Confusion and the Role of Intuitions in the Debate on the Conception of the Right to Privacy

Abstract

Recently, Jakob Thraine Mainz and Rasmus Uhrenfeldt defended a control-based conception of a moral right to privacy (Mainz and Uhrenfeldt, Res Publica, 2020)—focusing on conceptualizing necessary and jointly sufficient conditions for a privacy right violation. This reply comments on a number of mistakes they make, which have long reverberated through the debate on the conceptions of privacy and the right to privacy and therefore deserve to be corrected. Moreover, the reply provides a sketch of a general response for defending the limited access conception of the right to privacy against control-based intuitions.