The Samaritan State and Social Welfare Provision

Christopher Wellman and some allied scholars argue that a ‘samaritan theory’ can justify state coercion. They also suppose that states may provide robust, social egalitarian welfare provisions for a variety of reasons that would arise within samaritan states. However, the most promising reasons—samaritanism itself, natural socialism, relational equality, and anti-crime paternalism—cannot support robust provision without discarding the strong presumption favoring individual liberty (including both personal rights and private property rights) which must motivate the samaritan theory. Consequently, a samaritan state cannot be a robust social welfare state.