Ronald Dworkin is coming to my school on Thursday to give a lecture entitled The World’s Law: Why the Conventional View of International Law Won’t Do. I truthfully don’t know anything about him. I just happened to see this flier coming back to my room. If anyone on here knows about him aside from what Wikipedia has to say, would it be worth my time to go to the lecture?
If a lot people think that it’s worth my time, I can always try to record the audio (and possibly video) to post here.
Dr. Gordon reviewed a book of his here.
He also reviews a book referring to Dworkin’s work in Constitutional scholarship here.
From this article by Paul Gottfried:
Thus neoliberal Oxford professor of law Ronald Dworkin writes at length about how courts must define and uphold “rights” that should take precedence over the decisions of elected legislatures. Unlike “procedural matters,” decided on by elected representatives, wise judges should determine “prepolitical rights,” which protect individuals against the majority. Dworkin dishonestly defends racial and gender quotas as classical liberal rights.
Okay, so he sounds quite progressive. Any good ideas for questions I could ask him if I get the chance?
Yes, Dworkin is one of the more famous ‘liberal democracy’ defenders. Even if you won’t agree with him - which, assuming you are a libertarian, highly likely - it’s worth listening to one of the prime scholars of the philosophical case of liberal democracy.
Dworkin is an opponent of relatavism and positivism; he has argued that even supposedly ‘positivist’ political programs have hidden ethical judgments; where he differs from libertarianism is in his egalitarian and statist worldview. See Gordon on this here.