Egalitarian nonconsequentialism and the levelling down objection

Telic egalitarianism is famously threatened by the levelling down objection. In its canonical form, the objection purports to show that it is not, in itself, an improvement if inequality is reduced. In a variant that is less often discussed, the objection is that telic egalitarians are committed to believing that sometimes one ought to reduce inequality, even when doing so makes no one better off. The standard egalitarian response to this ‘all things considered’ variant of the levelling down objection is to embed egalitarianism in a pluralist consequentialist moral theory. In section 1, I briefly recapitulate this familiar strategy. In section 2, I argue that this standard pluralist consequentialist response is inadequate. The inadequacy of the standard response, I argue, stems from the fact that the following are jointly inconsistent: (1) a commitment to levelling down's impermissibility; (2) standard pluralist egalitarian consequentialism; (3) inequality being of non‐trivial importance; and (4) the most plausible measures of inequality's badness. In section 3, I show that egalitarians can better respond to the all‐things‐considered levelling down objection by embedding egalitarianism in a nonconsequentialist moral theory.     

Egalitarianism and Responsibility

This essay examines several possible rationales for the egalitarian judgment that justice requires better-off individuals to help those who are worse off even in the absence of social interaction. These rationales include equality (everyone should enjoy the same level of benefits), moral meritocracy (each should get benefits according to her responsibility or deservingness), the threshold of sufficiency (each should be assured a minimally decent quality of life), prioritarianism (a function of benefits to individuals should be maximized that gives priority to the worse off), and mixed views. A case is made for adopting either prioritarianism or a mixed view that gives priority both to the worse off and to the more responsible and deserving.     

Liberal Egalitarianism and Workfare

abstract In this paper we ask whether liberal egalitarians can endorse workfare policies that require that welfare recipients should work in return for their welfare benefits. In particular, we focus on the fairness‐based case for workfare, which holds that people should be responsible for their own welfare since they would otherwise impose unfair costs on others. Two versions of the fairness‐based case are considered. The first defends workfare on the grounds that it would form part of an unemployment insurance scheme that individuals would endorse under certain hypothetical conditions that are salient for the purposes of determining just public policy. The second appeals to the notion of reciprocity in order to justify the requirement that people work for their benefits. We cast doubt on both of these arguments for workfare. Neither argument shows that the unconditional provision of welfare benefits is unjust; hence, the fairness case for workfare is inconclusive.     

Egalitarianism and the Levelling Down Objection

In an important piece of work Derek Parfit distinguishes two different forms of egalitarianism, 'Deontic' and 'Telic' (Parfit 1995; see also Parfit 1997). He contrasts these with what he calls the Priority View, which is not strictly a form of egalitarianism at all, since it is not essentially concerned with how well off people are relative to each other. His main aim is to generate an adequate taxonomy of the positions available, but in the process he draws attention to some of the different problems they face. I shall argue that there are forms of egalitarianism overlooked by Parfit which avoid the problems encountered by Deontic and Telic Egalitarians.     

Against Global Egalitarianism

This article attacks the view that global justice should be understood in terms of a global principle of equality. The principle mainly discussed is global equality of opportunity – the idea that people of similar talent and motivation should have equivalent opportunity sets no matter to which society they belong. I argue first that in a culturally plural world we have no neutral way of measuring opportunity sets. I then suggest that the most commonly offered defences of global egalitarianism – the cosmopolitan claim that human lives have equal value, the argument that a persons nationality is a morally arbitrary characteristic, and the more empirical claim that relationships among fellow-nationals are no longer special in a way that matters for justice – are all defective. If we fall back on the idea of equality as a default principle, then we have to recognize that pursuing global equality of opportunity systematically would leave no space for national self-determination. Finally, I ask whether global inequality might be objectionable for reasons independent of justice, and argue that the main reason for concern is the inequalities of power that are likely to emerge in a radically unequal world.I am very grateful to Gillian Brock and Kok-Chor Tan for their helpful comments on an earlier draft of this article.     

Defending Luck Egalitarianism

abstract    This article defends luck egalitarianism as an interpretation of the egalitarian ideal against two major criticisms levelled against it by Elizabeth Anderson — that it is trapped in the distributive paradigm, and that it treats the victims of bad option luck too harshly to be considered an egalitarian theory. Against the first criticism, I argue that luck egalitarianism will condemn non-material inequalities and injustices if an appropriate conception of well-being is adopted. I demonstrate this by showing how the approach is sensitive to the five faces of oppression developed by Iris Young. Although the second criticism is more troubling, it does not defeat luck egalitarianism, either. I will show that few of the inequalities that arise in the real world result from option luck. Further, if cases do occur, rather than abandoning the theory, the best response is to combine luck egalitarianism with another egalitarian principle that will ensure that the basic needs of all citizens are satisfied. The paper concludes by defending the appeal of the distinction between option luck and brute luck, in light of the preceding discussion.     

Presentism and the objection from being-supervenience

In this paper, we show that presentism—the view that the way things are is the way things presently are—is not undermined by the objection from being-supervenience. This objection claims, roughly, that presentism has trouble accounting for the truth-value of past-tense claims. Our demonstration amounts to the articulation and defence of a novel version of presentism. This is brute past presentism, according to which the truth-value of past-tense claims is determined by the past understood as a fundamental aspect of reality different from things and how things are.     

Information closure and the sceptical objection

In this article, I define and then defend the principle of information closure (pic) against a sceptical objection similar to the one discussed by Dretske in relation to the principle of epistemic closure. If I am successful, given that pic is equivalent to the axiom of distribution and that the latter is one of the conditions that discriminate between normal and non-normal modal logics, a main result of such a defence is that one potentially good reason to look for a formalization of the logic of “ $S$ is informed that $p$ ” among the non-normal modal logics, which reject the axiom, is also removed. This is not to argue that the logic of “ $S$ is informed that $p$ ” should be a normal modal logic, but that it could still be insofar as the objection that it could not be, based on the sceptical objection against pic, has been removed. In other word, I shall argue that the sceptical objection against pic fails, so such an objection provides no ground to abandon the normal modal logic B (also known as KTB) as a formalization of “ $S$ is informed that $p$ ”, which remains plausible insofar as this specific obstacle is concerned.     

Methodological naturalism and the truth seeking objection

Methodological naturalism, the exclusion of the supernatural from the natural sciences, has drawn critique from both proponents of Intelligent Design and some philosophical naturalists who argue that the methods of science can also be used to evaluate supernatural claims. One principal objection to methodological naturalism has been what I call the truth seeking objection. In this article I develop an understanding of methodological naturalism capable of answering the truth seeking objection. I further also argue that methodological naturalism as a convention of science can be best defended by abandoning scientism. In this way methodological naturalism can be reconnected to the original theistic context in which it was first developed.     

Conscientious objection and emergency contraception

This article argues that practitioners have a professional ethical obligation to dispense emergency contraception, even given conscientious objection to this treatment. This recent controversy affects all medical professionals, including physicians as well as pharmacists. This article begins by analyzing the option of referring the patient to another willing provider. Objecting professionals may conscientiously refuse because they consider emergency contraception to be equivalent to abortion or because they believe contraception itself is immoral. This article critically evaluates these reasons and concludes that they do not successfully support conscientious objection in this context. Contrary to the views of other thinkers, it is not possible to easily strike a respectful balance between the interests of objecting providers and patients in this case. As medical professionals, providers have an ethical duty to inform women of this option and provide emergency contraception when this treatment is requested.