Inequality (1754)

Journal of Moral Philosophy, 2010

This review essay looks at two important recent books on the empirical social science of inequality, Richard Wilkinson and Kate Pickett’s The Spirit Level and John Hills et al.’s Towards a More Equal Society?, situating these books against the important work of Michael Marmot on epidemiology and health inequalities. I argue that political philosophy can gain a great deal from careful engagement with empirical research on the nature and consequences of inequality, especially in regard to empirical work on the relationship between socioeconomic inequality, status, self-respect, domination, autonomy, the quality of social relations, and societal health outcomes. The essay also raises some methodological questions about the approach taken by Wilkinson and Pickett, as well as questioning the ways in which their argument is (or is not) best understood as being fundamentally egalitarian in character. It concludes with some reflections, prompted by Hills et al., on the lessons that should be learned by egalitarians from the experience of the Blair and Brown governments in the UK.

History and the Study of Inequality” Journal of Interdisciplinary History, LI, no:3 (Winter, 2021), pp. 429-411

for the enlightening discussions that resulted in this review essay.

Philosophical Topics, Vol. 40, No. 1 (2012)

This is a very rough draft of a paper that develops an argument how inequality comes to matter in social conflict situations. It notably lacks references and foot notes given that it was written under quite high pressure but as draft it might be interesting for others working on similar ideas.

The Blanqui Lecture, ESHET Annual Meeting, Paris, 2016

I argue that, in Adam Smith’s social theory, inequality results from the same principles of human nature that make moral judgment possible, thus allowing for the very existence of human society, and the effect of those principles is heavier in commercial society than in tribes of hunters. Both inequality in the allocation of goods and inequality in rank, or personal dependence, are to be considered to be oppressive on whatsoever elementary considerations of dignity or justice. The policy recommendation Smith believes is justified on both normative considerations and realism is that, since distributive equality cannot be re-established from above by any kind of social engineering, for it arises from the same root, which makes relations without social dependence no less than the development of the virtues of humanity possible, at least some kind of minimal complex equality may be re-established by dismantling those political arrangements which grant control of information and decision to privileged groups.

2021

This is an introductory textbook of the history of economics of inequality for undergraduates and genreral readers. It begins with Adam Smith's critique of Rousseau. The first and second chapters focus on Smith and Karl Marx, in the broad classical tradition of economics, where it is believed that there is an inseparable relationship between production and distribution, economic growth and inequality. Chapters 3 and 4 argue that despite the fact that the founders of the neoclassical school had shown an active interest in social issues, namely worker poverty, the issues of production and distribution became discussed separately among neoclassicals. Toward the end of the 20th century, however, there was a renewed awareness within economics of the problem of the relationship between production and distribution. The young Piketty's beginnings as an economist are set against this backdrop. Chapters 5 to 8 explain the circumstances of the restoration of classical concerns within t...

2020

This draft paper is the result of my research for Inventing Equality (St. Martin's, 2020). It examines the ways in which American historians have treated the foundational principle of equality from the American Revolution through 1945. I hope to expand the work into the 21st century. Suggestions are very welcome.