Abstract

Suppose that a natural rights theory is justified if anyone who would consider it would find that in following it, she best served her self-interest. David Gauthier argues people would be rational in adhering to his version of Lockean natural rights, which appears as "the proviso" in his book Morals By Agreement. I am a proponent of an alternative theory of natural rights, NR$\sp*$, by which people have natural rights both to non-interference and to accommodation. I believe that NR$\sp*$ would be found to better serve people's self-interest than the proviso alone. I critically examine Gauthier's arguments to see whether the proviso can be justified on the theory of rationality and value Gauthier assumes. I argue that he justifies the proviso, if at all, only so far as actual people are like his model of the liberal individual. I argue that Gauthier's Archimedean point argument must be interpreted to include the self-interested choice to develop the emotional commitments and social aspirations of liberal individualism, in order that one could rationally comply with the proviso. But I argue that on his theory of rationality and value, it is not irrational to be a non-liberal individual. I then briefly outline an argument that actual people would be at least as reasonable in choosing, from the Archimedean point, to subscribe to NR$\sp*$.