Construed as a theory of justice, relational egalitarianism says that justice requires that people relate as equals. Construed as a theory of what makes democracy valuable, it says that democracy is a necessary, or constituent, part of the value of relating as equals. Typically, relational egalitarians want their theory to provide both an account of what justice requires and an account of what makes democracy valuable. We argue that relational egalitarians with this dual ambition face the justice-democracy (...) dilemma: Understanding social relations in such a way that renders relational egalitarianism plausible as an answer to what makes democracy valuable comes at the price of understanding social relations in a way that makes it less plausible as a theory of justice, and vice versa. We also argue that there is no easy way out of the dilemma and that relational egalitarians, who want relational equality to provide both accounts mentioned, may simply have to set their ambitions lower on behalf of relational equality. (shrink)

Relational views of equality put forward a social and political ideal of equality that aims at being a better interpretation of what social justice requires than the prevailing distributive conceptions of equality, especially luck egalitarian views. Yet it is unclear what social justice as relational equality demands in distributive terms; Elizabeth Anderson's view seems to vacate a large part of the terrain of distributive justice in favor of a minimalist, sufficiency view. Against that, this paper argues that (...) class='Hi'>relational equality, properly understood, requires setting stringent limits to distributive inequality, for both intrinsic and instrumental reasons. First, the relational egalitarian conception of society as a cooperative enterprise among equals gives rise to a presumption of equality in socially produced goods (and bads); inequalities in these goods have to be justified by justice-relevant reasons. Second, relational egalitarianism also delivers instrumental reasons to limit inequalities in income, wealth, and opportunities, because such inequalities may generate both opportunities for domination and inegalitarian status norms that threaten the social bases of self-respect of the worse off. (shrink)

Relational egalitarianism is a theory of justice according to which justice requires that people relate as equals. According to some relational egalitarians, X and Y relate as equals if, and only if, they (1) regard each other as equals; and (2) treat each other as equals. In this paper, we argue that relational egalitarians must give up 1.

Relational egalitarians claim that a situation is just only if everyone it involves relates to one another as equals. It implies that relational egalitarians believe the ideal of “living as equals” (for short) is desirable, and furthermore, necessary for justice. In this paper, I distinguish three accounts of the desirability of the ideal: the instrumental value account, the non‐instrumental value account, and the non‐consequentialist account. I argue that the former two accounts cannot provide satisfying reasons for being a (...) relational egalitarian. Instead, the ideal of “living as equals” ought to be understood as fundamentally a moral requirement in a non‐consequentialist sense. In addition, a pluralist (though fundamentally non‐consequentialist) approach is welcome. (shrink)

Pluralist egalitarians think that luck and relational egalitarianism each articulates a component in a pluralist account of egalitarian justice. However, this ecumenical view appears problematic in the light of Elizabeth Anderson's claim that the divide arises because two incompatible views of justification are in play, which in turn generates derivative disagreements – e.g. about the proper currency of egalitarian justice. In support of pluralist egalitarianism I argue that two of Anderson's derivative disagreements are not rooted in the disagreement over (...) justification she identifies, and that the disagreement over justification cuts across standard disagreements between luck and relational egalitarian justice. (shrink)

In recent decades political philosophers have increasingly been engaged with the issue of educational equality. However, egalitarians typically focus on achieving equality in the distribution of education, and ignore the relevance of an alternative, relational conception of equality. An exception to this is Elizabeth Anderson, who applies relational egalitarian principles to education in her 2007 article ‘Fair Opportunity in Education: A Democratic Equality Perspective’. Although Anderson remains one of the few relational egalitarians to consider what this ideal (...) requires in education, her arguments have received less attention than they deserve. In this article I examine Anderson's theory of fair educational opportunities for a democratic society of equals and develop an internal critique of her approach. I suggest that the sufficientarian standard Anderson proposes for education has the propensity to undermine the process of integration and the relations of equality she aspires to. Even if all children receive a sufficient education, inequality above the threshold could result in social divisions and status differentials that encourage informal segregation because people typically prefer to associate with other people who are similar to themselves. The article will finish by considering what implications this has for Anderson's relational egalitarian approach to education. (shrink)

In this thesis I argue that Adam Smith is committed to moral egalitarianism, which extends to his theory of political economy. While Smith’s work is often used to justify economic inequality in society, I show that his political theory is best understood as a kind of relational egalitarianism. Using Elizabeth Anderson’s Democratic Equality as a model, I examine Smith’s commitment to equality in the space of social relationships. In particular, I argue that Smith’s focus on eliminating inequalities that cause (...) oppression in society in conjunction with his efforts to design a political and economic system that will yield social conditions of freedom for individuals make him a relational egalitarian. (shrink)

