John Stuart Mill The Harm Principle Analysis

The tenet of paternalism has been the subject of thorough investigation and can be followed back to the times of John Stuart Mill. Paternalism is characterized as the activity of control over an individual and an obstruction with a person 's through and through liberty. Mill respected any outer intercession in singular issues, regardless of the possibility that conferred for the actor 's welfare, as an infringement of individual liberty (a policeman keeping a person from intersection an unsafe scaffold is a well - known illustration utilized by Mill). Mill 's "Harm Principle," denies restrictions on singular liberties unless such confinements lessen "damage to people other than the actor (the one disallowed from acting) and there is most likely no different implies that is similarly viable at no more prominent cost to different esteems." The Harm Principle does not

The problem of his instrumental argument is successfully resolved with the distinction between self - sovereignty and self - ownership. With this key concept in soft paternalism, individual liberty does not contradict human excellence, and thus does not produce a consequentialist argument. After analysis, the ambiguous concepts of harm and self - regarding actions become clearer, because soft paternalism provides for compatibility between moral obligations to paternalistic actions and the self - governing realm. Soft paternalism recognizes a distinct division of roles between the individual and others, which is more useful than that of the harm principle and more flexible than that of hard paternalism. In this way, the moral obligation to avoid inaction, if such inaction causes harm to others, provides a ground for justifiable paternalism. I n addition, individual liberty sets a sound limit within which an individual can rightfully promote his welfare unencumbered by unjust