Negative Duties, the WTO and the Harm Argument

Abstract

Citizens in rich countries should shoulder the burden of alleviating global poverty because they are harming the poor, or so many argue. But the baseline for assessing harm is often unclear.This paper recommends a baseline for harm as rights violations.This baseline makes it clear that many of the attributions of harm made by proponents of the harm argument, instead of representing cases of harms caused, are rather instances of benefits withheld from the poor. A moral case can be made that benefits should be extended by the rich countries toward poor ones, but this case will look very different from a case for responsibility for harm.

Global Justice and the Role of Stakeholding

“…201–203). The harm we contribute to here is a harm to others’ rights where severe poverty is understood as a violation of human rights and autonomy (Hassoun, 2012; Pavel, 2015). The Universal Declaration of Human Rights states in Article III that all persons have a right to the secure access of ‘minimally adequate shares of all basic goods’ (quoted in Pogge, 2002, p. 38).…”

Healthcare: between a human and a conventional right

“…Feinberg believes that many classes of setbacks to interest should be excluded: those that the victim has consented to by making risky bets which set back one's financial interest, or those that result from fair competition between businesses vying for the same customers (Feinberg 1987: 42). The practice of competition may result in setback to substantive interests, but such harm should not induce moral liability in the winner because those setbacks are part of a general practice that is conducive to the wellbeing of each participant (Pavel 2015). Human rights can piggyback on this general account of rights as protectors of fundamental interests.…”

Global Justice and Stakeholding

“…Severe poverty should be eradicated because we are responsible for it and not merely because we could bring it to an end . The harm we contribute to here is a harm to others' rights where severe poverty is understood as a violation of human rights and autonomy (see Hassoun 2012;Pavel 2015).…”