Many find that the objectionable nature of paternalism has something to do with belief. However, since it is commonly held that beliefs are directly governed by epistemic as opposed to moral norms, how could it be objectionable to hold paternalistic beliefs about others if they are supported by the evidence? Drawing on central elements of relational egalitarianism, this paper attempts to bridge this gap. In a first step, it argues that holding paternalistic beliefs about others implies a failure to (...) regard them as equals in terms of their moral agency. In a second step, it shows that the fact that we should regard others as equals in this sense raises the threshold for sufficiency of evidence for paternalistic beliefs to be epistemically justified. That is, moral reasons of relational equality encroach on the epistemic. However, these reasons are not decisive. In cases where others are about to jeopardize critical goods such as their lives, mobility or future autonomy, relational equality sometimes calls for paternalistic action and, by extension, the formation of beliefs that render such action rational. The upshot is that in order to meet demands of relational equality we have a pro tanto reason to not hold paternalistic beliefs about others. (shrink)

Politics, Philosophy & Economics, Volume 21, Issue 1, Page 55-74, February 2022. Many find that the objectionable nature of paternalism has something to do with belief. However, since it is commonly held that beliefs are directly governed by epistemic as opposed to moral norms, how could it be objectionable to hold paternalistic beliefs about others if they are supported by the evidence? Drawing on central elements of relational egalitarianism, this paper attempts to bridge this gap. In a first step, (...) it argues that holding paternalistic beliefs about others implies a failure to regard them as equals in terms of their moral agency. In a second step, it shows that the fact that we should regard others as equals in this sense raises the threshold for sufficiency of evidence for paternalistic beliefs to be epistemically justified. That is, moral reasons of relational equality encroach on the epistemic. However, these reasons are not decisive. In cases where others are about to jeopardize critical goods such as their lives, mobility or future autonomy, relational equality sometimes calls for paternalistic action and, by extension, the formation of beliefs that render such action rational. The upshot is that in order to meet demands of relational equality we have a pro tanto reason to not hold paternalistic beliefs about others. (shrink)

In the present chapter I try to determine to what extent the public policies adopted by Romanian governments following the fall of the communist regime contributed to alleviating the most egregious past injustice, the Holocaust. The measures taken for memorializing the Holocaust will be analysed through the lens of a mixed reparatory justice – relational egalitarian account. Employing such a framework entails a focus on symbolic reparations, meant to promote civic trust, social solidarity, and encourage the restoration of social (...) and cultural capital in societies affected by historical injustices. Such symbolic reparations can include public atonement, changing street names, establishing memorials, funding museums, including Holocaust study in the national curriculum, setting national days for the commemoration of the Holocaust, etc. The need for symbolic reparation has become increasingly clearer in the literature on Holocaust memorialization, and the present paper intends to go a step further, by providing researchers with a theoretical approach that can be used to make better sense of the effects of measures taken as part of the process of Holocaust remembrance. In the chapter I also address the issue of determining who the duty-bearers should be. I argue that there could be several indicators for reparatory justice, including in this case compensation programs and the establishment of institutions that would allow dialogue between descendants of the victims and descendants of the perpetrators, a sine qua non condition for restoring social trust in communities marked by violations of human rights, especially of such a scale as the Holocaust. (shrink)

Much contemporary egalitarian theorizing is broadly divided between luck egalitarians, such as G. A. Cohen, Richard Arneson, and John Roemer, and relational egalitarians, such as John Rawls, Samuel Scheffler, Josh Cohen, and me. The two camps disagree about how to conceive of equality: as an equal distribution of non-relational goods among individuals, or as a kind of social relation between persons - an equality of authority, status, or standing.This disagreement generates a second, about when unequal distributions of non- (...) class='Hi'>relational goods are unjust. Luck egalitarians claim that inequality is unjust when it is accidental: when it is caused by morally arbitrary factors such as circumstances of birth. Relational egalitarians claim that inequality is unjust when it disadvantages people: when it reflects, embodies, or causes inequality of authority, status, or standing. (shrink)

