Hard Paternalism, Personal Accountability, and Justice
This paper examines Goldman and Goldman's account of soft and hard paternalism within a utilitarian ethical framework. While soft paternalism is defended as compatible with Mill's On Liberty and the common good, the paper argues that hard paternalism—as applied to minority populations such as young people—creates serious problems for justice and personal accountability. Using age-based alcohol and tobacco restrictions as a primary case study, the paper contends that denying legal adults the right to drink or smoke normalizes deviance, fosters rebellion, and ultimately undermines the very common good hard paternalism is meant to protect. The hidden costs of enforcement and the cultural consequences of prohibition-style restrictions are also examined.
- Introduction: Defines paternalism and states the paper's thesis
- Exposition of Goldman and Goldman's Position: Explains soft and hard paternalism in utilitarian terms
- Age-Based Restrictions and the Normalization of Deviance: Argues drinking age laws foster rebellion and deviance
- Defense: Justice, Accountability, and the Costs of Hard Paternalism: Challenges hard paternalism on justice and cost grounds
- Conclusion: Synthesizes argument for a more balanced paternalistic approach
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What makes this paper effective
- The paper clearly distinguishes between soft and hard paternalism from the outset, grounding its argument in Goldman and Goldman's definitions before challenging them with concrete social examples.
- It uses a focused, real-world case study—age-based alcohol and tobacco restrictions—to make an abstract philosophical debate tangible and accessible.
- The argument moves logically from exposition to critique, using both statistical evidence and philosophical authority (Mill, Dworkin, Cudd) to build a multi-layered defense of its thesis.
Key academic technique demonstrated
This paper exemplifies the "expose-then-challenge" technique common in applied ethics writing: it first faithfully reconstructs a theoretical position (GG's justification of paternalism) and then systematically identifies its internal contradictions—particularly the tension between utilitarian cost-benefit logic and the real, hidden costs of hard paternalism for minority populations. This approach demonstrates philosophical engagement rather than simple disagreement.
Structure breakdown
The paper follows a four-part structure: an introduction that states the thesis, an exposition section that presents GG's argument on its own terms, a defense section that applies the thesis to concrete examples with supporting sources, and a conclusion that synthesizes the argument's implications. Each section builds directly on the previous, maintaining a coherent argumentative arc throughout.
Introduction
Goldman and Goldman (GG) state that "paternalism involves overriding a moral right of a person, often a liberty to act, for the person's own good" (65). The problem with paternalism in a free society is that it creates conflict and tension between the right of the individual to act freely and the need for society to restrict liberties in order to safeguard itself. This paper argues that while GG show that soft paternalism is justified from a utilitarian ethical perspective, hard paternalism creates problems that undermine the same ethical framework—namely, problems related to the development of personal accountability and justice.
Exposition of Goldman and Goldman's Position
GG propose that soft paternalism is justified in Mill's On Liberty, which serves as the foundation for utilitarian ethics. In utilitarianism, the good is that which benefits the majority of people—that is, the common good of all. Thus, soft paternalism is acceptable because, although it may place some restrictions on people's liberty, it does so in order to benefit the common good. Mill advocates liberty in most cases, but makes exceptions where the safety of the person or the community may be at risk, such as "restraining a person from crossing an unsafe bridge until he can be apprised of the danger, acting paternalistically toward children and incompetents, and refusing to honor contracts of individuals to sell themselves into slavery" (66). The principle of soft paternalism is equated with "maximizing voluntariness for each act except in cases of extreme long-run forfeiture" (GG 70). Hard paternalism, on the other hand, is equated with the notion of preventing self-harm as "sufficient in itself to override choice, whether truly voluntary or not" (GG 71). GG go on to contend that soft paternalism is as far as one can go in a utilitarian society.
However, in a diverse society, achieving the common good often requires some compromises, so hard paternalism is something to consider—at least for the minority population—in order to preserve the common good of the majority. Thus, GG posit that hard paternalism is necessary in the case of the minority, so long as it offers them only a minor inconvenience. This proposition is qualified by the statement that the total benefits of soft paternalism for the majority "must outweigh the moral costs" of hard paternalism for the minority "together with the costs of administering the laws" (GG 76). This is the central argument GG make on paternalism.
The larger issue, as it pertains to matters like underage drinking and smoking, is that the rights of young people are curtailed for no clear reason. Young people often point out that at age 18 they are able to vote responsibly and enlist in the military—they can put their lives on the line to defend their country—yet they are not permitted to buy alcohol and, in some cases, are not allowed to buy cigarettes. By age 21, however, they are allowed to do both. This arbitrary age discrimination makes little sense on its face and often leads young people to break the law in order to exercise what they consider their right, thereby making them scofflaws in the process. By flouting the law, a dangerous precedent is set and excess risk-taking is encouraged—such as the culture of heavy partying seen on college campuses.
