"Human rights are descendants of natural rights," or so said Michael Zuckert, a professor at the University of Notre Dame, in a seminar at the Institute for Culture and Society. He gave a session at the III Ethics & Society Forum entitled "Launching Liberalism: Philosophic Anthropology and the Leviathan State," as well as a conference with the Religion and Civil Society project, which was entitled "From Christian Aristotelianism to Modernity: Locke and the Doctrine of Natural Rights."

According to Professor Zuckert, one of the reasons why people began to talk of human rights rather than natural rights "was the emergence of a skeptical thought about nature as a source of standards for human beings."

For this professor of political science, the main difference lies in language: "When we speak of human rights, we do not have a very clear idea of what their base is and we do not exactly know what they are."

Natural rights and the development of countries

According to Professor Zuchert, both natural rights and human rights play an important role in the development of countries. As an example, he mentioned that John Locke, an important philosopher of natural rights, "was one of the first authors who strongly advocated for anti-imperialism: he argued that no country has the right to conquer another."

He reiterated that "in general, the position of natural rights does not say that a natural law obliges assistance to less developed countries, but it is also worth noting that they are not the only source of rights for framing good policies."

Michael Zuckert was one of the speakers to participate in this semester's Ethics and Society Forum. The aim of this initiative is threefold: it aims to disseminate ICS's work on the university community, foster interdisciplinary dialogue and encourage ICS researchers to receive feedback from other experts on their research in progress. The activity is open to researchers, professors and graduate students from across the Navarra campus.

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