Why does equality matter, as a social and political value, and what does it require? Relational egalitarians argue that it does not require that people receive equal distributive shares of some good, but that they relate as equals. Christian Schemmel here provides the first comprehensive development of a liberal conception of relational equality, one which understands relations of non-domination and egalitarian norms of social status as stringent demands of social justice. He first argues that expressing respect for the (...) freedom and equality of individuals in social cooperation requires stringent protections against domination. Taking this as a starting point, he then develops a substantive, liberal conception of non-domination and argues that non-domination is a particularly important, but not the only, concern of social justice. From there, Schemmel develops an account of the wrongness of inegalitarian norms of social status which shows how status-induced foreclosure of important social opportunities is a social injustice in its own right, over and above the role of status inequality in enabling domination, and the threats it poses to individuals' self-respect. Finally, Schemmel articulates the core requirements of liberal relational egalitarianism for political, economic, and health justice: these amount to demands for far-reaching forms of equality in all three domains, which can rarely, if ever, be overridden by competing concerns. With expert rigor and creativity, Justice and Egalitarian Relations brings together scholarship in a variety of related topics, from social justice and liberalism to distributive and relational equality, social equality, neo-republicanism, and non-denomination. (shrink)

Relational egalitarianism is a theory of justice according to which people must relate as equals. In this article, we develop relational sufficientarianism – a view of justice according to which people must relate as sufficients. We distinguish between three versions of this ideal, one that is incompatible with relational egalitarianism and two that are not. Building on this, we argue that relational theorists have good reason to support a pluralist view that is both egalitarian and sufficientarian.

This article contributes to the critical engagement with luck egalitarianism by advancing two arguments. Firstly, it questions the cogency of the dichotomies – e.g., luck/choice, person/circumstance, agency/structure – and the accompanying moral ideal of pure voluntarism. This makes it difficult for luck egalitarianism to dissect appropriately the inequalities embedded in social relations, such as social networks and involuntary associations, in which voluntariness and contingency as well as agency and structure are intertwined. Secondly, it suggests that the relational approach, which (...) has been developed, inter alia, in the empirical study of inequality, provides a morally and practically adequate perspective on egalitarian justice. The relational approach achieves this by converging upon those in‐between social relations that are irreducible to the macro‐level structure and to micro‐level agency. Moreover, a relationally sensitive perspective on inequality can adeptly respond to the difficulties that luck‐egalitarian theories encounter. (shrink)

Coercion is morally objectionable: it’s bad to be coerced and it’s wrong to coerce people. But why is coercion objectionable? In this paper, I advance an egalitarian account of what’s objectionable about coercion. The account is rooted in the idea that certain relationships, like those of master to slave and lord to peasant, are relationships of subordination or domination. These relationships are morally objectionable. Moreover, such relationships are in part constituted by asymmetries of power. A master subordinates a slave because (...) the master has more power over the slave than vice versa. The account says that coercion is objectionable because it creates such asymmetries of power, and so creates relationships of subordination. I show how this account can address its most serious problems, and how it can illuminate what’s wrong with blackmail, exploitation, withholding aid, and compulsion. (shrink)

In this chapter, Fourie identifies and systematizes the impairments associated with having privilege and evaluates their implications for theories of relational equality and distributive justice. Having certain social privileges, for example, being a man in a patriarchal society, can also be damaging; in other words, there are “impairments of privilege.” Fourie delineates six kinds of impairments—epistemic, evaluative, emotional, health-related, affiliative, and moral. She then goes on to assess the implications of the impairments of privilege for two theories in political (...) philosophy. Relational egalitarianism, she argues, has the theoretical resources to identify and address the problems associated with these impairments, whereas distributive egalitarianism does not. Furthermore, she argues that assessing the impairments of privilege through relational egalitarianism helps to characterize a society of equals: we must address the causes of functional impairments, express respect for the worse off by not normalizing the experiences of the privileged, and minimize competitive positionality. (shrink)

Many contemporary democratic theorists are democratic egalitarians. They think that the distinctive value of democracy lies in equality. Yet this position faces a serious problem. All contemporary democracies are representative democracies. Such democracies are highly unequal: representatives have much more power than do ordinary citizens. So, it seems that democratic egalitarians must condemn representative democracies. In this paper, I present a solution to this problem. My solution invokes popular control. If representatives are under popular control, then their extra power is (...) not objectionable. Unfortunately, so I argue, in the United States representatives are under loose popular control. (shrink)

