Overview

We are deeply social creatures. Our core social needs ED for meaningful social inclusion ED are more important than our civil and political needs and our economic welfare needs, and we won't secure those other things if our core social needs go unmet. Our core social needs ground a human right against social deprivation as well as a human right to have the resources to sustain other people. Kimberley Brownlee defends this fundamental but largely neglected human right; having defined social deprivation as a persistent lack of minimally adequate access to decent human contact, she then discusses situations such as solitary confinement and incidental isolation. Fleshing out what it means tothers. Our core social needs can clash with oo belong, Brownlee considers why loneliness and weak social connections are not just moral tragedies, but often injustices, and argues that we endure social contribution injustice when we are denied the means to sustain ur interests in interactive and associative freedom, and when they do, social needs take priority. We have a duty to ensure that everyone has the opportunity to satisfy their social needs. As Brownlee asserts, we violate this duty if we classify some people as inescapably socially threatening, either through using reductive, essentialist language that reduces people to certain acts or traits ED 'criminal', 'rapist', 'paedophile', 'foreigner' ED or in the ways we physically segregate such people and fail to help people to reintegrate after segregation.

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9780198874898

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Reviews

Being Sure of Each Other is an important contribution to the contemporary debate on the content and scope of our social rights and freedoms precisely because it allows us to raise these questions and provides a framework for addressing them. * Enrico Biale, Ethical Theory and Moral Practice * In this insightful and inspiring book, Kimberley Brownlee develops a nuanced appreciation of sociability as a fundamental human value. Arguing against unlimited liberal associative freedom, Brownlee's engaging analysis uncovers the neglected rights and duties generated by the importance of our need for social connection. This is essential, eye-opening reading for anyone working in human rights theory, moral or legal philosophy. * Rowan Cruft, University of Stirling * This excellent book opens a new chapter in moral philosophy: what we owe each other as social beings vulnerable to loneliness. * James W. Nickel, Emeritus Professor of Law and Philosophy, University of Miami * The book is replete with fine-grained distinctions that help make sense of the complexities of our social lives, but it is also animated by an array of fictional, literary, and real-life examples, that make it engaging and highly readable. * Jesse Tomalty, Ethics * It's a brilliant book and it's helping us get away from the individualistic, Robinson-Crusoe picture of ourselves and our relationship to each other. * Rae Langton, Cambridge University * Being Sure of Each Other: An Essay on Social Rights and Freedoms is an amazingly timely book. It's also a rich, nuanced, and insightful examination of the social needs that many people found suddenly unfulfilled in 2020. . . . Her arguments demand wide engagement across political philosophy, ethics, legal theory, and beyond. * Stephanie Collins, Mind * Kimberley Brownlee's Being Sure of Each Other is an impressively creative, deeply thoughtful, and ground-breaking book on the nature of social rights. * Cheshire Calhoun, Arizona State * This is a wonderful book. It's a fantastic piece of work... shining a light on issues that are often passed over in contemporary moral and political philosophy... I've learned a great deal from reading the book, and thoroughly recommend that others read it too. * Martin O'Neill, York University * Being Sure of Each Other is a ground-breaking investigation of a topic which, as Brownlee rightly contests, is of utmost importance. All the forms of sociality including casual social interaction, persistent intimate association, and social contribution are, generally speaking, of irreplaceable value to us, and we have claims of justice that the state support these goods. * Elizabeth Brake, Rice University *

At the heart of this book then is a simple plea - that we open our eyes to what is most basic, in many ways what is most challenging, but also most meaningful, about being human: our need for other humans. * David Jenkins, Law and Philosophy * Being Sure of Each Other is an important contribution to the contemporary debate on the content and scope of our social rights and freedoms precisely because it allows us to raise these questions and provides a framework for addressing them. * Enrico Biale, Ethical Theory and Moral Practice * In this insightful and inspiring book, Kimberley Brownlee develops a nuanced appreciation of sociability as a fundamental human value. Arguing against unlimited liberal associative freedom, Brownlee's engaging analysis uncovers the neglected rights and duties generated by the importance of our need for social connection. This is essential, eye-opening reading for anyone working in human rights theory, moral or legal philosophy. * Rowan Cruft, University of Stirling * This excellent book opens a new chapter in moral philosophy: what we owe each other as social beings vulnerable to loneliness. * James W. Nickel, Emeritus Professor of Law and Philosophy, University of Miami * The book is replete with fine-grained distinctions that help make sense of the complexities of our social lives, but it is also animated by an array of fictional, literary, and real-life examples, that make it engaging and highly readable. * Jesse Tomalty, Ethics * It's a brilliant book and it's helping us get away from the individualistic, Robinson-Crusoe picture of ourselves and our relationship to each other. * Rae Langton, Cambridge University * Being Sure of Each Other: An Essay on Social Rights and Freedoms is an amazingly timely book. It's also a rich, nuanced, and insightful examination of the social needs that many people found suddenly unfulfilled in 2020. . . . Her arguments demand wide engagement across political philosophy, ethics, legal theory, and beyond. * Stephanie Collins, Mind * Kimberley Brownlee's Being Sure of Each Other is an impressively creative, deeply thoughtful, and ground-breaking book on the nature of social rights. * Cheshire Calhoun, Arizona State * This is a wonderful book. It's a fantastic piece of work... shining a light on issues that are often passed over in contemporary moral and political philosophy... I've learned a great deal from reading the book, and thoroughly recommend that others read it too. * Martin O'Neill, York University * Being Sure of Each Other is a ground-breaking investigation of a topic which, as Brownlee rightly contests, is of utmost importance. All the forms of sociality including casual social interaction, persistent intimate association, and social contribution are, generally speaking, of irreplaceable value to us, and we have claims of justice that the state support these goods. * Elizabeth Brake, Rice University *

Author Information

Kimberley Brownlee is a Professor of Philosophy and holds the Canada Research Chair in Ethics and Political & Social Philosophy at the University of British Columbia. Her current research focuses on sociability, social rights, loneliness, and freedom of association. She is the author of Conscience and Conviction: The Case for Civil Disobedience (OUP 2012), co-editor of Disability and Disadvantage (OUP 2009), and co-editor of The Blackwell Companion to Applied Philosophy (Wiley 2016). She was previously a Professor of Philosophy at the University of Warwick.

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