Contra Ivan, Nick Troester levels a miniature defense of Locke. There is definitely an ‘anti-natural law’ aspect of Locke which actually remains fairly powerfully Aristotelian. If Aristotle was right that the political relationship was fundamentally different in kind from other sorts of human relationships, even if firmly dependent upon them; and if Aristotle was also right that the political relationship was a higher kind of relationship than the ones it was dependent on (such as family relationships), then isn’t it consistent with Aristotle himself to read the development of Lockean, individualistic regimes of rights as the natural outgrowth of Aristotelian politics? That, in other words, the erosion of natural-law based political regimes is, in a healthy and flourishing Aristotelian democracy, natural?
The question becomes: when, if ever, does the growth and diversification of rights become unnatural ? Or, if that language seems strained in this context, pathological, obsessive, fetishistic, self-destructive, or whatever?
It strikes me that even if we bracket natural law talk at this point for pragmatic reasons, we can still give a robust, persuasive account of why some rights talk is good for a flourishing polity and why some is not. The main thrust of critique is that some rights are simply not political, and therefore don’t belong among the goods of politics. This line of argument would dispense with the idea that any rights are not political. That may make some people uncomfortable, especially natural-law enthusiasts, but I don’t see the high philosophical stakes here translating into any serious risk to, say, American politics . Indeed, by letting go of the rope on that one we would probably also lose a lot of the insanity that causes any rights claim to be shoved into adjudication in our political-judicial framework (see the California marriage cases ruling, which, as the court earnestly claimed, was not a political decision — but a philosophical one). Once we jettison the idea that politicizing, nationalizing, and legally enshrining lifestyles and relationships as the ‘law of the land’ is the only way that we can ensure that American individuals can safely pursue their idiosyncratic private projects, we can reclaim the naturalness of political relationships.
But the keywords in that sentence are ‘safely’ and ‘private’. Conservatives today are annoyed by rights talk because it publicizes people’s idiosyncratic private projects. Liberals continue to champion right talks because they think private projects cannot be authentic unless they’re publicized. It seems to me the only possible way to make ourselves comfortable given this tension is through a really federalist regime on the one hand and a ‘nonfoundational’ politics with a ‘foundational’ culture on the other. Not a very innovative answer, but there it is. Thoughts?