Deprivations normally give rise to undeserved inequality. It is commonly thought that one way of improving a situation with respect to equality is by reducing the incidence of deprivations. In this paper I argue that there is at least one respect in which reducing the incidence of deprivations can make things worse from the point of view of equality. While eliminating deprivations leads to the elimination of inequalities, reducing the incidence of deprivations leads to an uneven distribution of the pairwise (...) relations of inequality of a population, which leads to the concentration of pairwise relations of inequality in the worse off. If my argument is correct, egalitarians have reasons to broaden their dimensions of concern: egalitarians should not only be concerned about the unequal distribution of goods, but also about the unequal distribution of pairwise relations of inequality of a population. (shrink)

This paper proposes a model of human uniqueness based on an unusual distinction between two contrasted kinds of political competition and political status: (1) antagonistic competition, in quest of dominance (antagonistic status), a zero-sum, self-limiting game whose stake—who takes what, when, how—summarizes a classical definition of politics (Lasswell 1936), and (2) synergistic competition, in quest of merit (synergistic status), a positive-sum, self-reinforcing game whose stake becomes “who brings what to a team’s common good.” In this view, Rawls’s (1971) famous virtual (...) “veil of ignorance” mainly conceals politics’ antagonistic stakes so as to devise the principles of a just, egalitarian society, yet without providing any means to enforce these ideals (Sen 2009). Instead, this paper proposes that human uniqueness flourished under a real “adapted veil of ignorance” concealing the steady inflation of synergistic politics which resulted from early humans’ sturdy egalitarianism. This proposition divides into four parts: (1) early humans first stumbled on a purely cultural means to enforce a unique kind of within-team antagonistic equality—dyadic balanced deterrence thanks to handheld weapons (Chapais 2008); (2) this cultural innovation is thus closely tied to humans’ darkest side, but it also launched the cumulative evolution of humans’ brightest qualities—egalitarian team synergy and solidarity, together with the associated synergistic intelligence, culture, and communications; (3) runaway synergistic competition for differential merit among antagonistically equal obligate teammates is the single politically selective mechanism behind the cumulative evolution of all these brighter qualities, but numerous factors to be clarified here conceal this mighty evolutionary driver; (4) this veil of ignorance persists today, which explains why humans’ unique prosocial capacities are still not clearly understood by science. The purpose of this paper is to start lifting this now-ill-adapted veil of ignorance, thus uncovering the tight functional relations between egalitarian team solidarity and the evolution of human uniqueness. (shrink)

Contemporary discussions of egalitarian justice have often focused on the issue of expensive taste. G.A. Cohen has recently abandoned the view that all chosen disadvantages are non-compensable, now maintaining that chosen expensive judgmental tastes—those endorsed by valuational judgment—are compensable as it is unreasonable to expect persons not to develop them. But chosen expensive brute taste—the main type of non-compensable expensive taste on the new scheme—cannot be described in such a way that there is a normative difference between it and chosen (...) expensive judgmental taste. As there are related problems with denying compensation for the other kind of expensive taste that might remain non-compensable, Cohen's position on taste appears to be either implausible or virtually indistinguishable from that of equality of welfare. However, compensation for valuational judgment-based expensive taste might be justified on grounds of responsibility. (shrink)

This critical notice provides an overview of Harry Frankfurt’s On Inequality and assesses whether Frankfurt is right to argue that equality is merely formal and empty. I counter-argue that egalitarianism, properly tweaked and circumscribed, can be defended against Frankfurt’s repudiation. After surveying the main arguments in Frankfurt’s book, I argue that whatever plausibility the ‘doctrine of sufficiency’ defended by Frankfurt may have, it does not strike a fatal blow against egalitarianism. There is nothing in egalitarianism that forbids acceptance of the (...) moral platitude expressed in sufficientarianism's positive thesis,. Nor is there anything in egalitarianism as such that makes it impossible to recognize the banal truth that there are many important things besides equality, and that many dimensions of human affairs are improperly appraised from a relational or comparative point of view. The fact that a relational or comparative point o... (shrink)

Within democratic theory, electoral competition is typically associated with minimalist and realist views of democracy. In contrast, this article argues for a reinterpretation of electoral competition as an important element of an egalitarian theory of democracy. Current relational egalitarian theories, in focusing on the equalization of individual power-over, present electoral institutions as in tension with equality. Against this view, the article contends that electoral competition can foster equality by incentivizing the equalization of cooperative power. The article develops the normative (...) category of equal opportunity to access cooperative power and shows how it can generate an egalitarian defense of electoral competition. Yet this ideal is not an affirmation of the status quo. Rather, it points to the need to reform electoral systems to make them more competitive and so more likely to foster cooperative power, as well as reforms to provide direct support to associations like unions that equalize cooperative power. (shrink)

