Liberdade, propriedade, justiça

: estado mínimo ou estado subsidiário? : diálogo entre o pensamento social católico e Robert Nozick

Abstract

The thesis describes the dialogue between Robert Nozick and Catholic Social Thought (PSC) in the respective State proposals – minimum and subsidiary, covering the themes that underlie it: the understanding of what it means to be a person, freedom, property, and justice. In the different conceptions of the human person that legitimize the existence of the State, we have in confrontation the PSC thesis, which defends the intrinsic sociability of the human person in need of State protection itself; and Nozick's thesis, which understands that only individuals and their interests should be considered for the conception of the State. The debate on the respective visions of freedom follows, mediated by Isaiah Berlin and his Two Concepts of Liberty, considering Nozick freedom exclusively in negative terms, such as rights of non-interference, and the PSC defending the two conceptions of freedom, negative and positive, as necessary in a society at the service of the human person. We review the PSC's tradition to outline the lines of permanence in the theme of freedom, seen essentially as responsibility. The debate evolves towards property, as Nozick's proposal for freedom is entirely based on it: in confrontation we have Nozick defending property, including self-ownership as an absolute right and the only basis for the protection of the State; and the PSC, defending the social function of property, and seeing it as a natural right that is not absolute, but subordinate to the universal destination of goods, taking into account the preferential option for the poor. The conception of justice for the two perspectives is subsequently exposed, with Nozick proposing a theory of historical justice without considering the consequences, arguing against patterned and redistributive theories (which he considers violating the Kantian principle of the “end in itself”); in comparison with a proposal of justice understood as the “good of the other”, integrating the commutative, legal, distributive, and social dimensions. Finally, the respective State proposals are presented: Nozickian minimal State confronted not only with the PSC, but also with anarchist criticism, in its elaboration; and the subsidiary State of the PSC, also in debate with the Nozickian utopia, in defence of what it considers to be the most suitable model to respond to the dignity of the human person and his flourishing.

Date of Award	18 Jun 2024
Original language	Portuguese
Awarding Institution	Universidade Católica Portuguesa
Supervisor	Orlando Samões (Supervisor)