Kant's View On Those Who Flout The Law

Immanuel Kant's theory of retributivism justifies punishment as a response to lawbreaking. Kant's theory is based on the belief that punishment is the intentional infliction of harm by a legitimate authority on someone who has broken the law. This harm is justified because the lawbreaker has committed a moral wrong and deserves to suffer. Kant's retributivism is distinct from forward-looking theories of punishment, which justify punishment by appealing to its social benefits, and utilitarians would condone the punishment of an innocent person if it had social benefits. Kant's retributivism is also distinct from backward-looking theories, which justify punishment by appealing to what the wrongdoer deserves.

Kant's retributivist theory of punishment

Kant's retributivist theory is based on his belief that punishment is a form of legal infliction of harm by a legitimate authority on someone who has broken the law. He argues that punishment can never be used as a means to promote the good of the criminal or civil society. Instead, punishment must always be inflicted on someone because they have committed a crime. This is because, according to Kant, human beings have an innate right never to be used simply as a tool to make society better. To be used "merely as a means" is incompatible with the respect we are owed as human beings.

Kant also argues that punishments shouldn't be less severe than deserved. He justifies this by appealing to the principle of equality, which states that it is unjust to treat those who have committed equally morally wrong acts differently.

Overall, Kant's retributivist theory of punishment is based on the belief that punishment is justified only when the wrongdoer deserves it and that punishments should be proportional to the wrong committed.

Kant's view of the state as a means to freedom

Immanuel Kant's ethical theory, Kantianism, is a deontological ethical theory based on the notion that "I ought never to act except in such a way that I could also will that my maxim should become a universal law." Kant's theory was developed in the context of Enlightenment rationalism, and it states that an action can only be moral if it is motivated by a sense of duty, and its maxim may be rationally willed as a universal, objective law.

Kant's conception of duty does not entail that people perform their duties grudgingly. Although duty often constrains people and prompts them to act against their inclinations, it still comes from an agent's volition: they desire to keep the moral law from respect of the moral law. Thus, when an agent performs an action from duty it is because their moral incentives are chosen over and above any opposing inclinations. Kant wished to move beyond the conception of morality as externally imposed duties and present an ethics of autonomy, in which rational agents freely recognise the claims reason makes upon them.

Kant's theory of the moral law is based on the categorical imperative, for which he provides four formulations. The first formulation of the categorical imperative is that of universalizability:

> Act only in accordance with that maxim through which you can at the same time will that it become a universal law.

Kant's second formulation of the categorical imperative is to treat humanity as an end in itself:

> So act that you use humanity, whether in your own person or in the person of any other, always at the same time as an end, never merely as a means.

The third formulation of the categorical imperative is the formula of autonomy, which concludes that rational agents are bound to the moral law by their own will. The fourth formulation is the concept of the Kingdom of Ends, which requires that people act as if the principles of their actions establish a law for a hypothetical kingdom.

Kant's ethical theory is based on the belief that reason should be used to determine how people ought to act. He did not attempt to prescribe specific actions, but instructed that reason should be used to determine how to behave. Kant construed duty as a basis for the ethical law, and he began his ethical theory by arguing that the only virtue that can be an unqualified good is a good will. No other virtue, or thing, has this status because every other virtue or thing can be used to achieve immoral ends. For example, the virtue of loyalty is not good if one is loyal to an evil person. The good will is singularly unique in that it is always good and maintains its moral value regardless of whether or not it achieves its moral intentions.

Kant's view of the state is as a means to freedom. He argues that the very existence of a state might seem to some as a limitation of freedom, since a state possesses the power to control the external freedom of individual citizens through force. This is the basic claim of anarchism. However, Kant holds that there is no innate right to unlimited freedom but only an innate right to freedom "insofar as it can coexist with the freedom of every other in accordance with universal law." Rightful freedom for each individual is limited, and the state is not an impediment to freedom but is the means for freedom. State action that is a hindrance to freedom can, when properly directed, support and maintain rightful freedom if the state action is aimed at hindering actions that themselves would hinder the rightful freedom of others and thus be wrongful uses of freedom. Given a subject's action that would limit the freedom of another subject, the state may hinder the first subject to defend the second by "hindering a hindrance to freedom". Such state coercion is compatible with the maximal freedom demanded in the principle of right because it does not reduce overall freedom but instead provides the necessary background conditions needed to secure rightful freedom. The amount of freedom lost by the first subject through direct state coercion is equal to the amount gained by the second subject through lifting the hindrance to actions. State action sustains the maximal amount of freedom consistent with identical freedom for all without reducing it.

