Luck egalitarianism provides one powerful way of defending global egalitarianism. The basic luck egalitarian idea that persons ought not to be disadvantaged compared to others on account of his or her bad luck seems to extend naturally to the global arena, where random factors such as persons’ place of birth and the natural distribution of the world’s resources do affect differentially their life chances. Yet luck egalitarianism as an ideal, as well as its global application, has come under severe criticisms in recent debate. My aim in this article is to restore plausibility to the luck egalitarian idea, and to suggest how it could then provide a plausible grounding for global egalitarianism. To do this, I will propose a more modest but also more defensible conception of luck egalitarianism that can also strengthen the case for global distributive justice.
Charles Beitz ( 1999) Political Theory and International Relations, 2nd edn, part III. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press. Thomas Pogge ( 1989) Realizing Rawls, part III. Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press. Simon Caney (2005) Justice Beyond Borders , esp. ch. 4. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Darrel Moellendorf ( 2001) Cosmopolitan Justice. Boulder, CO: Westview Press.
2.
This term has also been used by Alexander Brown (2008) ‘Are there Any Global Egalitarian Rights?’, Human Rights Review9(4): 435-64.
3.
Samuel Freeman (2006) Justice and the Social Contract: Essays on Rawls, esp. chs 8 and 9. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Joseph Heath (2005) ‘Rawls on Global Distributive Justice: A Defense’, Canadian Journal of Philosophy suppl. vol. 31: 205-6.
4.
See e.g. the influential papers by Michael Blake (2002) ‘Distributive Justice, State Coercion, and Autonomy’, Philosophy and Public Affairs30(3): 257-96; Thomas Nagel (2005) ‘The Problem of Global Justice’, Philosophy and Public Affairs33(2): 113-47; and Andrea Sangiovanni (2007) ‘Global Justice, Reciprocity, and the State’, Philosophy and Public Affairs35(1): 3-39.
5.
But for recent insightful and thorough responses to these objections on their own terms of why equality matters, see Simon Caney (2008) ‘Global Distributive Justice and the State’, Political Studies57(3): 487-518; and Arash Abizadeh ( 2007) ‘Cooperation, Pervasive Impact, and Coercion: On the Scope (Not Site) of Distributive Justice’, Philosophy and Public Affairs35(4): 318-58.
6.
See for instance the criticisms in David Miller (2007) National Responsibility and Global Justice. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
7.
Rawls ( 1971) A Theory of Justice. Cambridge, MA : Harvard University Press. So while some libertarians do offer accounts of distributive justice, they don’t offer accounts of egalitarian distributive justice. And see Paula Casal (2007) ‘Why Sufficiency is Not Enough’, Ethics117: 296-326, for discussions on how sufficientism is not egalitarianism.
8.
As David Miller puts it, a distributive principle is ‘comparative in form - it specifies how people are to be treated relative to one another’. Miller (1988) ‘The Ethical Significance of Nationality’, Ethics98(4): 660.
9.
This problem is clearly articulated in Nagel (n. 4).
10.
John Rawls (1998) The Law of Peoples. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press. Although Nagel (n. 4) sees himself to be defending Rawls’s position, some commentators think that Nagel’s account of humanity duty provides a more minimalist commitment than that affirmed in Rawls’s duty of assistance. See e.g. Joshua Cohen and Charles Sabel (2006) ‘Extra Rempublicam Nulla Justitia?’, Philosophy and Public Affairs 34(2): 148-75. But whether this is so depends on how ‘humanitarianism’ is to be defined within Nagel’s framework, and it seems to me that nothing in Nagel’s discussion precludes a more robust definition of humanitarianism that can include the duty to assist societies support decent functioning institutions as in Rawls. In any case what is without dispute, and of relevance to this article, is that Nagel, like Rawls, rejects global distributive equality, and like Rawls holds the view that what global justice requires is that all person are able to reach a certain developmental threshold.
11.
It is important to note that while humanitarianism is a form of sufficientism in that it defines a threshold of resource allocation, not all sufficientist theories are humanitarian, for some do set the threshold above basic needs and define the threshold for members of a social order of some kind rather than for persons in general. Arguably, Rawls’s duty of assistance in his The Law of Peoples is a sufficientist account of distribution that is not merely a humanitarian in the standard sense, committed as it is to the more demanding goal of ensuring that societies are able to support decent and functioning institutions.
