The essays in this volume constitute a symposium on the work of Joel Feinberg. Ten leading scholars in ethics, legal philosophy, and social and political philosophy offer a glimpse of the scope and impact of Feinberg's work. They address issues such as a theory of rights, antipaternalism, an account of action and omission, and the legal enforcement of morals.

Joel Feinberg's brief against legal paternalism, which is the central focus of his Harm to Self, is undoubtedly the most scrupulous, nuanced, and thorough critique of the view yet provided by a liberal philosopher. I was once convinced of Feinberg's case and am now less sure. This makes me uneasy, both because I have strong liberal instincts that I would prefer to be able to justify, and also because I suppose I have not thought about the matter with the kind or degree of care that Feinberg himself did. In assessing his antipaternalist arguments, I include here a number of excerpts from Feinberg's own writings to remind us of his subtlety and precision, his broad range of references, his elegant and informed style, his sound good sense, his ability to provide the revealing, compelling example, and his supple cast of mind. That my commentary is bound to pale by comparison is inevitable, but I take some comfort in thinking that one cannot be held liable for what cannot be helped.

Among Joel Feinberg's almost innumerable achievements are his development and defense of the sovereign-right conception of autonomy and its corresponding rejection of hard legal paternalism. According to Feinberg, a competent individual's voluntary, self-regarding conduct falls within the protected realm of sovereign self-rule and is therefore immune from coercive, paternalistic interference by the state. It does not matter whether the self-harm the state wants to prevent is big or the coercion needed to prevent it is small. The coercive interference would be illegitimate because “sovereignty is an all or nothing concept; one is entitled to absolute control of whatever is within one's domain however trivial it may be.”

This article argues that there is a fundamental tension between Joel Feinberg's theory of the nature of rights and his account of what types of beings are potential right-holders. In explaining this tension, I argue that Feinberg actually adopts two competing concepts of rights. Clearly, Feinberg must choose between these two theories, but I suggest that both are attractive and that neither view can be selected as either “correct” or “incorrect” on the grounds of either logical consistency or even straightforward conceptual analysis. In the end, one's preference between these two concepts of rights depends upon competing values, values about which reasonable people can disagree.

Christopher Wellman argues that Joel Feinberg fails to grasp the distinction between will theories and interest theories. According to Wellman, this failure leads Feinberg to defend a will theory in “The Nature and Value of Rights” and an interest theory in “The Rights of Animals and Unborn Generations” and therefore to hold an inconsistent theory of rights. Wellman's interpretation of Feinberg is plausible. I will argue that there is another plausible interpretation and that the texts do not allow us to determine which of the two plausible interpretations is correct. I will also argue that this alternative interpretation allows Feinberg to avoid Wellman's charge of inconsistency but has problems of its own. Along the way, I will make some points about how to defend a theory of rights and about the strengths and weaknesses of the will and interest theories of rights. (Wellman holds that choice theories are a subset of will theories. I have argued elsewhere that it is better to see will theories as a subset of choice theories. However, how one cuts up the field is irrelevant to the issue at hand. For the sake of argument, I will assume that Wellman's topology is correct.)

In Chapter 4 of his famous work, Harm to Others, Joel Feinberg, with characteristic clarity and insight, outlined the major problems associated with analyzing the foundations of responsibility for the failure to act. In that chapter he made a number of controversial claims supported by arguments that have generated debate ever since he made them in 1984. His analysis led him to conclude that liability (or responsibility) for the failure to act falls within the moral limits of the criminal law in cases in which a random bystander could easily rescue a seriously imperiled stranger.

Patricia Smith provides an analysis of the concept of omission that builds upon the work of Joel Feinberg. Her account succeeds in bringing together more systematically than did Feinberg several key elements of his analysis. She also usefully extends the analysis to include unintentional omissions. Nonetheless, I argue that she mistakenly presupposes that there is a unique and logically fundamental concept of omission. Rather, I contend, there are multiple omission concepts, each mapping the conceptual terrain of inaction in a somewhat different way. These different concepts, each useful for a distinct purpose, will emerge from an examination of the flaws that Smith's account shares with Feinberg's analysis.

Joel Feinberg was a brilliant philosopher whose work in social and moral philosophy is a legacy of excellent, even stunning achievement. Perhaps his most memorable achievement is his four-volume treatise on The Moral Limits of the Criminal Law, and perhaps the most striking jewel in this crowning achievement is his passionate and deeply insightful treatment of paternalism. Feinberg opposes legal paternalism, the doctrine that “it is always a good reason in support of a [criminal law] prohibition that it is probably necessary to prevent harm (physical, psychological, or economic) to the actor himself.” Against this doctrine Feinberg asserts that when an agent's sufficiently voluntary choice causes harm to herself or risk of harm to herself, this category of harm-to-self is never a good reason in support of criminal law prohibition of that type of conduct.

Richard Arneson finds that Joel Feinberg's “principled arguments against hard paternalism are defective and merit rejection.” Furthermore, Arneson concludes with a tone of finality, “there is no successful case against hard paternalism to be made.” This diagnosis seems especially dire coming from Arneson, who formerly defended hard antipaternalism against Feinberg's revisionistic “soft” antipaternalism. On Feinberg's behalf I will try to show how Arneson's critique downplays certain costs of hard paternalism. These costs may be worth paying, but (I think Feinberg believed) their magnitude itself constitutes a powerful case against paternalism.

Poetry is about the grief; politics is about the grievance.

—Robert Frost

The ruling passion in man is … a gregarious instinct to keep together by minding each others' business.

—Robert Frost

Joel Feinberg's four volume work The Moral Limits of the Criminal Law can, I believe, be accurately characterized as a normative treatise on what criminal law theorists call the “special part” of the criminal law. The “general part” deals with the basic elements of all criminal offenses—whatever is prohibited. Thus general part theorists analyze the notions of actus reus and mens rea, the conditions that negate voluntariness in acting, the distinction between acts and omissions, the nature of causation, joint participation in crime such as complicity and conspiracy, and the various defenses labeled justifications and excuses. Feinberg has little to say about these matters. His concern is with what conduct may be forbidden and punished—the specific substance rather than the general form of the criminal law.