Entitlements

Someone is entitled to something if a relevant institution has rules assigning that kind of thing to someone in the position of the person who is claimed to be entitled to that thing, given his or her position the word entitlement can refer either to the thing to which he or she is entitled or to the fact of that person's being entitled to it. The notion of entitlement, then, is strongly rule governed. Often these are legal rules. It is disputed whether, but not obviously impossible that, one can be entitled by moral, as opposed to strictly legal, rules. In any case, clubs, businesses, and all sorts of other organizations and informal arrangements among people have rules that specify entitlements or what amount to ...