Generally speaking, even those adverse to Bentham's utilitarian approach have found the fundamentals of his critique of natural rights convincing. It is difficult to envisage how a right could be natural "in the sense that it could be present before any society exists to recognize it, especially if we are talking about rights to things that seem to be socially defined, like property. Most contemporary rights. theorists have abandoned the idea of natural rights, regarding them instead as thoroughly social and political constructs. There are exceptions to this, most notably Alan Gewirth (1978), who still argues that certain features of our human nature lead us inexorably to recognize the rights. that all humans have to freedom and well-being, but such ideas are, as Habermas (1993: 150 remarks, untypical and rather easily criticizable '. In Alasdair MacIntyre's words, the best reason for asserting so bluntly that there are no such natural rights. is indeed precisely the same type of reason which we possess for asserting that there are no unicorns' (MacIntyre, 1993: 69), namely, that there is no evidence whatsoever for their existence.