Instead of teaching young people to drink responsibly by granting them access to alcohol and trusting that they will make sober decisions, society restricts their rights and pushes them in a direction similar to that which the country took during Prohibition in the 1920s. It was during that era that organized crime came into existence in a significant way, as criminal enterprises profited from people's desire to exercise their perceived right to drink in defiance of restrictive laws (Kobler). Today's young people feel similarly restricted and push back in much the same way. This environment generates conflict and tension, whereas society should be united and fair. It effectively normalizes deviance.
Age-Based Restrictions and the Normalization of Deviance
A law against smoking cigarettes or drinking alcohol does not constitute a minor inconvenience. It represents a demonstration of hypocrisy that undermines young people's acceptance of the law. Once a young person perceives the law as unjust, he or she is at risk of disregarding all laws, because they are part of the same legal system that has promoted injustice. The law should be equal, fair, and just for all. Age discrimination is a form of injustice that causes people to reject not only the rule of law but also the notion of the common good, since it is their perception that their own good is suppressed in favor of the good that others seek to enjoy.
Throm makes the case well that colleges in particular would benefit from doing away with such an unjust law. Currently, college campuses are places where young people are most at risk for alcohol abuse: unpracticed in drinking responsibly, they are exposed to an environment in which drinking illegally is an accepted norm, even though it is deviant behavior. They are encouraged to be deviants, and this opens a slippery slope that can lead to other risky behaviors, such as risky sexual behavior, drug use, and reckless driving. If young people were exposed to alcohol earlier, this risk would be diminished, and college campuses would be more sober because alcohol would not carry the allure of the forbidden. Throm notes that "telling a teenager not to do something usually results in them doing it anyway out of spite. Telling teenagers they aren't allowed to drink alcohol just makes them sneakier in finding a way to get it." Other countries, particularly in Europe, have shown that a society open to alcohol helps cultivate personal responsibility in young people.
In America, by contrast, a culture of irresponsibility and rebellion is created. Because of this culture of rebellion against what are seen as unjust laws, the consequences are dire: "more than 1,800 students die every year of alcohol-related causes. An additional 600,000 are injured while drunk, and nearly 100,000 become victims of alcohol-influenced sexual assaults" (McMurtrie). The allure of engaging in a forbidden activity that is suddenly readily available causes young people to make serious mistakes. If they were taught instead to respect alcohol and to consume it responsibly, the temptation to abuse it would not be as great. America's cultural memory of Prohibition illustrates precisely this dynamic: restriction breeds excess rather than restraint. The culture of the United States is still shaped by a Puritanical belief system rooted in its early history, yet it is simultaneously prone to excess precisely because of the sense of license and freedom that arrives when a person reaches a certain age or enters an environment where deviance is normalized.
Conclusion
The upshot of this argument regarding GG's position is that it opens the door for a more stable society—one in which there is genuine respect for the law and in which young people have the opportunity to develop personal accountability. This paper has argued that hard paternalism applied to minority populations creates problems in society and undermines respect for the common good. GG justify hard paternalism so long as the cost of maintaining the common good for the majority is not outweighed by the inconveniences associated with hard paternalism for the minority and the cost of enforcing that paternalism. As the argument here has shown, those costs and inconveniences do outweigh the common good of the majority, even if they are too often unrecognized by the majority. Minors need to feel secure in their environments and in themselves, and placing them in an environment where deviance is normalized is not the way to achieve that. Rather, young people should be taught to respect things like smoking and drinking and to engage with them responsibly, in a culture that strikes a balance between Puritanical restriction and unchecked permissiveness.
Works Cited
Cudd, Ann. "Taking Drugs Seriously: Liberal Paternalism and the Dental Prescription System." Public Affairs Quarterly.
Dworkin, Gerald. "Paternalism." The Monist, 1972, 56: 64–84.
Goldman, Michael N. and Alan H. Goldman. "Paternalistic Laws." Philosophical Topics, Vol. 18, No. 1, Philosophy of Law (Spring 1990), pp. 65–78.
Kobler, J. Capone: The Life and Times of Al Capone. New York: Da Capo Press, 2003.
McMurtrie, B. "Why Colleges Haven't Stopped Binge Drinking." New York Times, 2014.
Mill, J. S. Selections from On Liberty.
Throm, A. "Lowering the Drinking Age to 18 Is Better than Keeping It at 21." Daily Nebraskan, 2017.
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