This paper aims to reevaluate Aristotelian political theory from an egalitarian perspective and to pinpoint its legacy and relevance to contemporary political theory, demonstrating its importance for contemporary liberal democracies in a changing world, suggesting a new critique of liberal and neoliberal political theory and practice, and especially the improvement of our notion of the modern liberal-democratic state, since most contemporary representative liberal democracies fail to take into account the public interest of the many and do very little in order (...) to advance it. The paper will focus on key aspects of Aristotle’s thought, such as his notions of justice (δικαιοσύνη/dikaiosunē and ἁπλῶς δίκαιον/aplōs dikaion), concord (ὁμόμοια/homonoia), friendship (φιλία/philia) and the art of ruling (τέχνη τοῦ ἄρχειν/technē tou archein), arguing that Aristotle’s theory requires us to have concern for our fellow citizens; ‘concern for others’ as opposed to the mere ‘respect for others’ that contemporary neo-Kantian liberalism advocates . Hence, I will examine these aspects of Aristotle’s philosophy that have not so far been adequately discussed, in relation to his conception of the ‘common or public interest’ (τὸ κοινῇ συμφέρον/to koinē sympheron) which is essential in order to understand the Aristotelian vision for ‘the art of politics’ (τέχνη τοῦ ἄρχειν) which should always aim towards the interest of the many, i.e., the people (πλῆθος/plēthos). (shrink)

According to relational egalitarians, equality is not primarily about the distribution of some good but about people relating to one another as equals. However, compared with other theorists in political philosophy – including other egalitarians – relational egalitarians have said relatively little on what role personal responsibility should play in their theories. For example, is equality compatible with responsibility? Should economic distributions be responsibility-sensitive? This article fills this gap. I develop a relational egalitarian framework for personal responsibility (...) and show that relational equality commits us to responsibility. I develop two sets of arguments. First, I draw on relational theories of moral responsibility – particularly Strawsonian views – to show that valuable egalitarian relationships require responsibility. Second, I show why relational equality sometimes requires that economic distributions be sensitive to responsibility and choice. I also defend a seemingly paradoxical result: being committed to responsibility, relational egalitarianism not only justifies some distributive inequalities but some relational inequalities too. Overall, relational egalitarianism gives a nuanced and coherent answer as to why and how responsibility matters from within egalitarianism. That it does should be an important argument in its favour. (shrink)

The organization of cutting-edge HEP laboratories has evolved in the intersection of academia, state agencies, and industry. Exponentially ever-larger and more complex knowledge-intensive operations, the laboratories have often faced the challenges of, and required organizational solutions similar to, those identified by a cluster of diverse theories falling under the larger heading of organization theory. The cluster has either shaped or accounted for the organization of industry and state administration. The theories also apply to HEP laboratories, as they have gradually and (...) uniquely hybridized their principles and solutions. Yet scholarship has virtually ignored this linkage and has almost exclusively focused on the laboratories’ presumably unique egalitarian organizational aspects. Guided by the principles developed in the organization theory cluster, we identify the basic organizational features of HEP laboratories in relation to their pursuit of narrow and broad epistemic goals. We also provide a set of criteria and methods for assessing the efficiency of the identified organizational features in achieving such goals. (shrink)

Relational egalitarians argue that democratic institutions are justified by appeal to relational equality. According to the skeptical challenge, equality of political power is not required for relational equality, and the relational egalitarian case for democracy fails. I defend the relational egalitarian justification of democracy. I develop an analysis of social status and show that inequalities of power will not entail inequalities of status. I then show that inequalities of power will robustly cause inequalities of status (...) and argue that this vindicates the relational egalitarian case for democracy, because such theories have a much more pragmatic standard of success for the justification of democracy than conceptual necessity. I consider the objection that if inequalities of power robustly cause inequalities of status, then relational egalitarians should also oppose democratic institutions, because officials such as legislators or judges will have more power than citizens. In reply, I argue that relational egalitarians are only opposed to inequalities of status that mark a failure of recognition respect, and that inequalities of status that follow from democratically licensed inequalities of power will not mark such a failure. I conclude that the skeptical challenge is unsuccessful, and that the relational egalitarian justification of democracy is sound. (shrink)