Kant's writings on political philosophy consist of one book and several shorter works. The "Doctrine of Right", Part One of his two-part Metaphysics of Morals and first published as a stand-alone book in February 1797, contains virtually every directly political topic he treats. Other shorter works include a useful short summary of his discussion of the basis and role of the state in the second section of the essay "Theory and Practice", an extended discussion of international relations in the essay "Toward Perpetual Peace", and the essay "An Answer to the Question: What is Enlightenment?.

Kant's view of the state as a social contract

Immanuel Kant's view of the state as a social contract is rooted in his belief that the supreme principle of morality is a principle of practical rationality, which he called the "Categorical Imperative" (CI). This principle, according to Kant, is an objective, rationally necessary and unconditional rule that we must follow despite any natural desires we may have to the contrary. Kant's social contract theory is based on the idea that every rational being has an innate right to freedom and a duty to enter into a civil condition governed by a social contract to realise and preserve that freedom.

Kant's social contract theory can be understood in the context of his broader moral philosophy, which holds that an action can only be moral if it is motivated by a sense of duty. This sense of duty, according to Kant, comes from the rational respect for the moral law, which demands that we respect the rationality of all beings. This respect for rationality is what underlies Kant's view of the state as a social contract.

In Kant's theory, the social contract is not a historical document or a voluntary agreement between individuals. Instead, it is an idea of reason that sets moral limits on the sovereign's legislative acts. The social contract reflects pure reason, and each human being, as a rational being, already contains the basis for rational agreement to the state. This means that individuals can be coerced into the civil condition, even if their particular arbitrary choice might be to remain outside it.

The social contract, for Kant, is the rational justification for state power. It is not based on any actual consent or historical act but on the idea that state power is necessary to guarantee each individual's freedom and property rights. In the civil condition, individuals are subject to the centralising coercive power of the state, which enforces reciprocal coercion, obligation, and objective settlement of disputes. This state power is necessary to defend freedom and property rights, which are limited by conditions of right.

In summary, Kant's view of the state as a social contract is based on the idea that every rational being has an innate right to freedom. The social contract is an idea of reason that justifies state power as necessary to defend and preserve this freedom. This view is rooted in Kant's broader moral philosophy, which holds that an action can only be moral if it is motivated by a sense of duty and respect for the rationality of all beings.

Kant's view of the right to rebel

Immanuel Kant's views on punishment and law are based on his retributivist theory. According to Kant, punishment is justified when an individual breaks the law and is therefore a moral wrongdoer. In his retributivist defence of punishment, Kant argues that punishment is not forward-looking, serving the social benefit of deterrence, but backward-looking, serving as retribution for a moral wrong.

Kant's view of rebellion is informed by his belief that the only innate right is freedom, which he defines as "independence from being constrained by another's choice". This freedom is the basis of the state, which exists to preserve the freedom of its citizens. Kant argues that there is no right to rebel against the government because the embodiment of all right is the actually existing state. He claims that a rightful condition, the opposite of the state of nature, is possible only when there is a centralising of coercive power in a state. Therefore, rebellion would require that the people be authorised to resist the state, which is an exercise of sovereign power. However, Kant argues that sovereign power cannot be shared, so this is a contradiction.

Kant does allow for passive civil disobedience, which can take the form of a refusal of the people, in parliament, to accede to the demands of the government. He also states that citizens are obligated to obey the sovereign "in whatever does not conflict with inner morality".

In summary, Kant's view of the right to rebel is that there is no such right because the state is the embodiment of all right, and rebellion would require a sharing of sovereign power, which is a contradiction. However, he does allow for passive civil disobedience and the following of one's inner morality, even if this goes against the state.

Kant's view of cosmopolitan right

Kant also discusses colonial rule and settlement. In his published writings in the 1790s, he is strongly critical of the European colonisation of other lands already inhabited by other peoples. Settlement in these cases is allowed only by uncoerced informed contract. Even land that appears empty might be used by shepherds or hunters and cannot be appropriated without their consent. These positions represent a change in Kant's thought, for he had previously indicated acceptance if not endorsement of the European colonial practices of his time and the racial hierarchy behind them. Kant himself produced a theory of human racial classifications and origins and thought that non-European races were inferior in various ways. Kant thought that the course of world progress involved the spread of European culture and law throughout the world to what he considered to be less advanced cultures and inferior races. By the mid-1790s, however, Kant appears to have given up beliefs about racial inferiority and no longer discusses it in his lectures. He publicly criticised European colonial practices as violations of the rights of indigenous peoples who are capable of governing themselves.

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