Family values : the ethics of parent-child relationships

Bibliographic Information

Family values : the ethics of parent-child relationships

Harry Brighouse and Adam Swift

Princeton University Press, c2014

  • : pbk

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Note

Includes bibliographical references (p. [201]-211) and index

Description and Table of Contents

Description

The family is hotly contested ideological terrain. Some defend the traditional two-parent heterosexual family while others welcome its demise. Opinions vary about how much control parents should have over their children's upbringing. Family Values provides a major new theoretical account of the morality and politics of the family, telling us why the family is valuable, who has the right to parent, and what rights parents should--and should not--have over their children. Harry Brighouse and Adam Swift argue that parent-child relationships produce the "familial relationship goods" that people need to flourish. Children's healthy development depends on intimate relationships with authoritative adults, while the distinctive joys and challenges of parenting are part of a fulfilling life for adults. Yet the relationships that make these goods possible have little to do with biology, and do not require the extensive rights that parents currently enjoy. Challenging some of our most commonly held beliefs about the family, Brighouse and Swift explain why a child's interest in autonomy severely limits parents' right to shape their children's values, and why parents have no fundamental right to confer wealth or advantage on their children. Family Values reaffirms the vital importance of the family as a social institution while challenging its role in the reproduction of social inequality and carefully balancing the interests of parents and children.

Table of Contents

Preface ix Acknowledgments xvii Part One Liberty, Equality, Family 1 Introduction 2 Chapter 1 Liberalism and the Family 5 Chapter 2 Equality and the Family 23 Part Two Justifying the Family 47 Introduction 48 Chapter 3 Children 57 Chapter 4 Adults 86 Part Three Parents' Rights 113 Introduction 114 Chapter 5 Conferring Advantage 123 Chapter 6 Shaping Values 149 Conclusion 175 Notes 183 Bibliography 201 Index 213

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Details

  • NCID
    BB18950623
  • ISBN
    • 9780691126913
    • 9780691173733
  • LCCN
    2013044237
  • Country Code
    us
  • Title Language Code
    eng
  • Text Language Code
    eng
  • Place of Publication
    Princeton
  • Pages/Volumes
    xix, 216 p.
  • Size
    25 cm
  • Classification
  • Subject Headings
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