This paper reconsiders some themes and arguments from my earlier paper “Fairness, Respect and the Egalitarian Ethos.” That work is often considered to be part of a cluster of papers attacking “luck egalitarianism” on the grounds that insisting on luck egalitarianism's standards of fairness undermines relations of mutual respect among citizens. While this is an accurate reading, the earlier paper did not make its motivations clear, and the current paper attempts to explain the reasons that led me to write the (...) earlier paper, assesses the force of its arguments, and locates it in respect to work of Richard Arneson and Elizabeth Anderson. The paper concludes by bringing out what now appears to be the main message of the earlier paper: that the attempt to implement an “ideal” theory of equality can harm the very people that the theory is designed to help. (shrink)

The issue of distributive justice receives substantial amount of attention in our society. On the one hand, we are sensitive to whether and the extent to which people are responsible for being worse off. On the other hand, we are mindful of society’s worst-off members. There has been a debate over luck egalitarianism, which relates to the former concern, and relational egalitarianism, which echoes the latter. By investigating the psychological processes of these two concerns, this paper examines the reliability (...) of the argument that Elizabeth Anderson, a renowned relational egalitarian, presents against luck egalitarianism and for relational egalitarianism. It also considers whether it is possible to support luck egalitarianism and relational egalitarianism simultaneously, using an online experiment. The results of the experiment show that, first, for ordinary people, the luck consideration is as important as the basic capabilities consideration. Second, while real people consider the degree of compensation through the factors of causality and responsibility, the lack of basic capabilities directs them to determine how much victims of bad luck should be compensated. This suggests that pluralist egalitarianism is on the right track. (shrink)

In the past few decades, there has been a growing literature on relational egalitarianism. Relational egalitarianism is a view on the nature and value of equality. In contrast to the dominant view in recent debates on equality—distributive egalitarianism, on which equality is about ensuring people have or fare the same in some respect—on the relational view, equality is a matter of the terms on which relationships are structured. But what exactly does it mean for people to relate (...) as equals? And why are relations of equality valuable? Relational egalitarians have offered quite different answers to each of these questions. In this article, I draw attention to some key issues that underlie these disagree- ments, and I offer a taxonomy of different viewpoints that have emerged in the recent literature on these matters. (shrink)

Expressive theories of state action seek to identify and assess the ‘meaning’ implicit in state action, such as legislation and public policies. In expressive theories developed by relational egalitarians, state action must ‘express’ equal concern and respect for citizens. However, it is unclear how precisely we can determine and assess the meaning of what states do. This paper considers how an expressive theory could be developed, given the commitments of a relational account of equality, and how such a (...) theory would relate to relational egalitarianism more broadly. I suggest that expressive considerations should be tied more closely than they are in the current literature to agents’ attitudes and to their intentions. I discuss a range of real-world policies that are problematic for what they can be taken to express. (shrink)

This article analyses Adam Smith's and Sophie de Grouchy's accounts of sympathy to show how they arrive at strikingly different views on whether inequality is a threat to, or precondition of, social order. Where many scholars have recently sought to recover Smith's egalitarianism, I instead focus on how his account of sympathy in The Theory of Moral Sentiments naturalises socioeconomic inequalities, while also highlighting the wider inegalitarian implications of his analysis. I demonstrate that Grouchy was alert to these implications and (...) reveal how her own account of sympathy challenges the moral psychology underlying Smith's position on inequality. By reconstructing Grouchy's response to Smith, I illustrate how retrieving the insights of long‐overlooked thinkers can reorient the way we understand key debates in the history of philosophy, since Grouchy was far more concerned than Smith with exposing how economic inequality imperils the prospects of relating to one another as equals. (shrink)

Feminist literature on care has extensively addressed inequalities that cut across the social categories of gender, class and ethnicity in relation to care work. One category that has received less attention in theories of caregiving so far is age. Built on the feminist literature of care and taking young (female) carers as its subject matter, this article tackles age as a third social category of intersectional inequalities along with class and gender. Firstly, through dealing with Nancy Fraser’s justice framework of (...) participatory parity, it is argued that addressing the intersectional inequalities that young (female) carers face necessitates a justice framework that contemplates both the distributional and recognitional aspects of care. In this respect a dual conceptualisation of care is presented – both as a social good and a social process. Secondly, a critical analysis will be presented of the elements of the justice framework of Fraser, where the notion of subordinated status will be related to the identities of young carers. Lastly, the normative framework participatory parity will be discussed in relation to the politics of need, as care practices define the needs of young carers that are contextualised in the care processes, but also in a childhood space. (shrink)