12.
Richard J. Arneson (1989) ‘Equality and Equal Opportunity for Welfare’, Philosophical Studies 56 (1989): 77-93, and (2000) ‘Luck Egalitarianism and Prioritarianism’, Ethics 110(2): 339-49; G. A. Cohen (1989) ‘On the Currency of Egalitarian Justice’, Ethics 99: 906-44; Ronald Dworkin (2000) Sovereign Virtue. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press. Dworkin (2003) ‘Equality, Luck and Hierarchy’, Philosophy and Public Affairs 31(2): 190-206; Philippe Van Parijs (2003) Real Freedom for All. Oxford: Oxford University Press. See also Roland Pierik (2006) ‘Reparations for Luck Egalitarians’, Journal of Social Philosophy 37(4): 423-40, for an attempt to extend luck egalitarian arguments to reparations for past injustices.
13.
Elizabeth S. Anderson (1999) ‘What is the Point of Equality?’, Ethics 109(2): 287-337; Samuel Scheffler (2003) ‘What is Egalitarianism?’, Philosophy and Public Affairs 31(1): 5-39, and (2005) ‘Choice, Circumstances, and the Value of Equality’, Politics, Philosophy and Economic 4(1): 5-28; John Rawls (2001) Justice as Fairness: A Restatement, ed. Erin Kelly, e.g. pp. 130-3. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press. Anderson explicitly refers to her alternative to luck egalitarianism as ‘democratic equality’. Scheffler calls his account the ‘social and political ideal of equality’ which treats distributive equality to be grounded on the more fundamental concern for the equal status of democratic citizens (2003, pp. 22-3; 2005, p. 18). For Rawls, ‘democratic equality properly understood requires something like the difference principle’. Justice as Fairness, p. 49. I thus use the term ‘democratic equality’ broadly to refer to these accounts of the point of equality. Rawls is sometimes perceived as a luck egalitarian, but for discussion on how Rawls is not a luck egalitarian, see Freeman, ‘Rawls and Luck Egalitarianism’ (in n. 3); and Scheffler, 2003, pp. 24-31.
14.
Although distributive equality among citizens will also be instrumentally beneficial for democratic politics by way of making democratic political processes fairer among other things, it is important to note that equality is not justified under democratic equality simply in this instrumental sense. Rather, equality in distribution is justified ultimately in that this commitment is constitutive of the commitments of democracy. It is part of what it means to be in a democratic relationship with each other that we take an interest in our relative economic standing, among other interests. For this reason, I note that equality is derivative of rather than instrumental to the ideal of democracy or democratic reciprocity. I thank Darrel Moellendorf for his questions on this point.
15.
See Rawls’s remarks that the difference principle, or something like it, ‘is essential to democratic equality once we view society as a fair system of social cooperation between free and equal citizens from one generation to the next’ (n. 13), p. 133, also p. 6. See also Samuel Freeman who writes, ‘Distributive justice is ... part of the larger question of how to fairly structure economic and property relations among socially cooperative productive agents, who regard themselves as free and equal.’ Freeman (2006) ‘Distributive Justice and the Law of Peoples’, in R. Martin and D. Reidy (eds) Rawls’s Law of Peoples: A Realistic Utopia?, p. 257. Oxford: Blackwell.
16.
The terms ‘direct’ and ‘derivative’ arguments for equality is from Beitz (2001) ‘Does Global Inequality Matter?’, Metaphilosophy32(1-2): 95-112. See also T.M. Scanlon ( 2003) ‘The Diversity of Objections to Inequality’, in Scanlon, The Difficulty of Tolerance. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Rawls (n. 10).
17.
See Rawls (n. 10); Nagel (n. 4); Freeman (n. 15); Heath (n. 3); and David Miller (2005) ‘Against Global Egalitarianism’, Journal of Ethics 9: 55-79.
18.
Here it is important to recall an earlier remark that these anti-global egalitarians do not deny that there are no global duties as such. They will accept that there are duties of assistance (Rawls) or duties of humanitarian aid (Nagel), but these are not duties of distributive egalitarian justice in that these humanitarian duties or duties of aid only aim to help societies reach a determined and specified level of social development and do not function to regulate inequality between societies as such above the specified threshold.
