Cooperation,fairness and utility

Conclusions In the situations canvassed I have argued that (a) the dominant aim of the utilitarian will be the establishment of a fair procedure, (b) under radical uncertainty cooperation will constitute his best bet, and (c) when he knowsthat all others will cooperate it is still an open question whether he will slack, and if under some conditions he does so he does not then act unfairly. It is wise to bear in mind, however, that an enormous number of possible situations, mostly mixtures of the pure cases, simply have not been considered. It is not inconceivable that in one of them the utilitarian will clearly act unfairly; I am inclined to think not, but the possibility is not entirely ruled out.An earlier version of this paper was read on March 9, 1969 as part of a Colloquium in Political Philosophy held at the University of Toronto. I am much indebted to David Lyons for the helpful comments he delivered on that occasion; many of the subsequent revisions in the paper have been made in the light of those comments.