Discrimination and the aim of proportional representation

Politics, Philosophy and Economics 7 (2):159-182 (2008)
  Copy   BIBTEX

Abstract

Many organizations, companies, and so on are committed to certain representational aims as regards the composition of their workforce. One motivation for such aims is the assumption that numerical underrepresentation of groups manifests discrimination against them. In this article, I articulate representational aims in a way that best captures this rationale. My main claim is that the achievement of such representational aims is reducible to the elimination of the effects of wrongful discrimination on individuals and that this very important concern is, in principle, compatible with the representation of various groups diverging widely from their share of the overall population. The discussion also shows that we should ensure that a preoccupation with groups' numbers in relation to the population as a whole does not lead us away from our real aim, for example because we are blinded to the effects of discrimination against numerically overrepresented groups, or overlook the innocently different ambitions of some numerically underrepresented groups. In relation to the latter point, I appeal to the fact that many luck egalitarians think justice should be ambition sensitive. Also, the time-relative account of representational aims expounded shows that, and how, representational aims should accommodate the changing composition of populations over time.

Links

PhilArchive



    Upload a copy of this work     Papers currently archived: 90,616

External links

Setup an account with your affiliations in order to access resources via your University's proxy server

Through your library

Similar books and articles

The Ethics of Price Discrimination.Juan M. Elegido - 2011 - Business Ethics Quarterly 21 (4):633-660.
Hurley on egalitarianism and the luck-neutralizing aim.Kasper Lippert-Rasmussen - 2005 - Politics, Philosophy and Economics 4 (2):249-265.
Intentions and Discrimination in Hiring.Kasper Lippert-Rasmussen - 2012 - Journal of Moral Philosophy 9 (1):55-74.
Equality, Justice and Legitimacy in Selection.Matthew Clayton - 2012 - Journal of Moral Philosophy 9 (1):8-30.
Discrimination : discrimination : what is it and what makes it morally wrong?Kasper Lippert-Rasmussen - 2007 - In Jesper Ryberg, Thomas S. Petersen & Clark Wolf (eds.), New Waves in Applied Ethics. Palgrave-Macmillan.
Weighing the aim of belief.Asbjørn Steglich-Petersen - 2009 - Philosophical Studies 145 (3):395-405.

Analytics

Added to PP
2009-01-28

Downloads
46 (#305,111)

6 months
5 (#247,092)

Historical graph of downloads
How can I increase my downloads?

Author's Profile

Citations of this work

Affirmative action.Robert Fullinwider - 2008 - Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy.
“The right thing to do?” Transformation in South African sport.Brian Penrose - 2017 - South African Journal of Philosophy 36 (3):377-392.

Add more citations

References found in this work

Defending equality of outcome.Anne Phillips - 2004 - Journal of Political Philosophy 12 (1):1–19.
Equality, Personal Responsibility, and Gender Socialisation.Andrew Mason - 2000 - Proceedings of the Aristotelian Society 100 (1):227-246.

Add more references