Freedom from Poverty as a Human Right: Who Owes What to the Very Poor? - Paperback

by Thomas Pogge (Editor)

Collected here in one volume are fifteen cutting-edge essays by leading academics which together clarify and defend the claim that freedom from poverty is a human right with corresponding binding obligations on the more affluent to practice effective poverty avoidance. The nature of human rights and their corresponding duties is examined, as is the theoretical standing of the social, economic and cultural rights. The authors largely agree in concluding that there is a human right to be free from poverty and that this right is massively violated by the present world economy which creates huge unfair imbalances in income and wealth among and within countries. This searing indictment of the status quo is all the more powerful as the authors endorsing it exemplify diverse philosophical methods and moral traditions and also highlight different aspects of poverty and global institutional arrangements.

Author Biography

Having received his PhD in philosophy from Harvard, Pogge has published widely on Kant and in moral and political philosophy, including various books on Rawls and global justice. He is Professor of Political Science at Columbia University, Professorial Fellow at the ANU Centre for Applied Philosophy and Public Ethics, and Professor II of Philosophy at the University of Oslo.