In Defence of Global Egalitarianism

Are democratic egalitarians bound to endorse statism? It seems so, given their insistence on relations of democratic reciprocity, and the lack of such relations in the global realm. If so, it would apparently be inconsistent to endorse both cosmopolitanism and democratic egalitarianism. Democratic egalitarians actually face an apparent dilemma: either they must accept statism, or they must provide further explanation regarding why they do not. Luck egalitarianism, by contrast, seemingly offers a more straightforward ground to the claim that the scope of justice is global. My thesis is twofold: first, I show that (a) democratic egalitarians can escape the dilemma, to the effect that, as such, they need be committed neither to statism nor to cosmopolitanism, and (b) that luck egalitarians are not, so to speak, as shielded from the dilemma as it might first appear. Second, I defend the plausibility of global social egalitarianism against both statist variants of democratic egalitarianism and luck egalitarianism, and suggest a form of division of labor between domestic and global justice.

Res Publica, 2005

This paper considers issues raised by Elizabeth Anderson's recent critique of the position she terms luck egalitarianism. It is maintained that luck egalitarianism, once clarified and elaborated in certain regards, remains the strongest egalitarian stance. Andersons arguments that luck egalitarians abandon both the negligent and prudent dependent caretakers fails to account for the moderate positions open to luck egalitarians and overemphasizes their commitment to unregulated market choices. The claim that luck egalitarianism insults citizens by redistributing on the grounds of paternalistic beliefs, pity and envy, and by making intrusive and stigmatizing judgments of responsibility, fails accurately to characterize the luck egalitarians rationale for redistribution and relies upon luck egalitarians being insensitive to the danger of stigmatization (which they need not be). The luck egalitarian position is reinforced by the fact that Andersons favoured conception of equality, democratic equality, is counterintuitively indifferent to all unchosen inequalities, including intergenerational inequalities, once bare social minima are met.

This paper uses the exploration of the grounds of a common criticism of luck egalitarianism to try and make an argument about both the proper subject of theorizing about justice and how to approach that subject. It draws a distinction between what it calls basic structure views and a priori baseline views, where the former take the institutional aspects of political prescriptions seriously and the latter do not. It argues that objections to luck egalitarianism on the grounds of its harshness can in part be explained by this blindness to relevant features of institutions. Further, it may be that luck egalitarianism cannot regard its own enactment as just. A related objection to Ronald Dworkin’s equality of resources, which claims that it cannot pick a particular institutional background to set the costs of resources and so is radically indeterminate, is also presented. These results, I argue, give us good reason to reject all a priori baseline views.

Many political theorists are troubled by the social and economic inequalities within a single country but they tend to accept only sufficiency principles of distributive justice at the global level. Dissatisfied with this view, some theorists argue that luck egalitarianism—the view that no one should be worse off than others through no fault or choice of one’s own—can offer the most compelling objection to global distributive inequalities. For instance, it is unfair if some have worse opportunities because of their national or civic identity since being born into a poor country is just part of a person’s “unchosen” circumstances. A potential problem with this view is that it pays little attention (if any) to the nature of the relationship that people stand to one another and as such it fails to capture some of our most fundamental concerns with distributive inequalities. This paper aims to develop and defend a conception of equality which expresses an ideal of how human relations should be conducted and argue that it applies at the global level. More specifically, it identifies three aspects of equality as a relational ideal: (1) the preservation of self-respect, (2) non-domination, and (3) fair terms of cooperation in collective endeavors, which implies (a) the terms of interactions must be free from exploitation (and there should be appropriate institutional arrangements to prevent people from being exploited by more powerful agents), and (b) each participant in the cooperative scheme is to have fair access to the benefits resulted from their cooperation.. It argues that equality is a relevant ideal in the global context because living in a global community of equals has instrumental as well as non-instrumental values: it is consistent with our status as equal moral agents and it supports our self-respect, protects freedom from domination, and promotes fair terms of transnational cooperation. By grounding global egalitarianism on the “relational” ideal of equality, my paper will therefore steer a middle course between the strong globalist view that the demands of equality apply everywhere with the same strength and the strong statist view that we should only object to inequalities among individuals living in the same society. The final section of the paper responds to a number of possible objections to this version of relational egalitarianism.

International Affairs, 2008

Critical Review of International Social and Political Philosophy

Luck egalitarianism originated in an attempt to respond to the conservative objection that egalitarianism fails to respect the value of responsibility. In response, luck egalitarians have introduced a distinction between choice and circumstances and recommend redistribution only when inequalities are not the result of choice. I will argue, however, that this standard formulation of the luck egalitarian aim is problematic, and ought to be revised. Valuing responsibility requires more than redistribution—it requires giving priority to ensuring equality of opportunity for advantages at the level of institutions. Preventing unfairness has normative priority over efforts to alleviate it. Compensation’s role is secondary to the prior normative importance of ensuring that people are responsible for the advantages they have.

2012

Carl Knight’s well-written and useful book, Luck Egalitarianism: Equality, Responsibility, and Justice, provides an interpretation and defense of luck egalitarianism, which he characterizes most generally as “the view that variations in the levels of advantage held by different persons are justified, if and only if, those persons are responsible for those levels” (p.1). Knight divides his book into three sections, the first seeking the best interpretation of luck egalitarianism, the second evaluating luck egalitarianism as an account of equality, and the third assessing luck egalitarianism as an account of justice. As the second and third section of the book both largely deal with challenges to luck egalitarianism, we can think of the book as having two parts. In the first, Knight clarifies the relationship between different versions of luck egalitarianism and argues that a particular variety, “equal opportunity for present mood”, is the best interpretation, both on its own terms and in light of the inner logic of luck egalitarianism. In the second, he defends luck egalitarianism against many objections and shows where it has shortcomings as a complete theory of justice.

Lack egalitarianism is a modest way of striving to limit inequality. It may not achieve equality; however, it does work to address differential inequalities mostly external, but sometimes internal, to individuals concerned. Most of the philosophers we have studied this semester have advocated for some form of luck egalitarianism. For some of us who believe in equality, this is a step in the right direction, a step that we must encourage and champion.

This paper defends luck egalitarianism against some well-known criticisms. It then extends a revisionary luck egalitarian account, institutional luck egalitarianism, to the global domain to make the case for global egalitarian justice.

Proponents of practice-dependent egalitarianism argue that egalitarian duties and entitlements only apply among participants in morally relevant practices. In this paper I argue that these views are implausible because they allow for objectionable treatment of nonparticipants. I show that it is impossible, on the basis of practice-internal considerations alone, to determine the extent to which the pursuit of practices can permissibly limit the opportunities of nonparticipants. There are opportunities beyond the current holdings of practices to which no one has a privileged claim (such as unowned natural resources), and the distribution of which is a matter of justice. A just distribution of such unowned distributive goods, though, requires a practice-independent distributive baseline. I further show that such a baseline can only be egalitarian, because all alternative baselines face serious objections. From this I conclude that any plausible theory of distributive justice must accept some form of equal practice-independent distributive entitlements.