain Grisez. Grisez, and following him Finnis, attempt to combine the Aristotelian insight that human actions are fundamentally directed toward realization of or participation in certain human goods, with the Kantian (and traditionalist Catholic) position that certain actions are never morally permissible, no matter what human goods may be achieved by doing them. The justification for this restriction lies in the "incommensurability" of multiple human goods: because goods cannot be commensurated, it is never rational to say that acting against a certain basic good is justified by the overall "better" effect of doing so. This moral principle supplies a justification for certain specific political rights (e.g., the right of innocents not be killed) and so for certain (not all) rights protected in e.g., in the American Bill of Rights.

Finnis's political philosophy is based on the necessity of political communities for the realization of certain kinds of human good, which in turn is the basis for the justification of political authority and of law in particular.

The foregoing is a very brief and selective sketch of a theory that Finnis develops in great detail over the course of the book's ten central chapters. Although much of Finnis's theory is necessarily controversial--especially his account of the incommensurability of goods--the book offers a subtle, rich, and I think largely compelling alternative to purely consequentialist and purely deontological theories of law and political morality. Finnis's work clearly comes out of a specifically Catholic intellectual tradition, but I think this book can be profitably read by a much wider audience. Finnis never relies on specifically Catholic (or Christian, or religious) doctrine, and he seems to have intentionally focused the discussion away from specifically Catholic moral controversies.

The book presupposes some familiarity with moral and political philosophy, e.g., Aristotle's _Ethics_ and modern consequentialist theories. Familiarity with Aquinas will reveal some of Finnis's influences but I doubt such familiarity is strictly necessary to understand what Finnis is saying. Certainly the book's arguments stand (or fall) on their own merits, without appeal the authority of Aquinas.

12 of 13 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A brilliantly refreshing attempt at Natural Law, June 4, 2002

By 

JUDE CHUA SOO MENG (Singapore, Singapore Singapore) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Natural Law and Natural Rights (Clarendon Law Series) (Paperback)

John Finnis's book is revolutionary, and it is owing to this brilliant, though not uncontroverted work that Aquinas' theory of natural law has regained its appeal and even prestige. Finnis' arguments can be hard to grasp, principally because natural law is not argued for, but is self-evident, and can only be submitted to a defense. Precisely on this count Finnis, and his collaborators with him, Germain Grisez and Robert P George (themselves also excellent catholic intellectuals) have found criticism amongst more conservative readers of Aquinas' moral theory. For Finnis, the reasonable grasp of basic goods, i.e., the awareness of first practical principles, i.e., the natural law, is known per se nota, not derived from anything. Especially exciting his defense of knowlegde or truth as an undeniable basic good, although his treatment and defense of other basic goods require development Also interesting is his treatment of Aquinas' notion legal validity in positive law, which he argues admits of a certain abstraction from morality, thereby aligning himself somewhat with Hart's positivism. Issues of Thomistic exegesis aside, this is a magnificent work in its own right, and compulsory reading for ages to come in jurisprudence. A good and perhaps even essential companion is his Fundamentals of Ethics.

15 of 18 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars The best introduction to Natural Law Theory, July 19, 2001

By 

Cristobal Orrego - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Natural Law and Natural Rights (Clarendon Law Series) (Paperback)

Finnis, encouraged by the late H.L.A. Hart (20th Century leading English legal positivist), wrote this introduction to legal theory from the Natural Law Tradition point of view. In 13 chapters he shows what is a science of Law, why Natural Law classical (Plato's, Aristotle's and Aquinas') theory has been misunderstood (even by Hart or Kelsen), which are the basic principles of practical reason (corresponding to the basic human values) and the basic requirements of practical reasonableness (which allow us to reason in a morally right way), and which are the most fundamental truths regarding the community and its common good, justice, (legal and natural) rights, authority, the Law and obligation, unjust laws and, finally, the place of God in this order or practical knowledge. The book is difficult to read, but a source ot true intellectual joy. I have translated this book into Spanish, and this, I guess, might be a sign of how much I think it is worthwhile reading and using it, along with Finnis' "Aquinas" (1998).