Natural law
Topic: Political Theory: Freedom and Rights · NCERT: Class 11, Ch 5 "Rights"
Meaning
Natural law means rules believed to be laid down by nature or God, not made by any ruler. In the 17th and 18th centuries, thinkers drew natural rights from it: rights people are born with, such as Locke's life, liberty and property. These ideas were used against kings with unlimited power. Today fewer people believe in natural law. So the term "human rights" has largely replaced "natural rights".
Example
The US Declaration of Independence (1776) and the French Declaration of the Rights of Man (1789) used natural-rights ideas to challenge arbitrary rule. Their spirit carried into the UDHR (1948) and India's Fundamental Rights.
Don't confuse with
- Positive (man-made) law: this is law passed by a legislature, such as an Act of Parliament. Natural law is believed to exist above and before any state.
- Natural rights: these are the rights drawn from natural law. They are not the law itself.
Related concepts
- Rights
- Natural rights
- Inalienable rights
- Human rights
- Kant's idea of human dignity
- Moral conception of rights