Question : Is civil disobedience in a democratic State justifiable? Discuss.
(2015)
Answer : Rawls has given four conditions for justifying civil disobedience. First, all other ordinary avenues towards changing the law have been closed off.Second, acts of civil disobedience should target only substantial and clear violations of justice-particularly violations of equal liberty and equal opportunity-and not just and bad law. Third, acts of civil disobedience should be restricted to those cases where the dissenter allows that anyone else subjected to similar injustices would have a right to disobey ....
Question : Discuss Amartya Sen’s principle of Niti as a critique of Nyaya.
(2014)
Answer : Borrowing from an ancient Sanskrit text, Sen has explained the contrast between the two approaches to justice as the difference between “niti” and “nyaya.” “Niti,” translated as “organizational propriety and correctness,” refers to the institutions that should be created in order to have a just society. “Nyaya” on the other hand, translated as “a comprehensive idea of realized justice,” is inescapably linked to the world and the lives of the people. Sen states that the ....
Question : “All human rights are centered on individual rights.” Discuss.
(2014)
Answer : Rights are powers and privileges to which one has a just claim. The individual is the basic unit of society, and since the time of ancient republics, individuals have been understood to have certain rights. Philosophers like John Locke theorized that natural rights come from nature or from God, and are not “granted” by government. Individual rights include life, liberty, and property.
Individual natural rights include freedom of speech, religion, and press, as well as freedom ....
Question : What is the significance of including duties of citizens in the Indian Constitution?
(2013)
Answer : We are social beings. We are interdependent. We enjoy many things for free which are the result of contribution of other people. Our forefathers had strived very hard for providing us a free country. So naturally we are some way duty bound to the society or country. We cannot escape from it. And, as a democratic nation we are governed by a constitution. And, the constitution gives us guideline about how to function and conduct ....
Question : Can we dissociate rights of citizens from their duties?
(2012)
Answer : We cannot dissociate rights of citizens from their duties, because with the rights, duties of the citizens are also linked and there is this corelation between these two. Rights and duties of the citizens are two sides of the same coin. In between them there are two kinds of relations. Firstly, any given society can be active only on the basis of theory of co-existence. For example, in relation to the rights it is the ....
Question : Discuss Kant’s distinction between duties of perfect and imperfect obligation.
(2011)
Answer : Kant was foremost among western philosophers. He contributed greatly in the tradition of philosophy. Kant divided duties into two aspects. One, the duty which was motivated or guided by the own personal
entwist. Like a shopkeeper who is guided by the personal motive to earn more. Such duties could not be termed as honest, and pious. Kant’s philosophy is based upon such principle.
Kant also deliberated about another kind of duty. This could be said as ....
Question : Does accountability necessarily contribute to moral perfection? Offer your views.
(2010)
Answer : Personal development starts with accountability given that accountability is the Cornerstone of personal development. Personal development or better to say moral perfection as the name implies means to grow as a human being to step into your greater self. A key component to personal development is accountability. Until there is accountability there is no true and lasting opportunity to grow as a person. None of us grow in isolation. We grow by our interactions and ....
Question : “Rights and duties are complementary.” Explain.
(2009)
Answer : Rights are entitlements (not) to perform certain actions or be in certain states, or entitlements that others (not) perform certain actions or be in certain states. Rights dominate most modern understandings of what actions are proper and which institutions are just. Duty is a term that conveys a sense of moral commitment to someone or something. The moral commitment is the sort that results in action, and it is not a matter of passive feeling ....
Question : Is Theocracy an outdated ideology? Discuss.
(2009)
Answer : Theocracy is a form of government in which a god or deity is recognized as the state’s supreme civil ruler or in a higher sense, a form of government in which a state is governed by immediate divine guidance or by officials who are regarded as divinely guided. In Common Greek, “theocracy” means a rule by God. For believers, theocracy is a form of government in which divine power governs an earthly human state, either ....
Question : Comment on the relationship between Equality and Freedom.
(2009)
Answer : The terms “equality” “equal,” and “equally” signify a qualitative relationship. ‘Equality’ (or ‘equal’) signifies correspondence between groups of different objects, persons, processes or circumstances that have the same qualities in at least one respect, but not all respects, i.e., regarding one specific feature, with differences in other features. Freedom is the right to act according to ones will without being held up by the power of others. From a philosophical point of view, it can ....
Question : Do rights necessarily imply corresponding obligations? To whom does one primarily own obligations-individuals or State?
(2008)
Answer : Rights are entitlements not to perform certain actions or be in certain states, or entitlements that others (not) perform certain actions or be in certain states. Rights dominate most modern understandings of what actions are proper and which institutions are just. Rights structure the forms of our governments, the contents of our laws, and the shape of morality as we perceive it. To accept a set of rights is to approve a distribution of freedom ....
Question : State is the ‘actuality of concrete freedom’.
(2005)
Answer : The Hegel’s statement wants to convey that the state is absolutely rational inasmuch as it is the actuality of the substantial will which it possesses in the particular self-consciousness once that consciousness has been raised to consciousness of its universality. This substantial unity is an absolute unmoved end in itself, in which freedom comes into its supreme right. On the other hand this final end has supreme right against the individual, whose supreme duty is ....
Question : Are the claims of the State and the Individual really mutually conflicting? Discuss.
(2000)
Answer : Individuality may be described as the consciousness of the individual as to what he is and how he lives. It is inherent in every human being and is a thing of growth. The State and social institutions come and go, but individuality remains and persists. The very essence of individuality is expression; the sense of dignity and independence is the soil wherein it thrives. Individuality is not the impersonal and mechanistic thing that the State ....
Question : “We obey the state because in the end it most truly represents ourselves”. Discuss the relation of the individual and the state in the light of the above concept of the state.
(1999)
Answer : The state is by no means a power forced on society from outside; neither is it the realization of the ethical idea, the image and the realization of reason. It is simply a product of society at a certain stage of evolution. It is the confession that this society has become hopelessly divided against itself, has entangled itself in irreconcilable contradictions which it is powerless to banish. In order that these contradictions, these classes with ....
Question : Can citizens have rights without duties? Discuss with examples.
Answer : Our Constitution imposes some fundamental duties along with the grant of fundamental rights as with our duties, rights world be inimical to the society. Both are intertwined and inter-related. Both are aspect of the same coin. If you are claiming the right; certain degree of responsibility is also has to be owned. Otherwise it will be devoid of its merit. If citizen has certain duties then he should have natural as well as fundamental rights ....