Paternalism

Paternalism is interference with a person’s choices or liberty justified by claims about that person’s own welfare. It raises questions about when protection can override self-direction.

Hard paternalism: Interference with a competent person’s choices for that person’s own good, even when the person does not consent. It captures the clearest conflict between welfare-based protection and a competent person’s wishes.
Liberty principle: The principle that people should be free to act unless their conduct harms others. It supplies a leading objection to restricting choices solely for the chooser’s own good.
Seat belt laws: Laws requiring vehicle occupants to wear seat belts while traveling. They are a classic case of legal restrictions defended partly by protection of the wearer.
John Stuart Mill: A nineteenth-century British philosopher and political economist known for works on liberty, utilitarianism, and representative government. His liberty principle became a central challenge to coercion justified only by a person’s own good.
Soft paternalism: Interference with a person’s choices to establish whether those choices are informed and voluntary. It permits intervention when capacity or voluntariness is in doubt, without endorsing unrestricted protection.
Harm principle: John Stuart Mill’s principle that coercion is justified to prevent harm to others, not merely to benefit the person coerced. It draws a direct boundary between preventing harm to others and enforcing self-regarding welfare.
Helmet laws: Laws requiring specified riders or workers to wear protective helmets. They test whether preventing self-inflicted injury can justify compulsory safety equipment.
On Liberty: John Stuart Mill’s 1859 essay arguing for individual liberty against social and political coercion. It states the influential case against paternalistic restrictions on competent adults.
Libertarian paternalism: Policy design that steers choices toward welfare-promoting options while preserving the ability to opt out. It shows how influence can aim at welfare without formally removing alternatives.
Autonomy: The capacity or right to govern oneself and make decisions according to one's own reasons and values. Paternalistic intervention is disputed because it can displace a person’s self-government.

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