{"agent_id":"mill","agent_name":"John Stuart Mill","slug":"the-harm-principle","label":"The harm principle: when, if ever, may society interfere with individual liberty?","topic":"The harm principle","question":"When, if ever, may society interfere with individual liberty?","position":"The harm principle is the single article of On Liberty: \"the sole end for which mankind are warranted, individually or collectively, in interfering with the liberty of action of any of their number, is self-protection.\" Self-regarding actions are immune from social coercion. Other-regarding actions, where they cause harm to others, may be regulated. The principle is anti-paternalist (the agent's own good is not sufficient warrant), anti-moralist (the moral disapproval of others is not sufficient warrant), and anti-perfectionist (society may not coerce its members toward its conception of the good life). Individuality is essential to human well-being; experiments of living are how new modes of human flourishing are discovered; the despotism of custom is the chief obstacle to human progress; the tyranny of the majority is as dangerous as governmental tyranny. The principle admits explicit exceptions for children and for \"barbarians\" not yet capable of self-governance — the developmental qualification that connects On Liberty to the imperialism position.","paragraphs":[[{"t":"The harm principle is the single article of On Liberty: \"the sole end for which mankind are warranted, individually or collectively, in interfering with the liberty of action of any of their number, is self-protection.\" Self-regarding actions are immune from social coercion.","n":[]},{"t":"Other-regarding actions, where they cause harm to others, may be regulated.","n":[]}],[{"t":"The principle is anti-paternalist (the agent's own good is not sufficient warrant), anti-moralist (the moral disapproval of others is not sufficient warrant), and anti-perfectionist (society may not coerce its members toward its conception of the good life).","n":[]},{"t":"Individuality is essential to human well-being; experiments of living are how new modes of human flourishing are discovered; the despotism of custom is the chief obstacle to human progress; the tyranny of the majority is as dangerous as governmental tyranny.","n":[]}],[{"t":"The principle admits explicit exceptions for children and for \"barbarians\" not yet capable of self-governance — the developmental qualification that connects On Liberty to the imperialism position.","n":[1,2,3]}]],"texts":"On Liberty (1859), Chapter I (Introductory) and Chapter IV (Of the Limits to the Authority of Society over the Individual); Considerations on Representative Government (1861); Subjection of Women (1869) for the application to gender equality. Reception: Isaiah Berlin's 'Two Concepts of Liberty' (1958), framing Mill in negative-liberty terms; the Hart-Devlin debate (Patrick Devlin's The Enforcement of Morals, 1965, against H.L.A. Hart's Law, Liberty, and Morality, 1963); Joel Feinberg's four-volume Moral Limits of the Criminal Law (1984-88); Skorupski's John Stuart Mill (1989) and Donner's The Liberal Self (1991), both contesting the negative-liberty reading; communitarian critiques (MacIntyre, Sandel, Taylor) charging Mill with atomistic individualism.","works":["On Liberty (1859), Chapter I (Introductory) and Chapter IV (Of the Limits to the Authority of Society over the Individual)","Considerations on Representative Government (1861)","Subjection of Women (1869) for the application to gender equality"],"reception":"Isaiah Berlin's 'Two Concepts of Liberty' (1958), framing Mill in negative-liberty terms; the Hart-Devlin debate (Patrick Devlin's The Enforcement of Morals, 1965, against H.L.A. Hart's Law, Liberty, and Morality, 1963); Joel Feinberg's four-volume Moral Limits of the Criminal Law (1984-88); Skorupski's John Stuart Mill (1989) and Donner's The Liberal Self (1991), both contesting the negative-liberty reading; communitarian critiques (MacIntyre, Sandel, Taylor) charging Mill with atomistic individualism.","status":"The most influential single principle in modern liberal political philosophy and the most contested. Berlin's \"Two Concepts of Liberty\" framed it in negative-liberty terms — a reading Skorupski, Donner, and Riley argue systematically misses Mill's positive concern with individuality. The Hart-Devlin debate of the 1960s reanimated the principle in legal philosophy. Feinberg developed it into a refined taxonomy distinguishing harm, offense, paternalism, and legal moralism. Communitarians charge that the principle presupposes incoherent atomistic individualism. Soft-paternalist programs (Sunstein and Thaler) accept the indirect coercion Mill explicitly rejected.","era":"1806-1873","discipline":"Philosophy","refs":[{"n":1,"work":"Introductory","page":"p. 236","canonical":"","quote":"And it seems to me that in consequence of this absence of rule or principle, one side is at present as often wrong as the other; the interference of government is, with about equal frequency, improperly invoked and improperly condemned.","label":"Introductory, p. 236"},{"n":2,"work":"On Liberty","page":"","canonical":"","quote":"And it seems to me that in consequence of this absence of rule or principle, one side is at present as often wrong as the other; the interference of government is, with about equal frequency, improperly invoked and improperly condemned.","label":"On Liberty"},{"n":3,"work":"On Liberty","page":"","canonical":"","quote":"To justify that, the conduct from which it is desired to deter him must be calculated to produce evil to some one else. The only part of the conduct of any one, for which he is amenable to society, is that which concerns others. In the part which merely concerns himself, his independence is, of right, absolute. Over himself, over his own body and mind, the individual is sovereign.","label":"On Liberty"}],"answer":null,"siblings":[{"slug":"utilitarianism","label":"Utilitarianism: are some pleasures qualitatively higher than others, and is the principle of utility provable?"},{"slug":"plural-voting-and-the-qualified-franchise","label":"Plural voting and the qualified franchise: should the educated have more votes than the uneducated?"}]}