Reviews

DOIhttp://doi.org/10.1111/j.1468-2230.1996.tb02094.x
Published date01 May 1996
Date01 May 1996
REVIEWS
Ronald Dworkin,
Life’s Dominion: An Argument about Abortion and
Euthanasia,
London: Harper Collins Publishers,
1993, 272
pp, hb
S17.50.
The publication of
Life’s Dominion
could not have been more timely. Neither
ethics nor law have been able to keep abreast of the dilemmas generated by
technological advances in medicine. In the absence of legislation, the courts have
reluctantly been forced by the medical profession to fill the legal vacuum on issues
such as euthanasia, where society is divided and moral controversy is
rife.
Dworkin’s book has received judicial attention in the Court of Appeal in
Airedale
NHS
Trust
v
Bland
(1 993)
and also in the Supreme Court of Canada (in
Rodriguez
v
British Columbia
(1993)).
That it has done
so
is perhaps attributable to the fact
that it promises to clarify the principles on which legal intervention should proceed
in the absence of a moral consensus on matters of life and death. Yet
Life’s
Dominion
disappointingly fails to live up to this promise.
According to Dworkin, there is
a
common thread which runs through the recent
controversy over euthanasia and the traditional battle over abortion. The
fundamental
moral
principle at stake in both cases, Dworkin maintains, is the
principle of the sanctity of life. The crucial jurisprudential question, then, is whether
the principle of the sanctity of life should be given effect in law and, if
so,
in what
form. Dworkin contends that the principle of the sanctity of life should not become a
legal
principle, because the principle admits of different ‘quasi-religious’
interpretations. If the principle were to be given effect in law, the courts or the
legislature would have to take sides in what are essentially religious disputes and
adopt an ‘official’ (state) view of the sanctity of life. This, however, would
be
contrary to the democratic ideal of freedom of religion. On this basis, Dworkin
seeks to show that the appropriate jurisprudential stance over abortion and
euthanasia is one which accommodates both the conservative and the liberal
positions.
The first three chapters of the book develop this argument in relation to abortion.
According to Dworkin, the traditional objection to abortion is a
derivative
one
which seeks to confer legal protection on the foetus on the grounds of the foetus’
right to life. But Dworkin maintains that the traditional account is flawed and that,
in reality, the true objection to abortion rests on a detached argument which
grounds legal protection of foetal life on respect for the principle of the sanctity of
life. Moral conservatives are opposed to abortion because they value the ‘natural’
investment in life. By contrast, moral liberals value the ‘human’ investment in life.
But they too are prompted by respect for the sanctity of life. Contrary to all
appearances, then, there is a moral consensus between conservatives and liberals
on the fundamental importance of the principle of the sanctity of life. Both sides
agree that life has intrinsic value, independently of whether it is
a
good for the
individual himself
or
for others. The differences between each side are attributable
to the respective emphasis put on the natural,
as
against the human, investment in
life. These differences, Dworkin suggests, have their source in quasi-religious
or
spiritual concerns; and it is for this very reason that the sanctity of life should not
be
embedded in law.
479
0
The
Modern Law Review Limited
19%
(MLR
59:3.
May). Published by Blackwell Publishers,
108
Cowley Road, Oxford
OX4
IJF
and
238
Main
Street,
Cambridge, MA
02142,
USA.

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