Political philosophers have become increasingly interested in questions of justice as applied to health. Much of this literature works from a distributive understanding of justice. In the recent debate, however, ‘relational’ egalitarians have proposed a different way of conceptualising equality, which focuses on the quality of social relations among citizens and/or how social institutions ‘treat’ citizens. This paper explores some implications of a relational approach to health, with particular focus on health care, health inequalities and health policy. While (...) the relational account can add interesting perspectives to current debates on justice and health, we also highlight some tensions and difficulties relational egalitarians might encounter and some discontinuities between the implications of a relational account and current discourse on health equity. (shrink)

Individuals in capitalist societies are increasingly exposed to market risks. Luck egalitarian theories, which advocate neutralizing the influence of luck on distribution, fail to cope with this problem, because they focus on the wrong kinds of distributive constraints. Rules of distributive justice can specify (1) acceptable procedures for allocating goods, (2) the range of acceptable variations in distributive outcomes, or (3) which individuals should have which goods, according to individual characteristics such as desert or need. Desert-catering luck egalitarians offer rules (...) of the third type. Their theories fail because considerations of market efficiency, freedom, and dignity undermine the claims of desert to inform standards of justice for society as a whole. Responsibility-catering luck egalitarians offer rules of the first type. Their theories fail because such rules don’t constrain the downside risks of market choices. To solve this problem, we need rules of the second type, which allow market forces, and hence luck, to influence distributive outcomes, but only within an acceptable egalitarian range. The ideal of equality in social relations helps us devise acceptable constraints at the top, bottom, and middle of the income range. (shrink)

There is something attractive about combining the values of equality and responsibility, even though the view most commonly associated with doing so, of luck egalitarianism, is beset with objections. This article hence proposes an alternative approach to being a responsibility-sensitive egalitarian: one grounded on our valuable social practices of responsibility, rather than on a desire to mitigate the influence of luck on people's prospects. First, I argue that this practice-based approach better captures the very reasons that responsibility is significant for (...) justice than does the prevalent approach among luck egalitarians: namely, the values of fairness, choice and respect. Second, I show that the remaining motivation of the luck egalitarian approach, of being ‘anti-luck’, is impoverished. I conclude by suggesting that this practice-based approach is better motivated and more palatable than existing forms of luck egalitarianism, even for those relational egalitarians who standardly criticise making egalitarianism responsibility-sensitive. (shrink)

Herbert Hart and the positivists influenced by him have, according to Nigel Simmonds, deflected attention from the question that has always been at the heart of philosophical reflection on law. This question concerns the relationship between law and morality and how we should understand it. Simmonds argues that law and morality are necessarily related and seeks to explain their relationship by reference to an archetype that actually existing legal institutions approximate more or less adequately. He identifies this archetype as providing (...) the basis for an analysis of law that is free from metaphysics and universally applicable. This review article raises doubts concerning Simmonds’ claims to offer a metaphysics-free and universal analysis. It also offers an argument in support of the conclusion that he has failed to point up the complexity of the positivist tradition he criticizes. While Simmonds is vulnerable to these criticisms, he throws light on an egalitarian philosophy of government that informs legal institutions in the West and is relevant to positivist analyses of law. (shrink)

According to relational egalitarians, the fundamental value that grounds requirements of justice is egalitarian social relationships. Hierarchical authority relations appear to be a threat to relational equality. Such relations, however, are pervasive in our working lives. Contemporary workplaces, then, seem to be potential sites of substantial injustice for relational egalitarians. This presents us with a challenge: the view that justice requires that individuals relate as equals appears difficult to reconcile with the view that it is permissible for (...) firms to be organized with hierarchical authority structures, and yet both claims seem independently plausible. This chapter argues that these claims can be reconciled, but only if we reject the widely accepted Rawlsian “institutionalist” view that principles of justice apply to the institutions of the basic structure of society, but do not apply directly to the conduct of agents within those institutions. (shrink)

People with disabilities suffer from pervasive inequalities in employment, education, transportation, housing, and health care compared to those who are not disabled. Moreover, people with disabilities are often subject to unjustified stigma and pity. In this paper, I will explain why these disadvantages violate relational egalitarian principles of justice. As I will show, my argument can account for both kinds of inequality that disabled people face.

