Innocent Threats vs Innocent Bystanders A Case Study in Rights Theory

Abstract

There has been a long-running debate in moral philosophy regarding whether it is morally permissible to kill an innocent threat to save the life of an innocent victim. Rather than take a position in that debate, I argue that an innocent threat’s claim not to be killed to save an innocent victim is at least weaker than an innocent bystander’s. This has implications for just war theory. Moreover, it highlights a problem with the common view of rights, according to which rights may sometimes be infringed for the sake of achieving a lesser evil. This sort of hybrid of rights theory and consequentialism raises unnecessary problems that can be solved by adopting a different framework on rights: the Mechanics of Claims.