Playing Fair Political Obligation and the Problems of Punishment

"This book addresses two long-standing concerns of political and legal philosophy: the problems of political obligation and of punishment. Even though political obligation and punishment are often treated as independent topics and there are broad literatures on each, Richard Dagger sees them as closely related problems and attempts to resolve them together. Dagger first establishes the principle of fair play--the idea that citizens in a cooperative venture have obligations to each other to shoulder a fair share of the burdens because they receive a fair share of the benefits of cooperation--as the basis of political obligation. Dagger then argues that the members of a reasonably just polity have an obligation to obey its laws because they have an obligation of reciprocity or fair play to one another. This theory of political obligation then provides answers to fundamental and still debated questions about how to justify punishment, who has the right to carry it out, and how much to punish. He concludes by bringing the two concerns together to rebuke those who deny the possibility of a general obligation to obey the law, to defend the link between political authority and obligation, and to establish the proper scope of criminal law"--