Chapter 9
1 R. DWORKIN, Taking Rights Seriously, p. xi.
2 R. DWORKIN, Taking Rights Seriously, p. 191.
3 E.g., R. DWORKIN, Taking Rights Seriously, p. 185.
4 R. DWORKIN, Taking Rights Seriously, p. 87.
5 Like the one espoused by Th. AQUINAS, Summa Theologiae 1a2ae, q. 90, art. 2 (p. 150); q. 93, art. 3 (p. 164); q. 94, art. 2 (pp. 169, 170); q. 94, art. 5 (pp. 172, 173).
6 R. DWORKIN, Taking Rights Seriously, p. 87.
7 R. DWORKIN, A Matter of Principle, p. 205.
8 R. DWORKIN, A Matter of Principle, p. 205.
9 E.g., in part 3 (Chs. 8-11) of A Matter of Principle.
10 I do not, then, express myself here on the hierarchy between one’s economic and political interests, save for remarking that in the direst of circumstances, it would be virtually absurd to suppose that the former might not supersede the latter, and it is not inapposite to note, especially in view of urgent situations, that the interest in realizing the latter becomes moot if this realization is to take place at a time when one is no longer alive to enjoy them.
11 R. DWORKIN, Taking Rights Seriously, p. 267.
12 R. DWORKIN, Justice in Robes, p. 112.
13 It is obvious that this question must come to the fore. It is very easy to support a conclusion through premises of one’s own fabrication, but that does not make it correct, of course (an extreme example of this approach is found in Spinoza’s Ethica, notably the first part).
14 R. DWORKIN, Sovereign Virtue, p. 237; cf. Is Democracy Possible Here?, pp. 69-73.
15 Again, I myself do not distinguish between freedom and liberty and consider them synonyms.
16 It would be a petitio principii to say that this conclusion is not warranted because Dworkin has not defined ‘liberty’ thus but rather by referring to equality in the first place. After all, what is under discussion is this definition itself, which is far from self-evident.
17 The view that liberty should be understood as negative freedom in this case is not only propagated by Berlin, of course.
18 An even greater skepticism may be defended, on the basis of which it may be argued that the question which party is right (or rather – in this case – ‘right’) is based on the unfounded premise (some would call ‘essentialism’) that such a question can be answered at all, as if the answer to it is hidden somewhere, waiting to be discovered.
19 R. DWORKIN, Justice in Robes, pp. 112, 113; “Do Values Conflict? A Hedgehog’s Approach”, p. 256.
20 This does not mean that equality or liberty cannot be valuable, but that is a different matter. One may consider music or a nice meal valuable, but it would be difficult, I think, to consider enjoying these things something ‘moral’.
21 R. DWORKIN, Justice in Robes, pp. 115, 116.
22 Explicitly so elsewhere (R. DWORKIN, “Do Values Conflict? A Hedgehog’s Approach”, p. 254).