Theory of Rights

by Ronald
Dworkin
By Akansha Mewara
Ronald Dworkin
 American philosopher, jurist, and scholar of United States
constitutional law
 Dworkin conceives of individual rights as being fundamental and is
being derived from an abstract right to equality being fundamental
they cannot be overridden by governments except in extraordinary
circumstances
 Dworkin, as positivism's most significant critic, rejects the positivist
theory on every conceivable level. Dworkin denies that there can be
any general theory of the existence and content of law; he denies
that local theories of particular legal systems can identify law
without recourse to its moral merits, and he rejects the whole
institutional focus of positivism.
 now as a conventional liberal in the twentieth
century to work and holds the view that
government as far as possible in the Western
liberal democracies ought not to be predicated and
its policies ought not to be based on any
controversial understanding of human good
instead as much as possible governmental policies
ought to be loosened from those controversial
foundations
 A theory of law is for Dworkin a theory of how cases ought to be
decided and it begins, not with an account of the political
organization of a legal system, but with an abstract ideal regulating
the conditions under which governments may use coercive force
over their subjects
 Dworkin disagrees with several of the major tenets of Hart's theory.
He contends, first, that judges are never free to exercise "strong
discretion" in deciding issues of law, even in cases in which no legal
rule dictates a clear result.15 When a judge runs out of "textbook
rules,"Dworkin asserts, he must base his decision not on nonlegal
standards or norms, but rather on what may be called legal
principles.
 The rights thesis relies heavily upon Dworkin's distinction
between principles, upon which judges must ground their
reasoning, and policies, the weighing of which they must
eschew.
 As Dworkin explains, "[a]rguments of policy justify a political
decision by showing that the decision advances or protects
some collective goal of the community as a whole," while
"[a]rguments of principle justify a political decision by
showing that the decision respects or secures some individual
or group right.In short, "[p]rinciples are propositions that
describe rights; policies are propositions that describe goals
 the liberal position suggests that society ought not
to override your individual rights or my individual
rights instead you know to defer to those rights as
being fundamental and taking greater precedence
than society's own goals or policies
Conclusion
 Dworkin views on individual rights views that have been
very influential he's a kind of a rights fundamentalist very
famously he asserted always and everywhere individual
rights and individual conceptions of the good though they
may be self-destructive nevertheless take precedence over
community interests collective interests precisely because
it is the individual who should chart his or her own way
and liberty for the individual ought to be inviolable even
against even over and against very great community
goods which could otherwise be achieved