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Robert Nozick s Anarchy, State, and Utopia is a powerful,philosophical challenge to the most widely held political andsocial positions of our age -- liberal, socialist andconservative.
"Individuals have rights," Nozick writes in his openingsentence, "and there are things no person or group may do to themwithout violating their rights." The work that follows is asophisticated and passionate defence of the rights of theindividual as opposed to the state.
The author argues that the state is justified only when it isseverely limited to the narrow function of protection againstforce, theft and fraud and to the enforcement of contracts. Anymore extensive activities by the state, he demonstrates, willinevitably violate individual rights.
Among the many achievements of the work are an important newtheory of distributive justice, a model of utopia, and anintegration of ethics, legal philosophy and economic theory into aprofound position in political philosophy which will be discussedfor years to come.
About the author
Robert Nozick (16. November 1938 bis 23. Januar 2002) gilt als ein wichtiger Vertreter der zeitgemäßen angloamerikanischen Philosophie, der nahezu zu allen wichtigen Bereichen der Philosophie (Wissen, freier Wille und Wert, Liebe, Tod und Glaube) nennenswerte Beiträge geleistet hat. 1938 geboren, wuchs er im New Yorker Stadtteil Brooklyn als Sohn eines russischen Einwanderers auf. Unter dem Einfluss von Werken von Murray N. Rothbard, Friedrich A. von Hayek und Milton Friedman wandte er sich während seines Studiums an der Princeton University dem Libertarismus zu. 1969 übernahm der 30-Jährige die Pellegrino-University-Professur (Philosophie) an der renommierten Universität Harvard.
Summary
Robert Nozicka s Anarchy, State, and Utopia is a powerful, philosophical challenge to the most widely held political and social positions of our age ---- liberal, socialist and conservative.
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"...This book is the best piece of sustained analytical argument inpolitical philosophy to have appeared for a very long time." Mind
"...complex, sophisticated and ingenious." Economist