Egalitarians often claim that well-off states’ immigration restrictions create or reinforce objectionable inequality. Standard defenses of this claim appeal to the distributive consequences of exclusion. This article offers a relational egalitarian defense of more open borders. On this view, well-off states’ immigration restrictions are problematic because they accord the citizens of well-off states a troubling form of asymmetric power over the disadvantaged. This creates an objectionably unequal relationship between affluent states’ citizens and disadvantaged immigrants. I show that this argument (...) offers a compelling diagnosis of a central problem with border control, defend the argument against objections, and explore its implications. (shrink)

According to the Maximin principle of distributive justice, one outcome is more just than another if the worst off individual in the first outcome is better off than the worst off individual in the second. This is often interpreted as a highly egalitarian principle, and, more specifically, as a highly egalitarian way of balancing a concern with equality against a concern with efficiency. But this interpretation faces a challenge: why should a concern with efficiency and equality lead us to a (...) concern only for the very worst off? Egalitarian proponents of Maximin tend to meet this challenge by showing that it possible to formally derive Maximin from surprisingly weak conditions relating efficiency and equality to justice. But in this paper, I argue that this reply fails. The issue is not that the proofs are invalid, but instead that every existing proof of Maximin transforms into an impossibility result as soon as we realize that any reasonable conception of equality must satisfy a certain formal property. The upshot is that even if it is possible to defend Maximin on other grounds, there is no known way to defend it on the grounds that it balances a concern with equality against a concern for efficiency. Further, more general implications of this result for egalitarian theories of distributive justice are also explored. (shrink)

Philanthropy is a contentious and often polarising topic within egalitarian social movements. There are good reasons for this. Philanthropy is reliant on the inequalities inherent in the capitalist system, is fundamentally at odds with democratic relationships, and can moderate or control the activities of recipients. This article therefore starts from the premise that philanthropy violates egalitarian ideals in very significant ways. However, it goes on to suggest that, absent a ruptural change that would drastically weaken the bases of philanthropic wealth, (...) there is a strategic and contingent case for its selective use so long as it pushes existing configurations of power in more egalitarian directions. In making this case, the article draws primarily on the work of Wright ( 2010 ) but also on recent developments in the political theory of philanthropy. It calls for a critical literacy around philanthropy that combines an openness to experimentation with a clear-eyed sense of its significant risks. In this respect, it outlines specific conditions and strategies that movements should adopt if they pursue or accept philanthropic funding. Firstly, movements must deliberately articulate and actively defend their transformative vision, clarifying in the process the tactical place of philanthropy within this. Secondly, they must resist funder conditionalities, and preserve egalitarian modes of organising in the face of practices which undermine participatory ideals and threaten relations of care and solidarity. The article’s chief contribution is to integrate normative insights with lessons from the sociological literature on movement-philanthropy relations, for the sake of systematically untangling a live and troublesome issue within the praxis of radical movements. (shrink)

This article presents two rejoinders to Frankfurt’s arguments against egalitarianism. In developing the first, I introduce a novel relational view of justice: relational sufficiency. This is the view that justice requires us to relate to one another as people with sufficient, but not necessarily equal, standing. I argue that if Frankfurt’s objections to distributive equality are sound, so are analogous objections to relational equality. However, in a range of cases involving comparative justice we should be relational (...) egalitarians, not relational sufficientarians, and that we must therefore reject Frankfurt’s objections to distributive equality. The second rejoinder takes the form of a demonstration that all of Frankfurt’s objections to distributive equality are unsound. In effect, the article rehabilitates the ideal of distributive equality in the face of Frankfurt’s objections. (shrink)

Two prominent relational egalitarians, Elizabeth Anderson and Niko Kolodny, object to giving people in a democratic community differential voting weights on the grounds that doing so would lead to unequal relations between them. Their claim is that deviating from a “one-person, one-vote” scheme is incompatible with realizing relational egalitarian justice. In this article, I argue that they are wrong. I do so by showing that people can relate as moral, epistemic, social, and empirical equals in a scheme with (...) differential voting weights. I end the article by showing that from the perspective of relational egalitarianism, it is sometimes true that differential voting weights are more just than equal voting weights. (shrink)

This paper identifies a challenge for liberal relational egalitarians—namely, how to respond to the prospect of emergent inequalities of power, status, and influence arising unintentionally through the free exercise of fundamental individual liberties over time. I argue that these emergent social inequalities can be produced through patterns of nonmalicious choices, that they can in fact impede the full realization of relational equality, and that it is possible they cannot be eliminated entirely without abandoning fundamental liberal commitments to leave (...) individuals substantial discretion in their personal lives. In such cases, I argue that liberal egalitarians should accept fair relational equality—a demanding but nevertheless imperfect form of relational equality. (shrink)