Does the right to exclude violate the demands of moral equality?
This thesis draws on the principle of moral equality to develop a novel critique of a range of practices apparently licensed by the idea that the state has a right to exclude. The stateâs right to exclude can be understood as consisting of three conceptually distinct rights: a right to exclude outsiders from its territory, a right to exclude them from settling within the territory, and a right to exclude them from acquiring citizenship status. It is widely acknowledged that the right to exclude has its limits. But on what grounds do we think the right to exclude must be limited, and how extensive are those limits? It is common to argue that the right to exclude must be constrained by the principle of moral equality: the idea that all persons are of equal moral worth, by virtue of their shared humanity. Indeed, in the existing literature, there has been one powerful attempt to show that the right to exclude always violates the requirements of moral equality, by distinguishing between citizens and non-citizens on the basis of a factor that is morally arbitrary: their nationality. According to that line of argument, there can be no right to exclude. In this thesis, I make a different move. I argue that we need
Lim, Desiree Yuet Cheng
Does the right to exclude violate the demands of moral equality?. This thesis draws on the principle of moral equality to develop a novel critique of a range of practices apparently licensed by the idea that the state has a right to exclude. The stateâs right to exclude can be understood as consisting of three conceptually distinct rights: a right to exclude outsiders from its territory, a right to exclude them from settling within the territory, and a right to exclude them from acquiring citizenship status. It is widely acknowledged that the right to exclude has its limits. But on what grounds do we think the right to exclude must be limited, and how extensive are those limits? It is common to argue that the right to exclude must be constrained by the principle of moral equality: the idea that all persons are of equal moral worth, by virtue of their shared humanity. Indeed, in the existing literature, there has been one powerful attempt to show that the right to exclude always violates the requirements of moral equality, by distinguishing between citizens and non-citizens on the basis of a factor that is morally arbitrary: their nationality. According to that line of argument, there can be no right to exclude. In this thesis, I make a different move. I argue that we need
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