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A KANTIAN ‘FOUNDATION’ OF HUMAN RIGHTS THROUGH THE IMPOSSIBILITY...
Key element in Kant’s moral philosophy is the term freedom. He distinguishes
between inner and outer freedom, or between morality and legality. Morality or inner
freedom describes our ability to act independently from sensual inclinations: pure
(non-empirical) reason subjugates our maxims for ensuing actions “under...a general
law.”? This inner freedom, i.e. freedom from outer influences, would feature pure rea¬
son as the decisive moral factor for the guidance of our outer actions. Moral freedom,
therefore, is the determination of our will through pure reason, transforming our
empirical will (Willkuer) into the pure — or universal — will (reiner Wille), now liber¬
ated from personal sensual desires. Kant’s notion for such a desired determination of
the will is the Categorical Imperative (a “synthetic-practical proposition a priori””).
Legal or ‘outer’ freedom, on the other hand, focuses on rights we (should) have
vis-a-vis others within the framework of positive laws, with the only restriction
that one’s freedom must not interfere with the freedom of others: “Right is the sum
of the conditions under which the choice of one can be united with the choice of
another in accordance with a universal law of freedom””’. We have here the classic
subjective, liberal rights — to be free to do whatever we want unless restricting
others’ freedom. Assuming this outer freedom is for Kant a “postulate of reason””
for which, being contingent, “no proof is possible”.
Which is now the proper subject of the foundational human rights discourse:
the inner or the outer freedom?
In an often-quoted passage Kant refers to an innate right all humans have:
“Freedom (independence from being constrained by another’s choice), insofar as
it can coexist with the freedom of every other in accordance with a universal law,
is the only innate right belonging to every person by virtue of their humanity.”**
This crucial quote indicates that innateness refers to the contingent outer
freedom as a subjective, legal right which deserves utmost protection and respect —
just like modern human rights”. What is to be protected for Kant is hence the outer
(political) freedom because of the inner qualities — morality, dignity, autonomy —
of human beings: individuals are to be legally and politically empowered to act
Immanuel Kant, Metaphysik der Sitten, in Wilhelm Weischedel (ed.), Werke in sechs
Baenden, Band IV, Darmstadt, Wissenschaftliche Buchgesellschaft, 318.
20 Immanual Kant, Grundlegung zur Metaphysik der Sitten, Hamburg, Meiner, 1965, 420.
?! Kant, Metaphysik, 337.
2 Ibid, 338.
2% Ibid, 341.
4 Tbid, 345. For Hoeffe, Recht, 40, this freedom functions as “principle of ‘all’ positive
legislation”.
25 Jiirgen Habermas, Kants Idee des ewigen Friedens — aus dem historischen Abstand von
200 Jahren, in Jiirgen Habermas, Die Einbeziehung des Anderen, Frankfurt am Main,
Suhrkamp, 1999, 225: “Bei Kant finden Menschenrechte konsequenterweise ihren Platz in
der Rechtslehre — und nur hier.”
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