19.
See Beitz (n. 1); Pogge (n. 1); Caney (n. 1). Caney (2001) ‘Cosmopolitan Justice and Equalizing Opportunities’, Metaphilosophy 32(1-2): 113-34. Moellendorf (n. 1), pp. 78- 80. Also Cecile Fabre (2005) ‘Global Distributive Justice: An Egalitarian Perspective’. Canadian Journal of Philosophy, suppl. vol. 31: 139-64; Brown (n. 2).
20.
For a view on globalizing the democratic ideal, see Carol Gould (1988) Rethinking Democracy. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Gould (2004) Globalizing Democracy and Human Rights. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
21.
For attempts to extend democratic equality (broadly construed) to the global domain, see Beitz (n. 16).
22.
Anderson (n. 13); Scheffler (2003, 2005, in n. 13).
23.
Anderson (n. 13), p. 335.
24.
Ibid. pp. 302ff.; Jonathan Wolff (1998) ‘Fairness, Respect and the Egalitarian Ethos’, Philosophy and Public Affairs27(2): 109-13.
25.
Anderson (n. 13), pp. 312-16; Scheffler (2003, in n. 13), pp. 21-4; Scheffler (2005, in n. 13).
26.
Freeman (n. 3), pp. 132-5.
27.
As an aside, I don’t claim that all luck egalitarians will understand the domain, site and justificatory role of luck egalitarianism in the way I do, and so the fact that critics make the challenge they do is in part due to the way some luck egalitarians have conceived of their position (or at least failed to make explicit the limits of the luck egalitarian position). But nonetheless the luck egalitarian account I am offering is still fundamentally luck egalitarian even if it deviates from some standard accounts, so I will suggest.
28.
The discussion in this section draws on arguments presented in greater detail in my (2008) ‘A Defense of Luck Egalitarianism’ , Journal of Philosophy105(11): 665-90; and (2008) ‘Liberal Equality: What, Where and Why’, in Cheryl Misak (ed.) The Oxford Handbook of American Philosophy. Oxford: Oxford University Press. In the former, I also note how my account differs from recent attempted defences of luck egalitarianism.
29.
It is not that the luck egalitarian has qua luck egalitarian to deny that this person is entitled to basic assistance but that, luckily, other principles come to the rescue by trumping the luck/choice principle. Rather, luck egalitarianism, on my account, is silent about these sorts of questions because they fall outside its domain. The luck egalitarian is not forced to deny the imprudent social assistance qua luck egalitarian - the luck egalitarian simply has no comments qua luck egalitarian.
30.
See e.g. Nagel’s distinction between duties of humanitarian aid versus duties of distributive justice (n. 5); and Rawls’s parallel distinction between duties of assistance and duties of distributive justice (n. 10). More generally, see Nagel’s idea of the ‘fragmentation of value’ in (1979) ‘The Fragmentation of Value’, Mortal Questions. New York: Cambridge University Press.
31.
Rawls’s duty of assistance in The Law of Peoples is one of the principles of justice for the Society of Peoples, and imposes a demandable obligation on all decent and liberal peoples.
32.
Nor does my distinction between duties of distributive justice and duties of assistance imply that the former is institutional and enforceable whereas the latter is neither institutional nor enforceable. First, duties of assistance can be institutional in that they can entail significant institutional commitments (e.g. the establishment of standing relief agencies; a source of continuous funding for such agencies; international recognition of the standing of such agencies and so on). Also they can require institutional reforms if certain humanitarian disasters can be shown to be provoked by prevailing institutionalized practices (such as climatically related disasters due to lack of or inadequate regulation of industrial activities). Second, duties of assistance are not merely charitable acts and left to discretion of agents. Like Rawls’s duty of assistance in The Law of Peoples, these are duties that can be rightly demanded of agents in the name of justice. My point is that these are not distributive justice, following Rawls’s own distinction. But ultimately, the nomenclature is unimportant so long as we can see that duties of assistance, though institutional and enforceable in the name of justice in the way described, are quite different from duties of distributive justice in that the latter is commitment to regulating inequalities and hence is ongoing and comparative in the way that duties of assistance are not.
33.
This point is addressed not so much to critics of luck egalitarians who would not, I think, deny this, but to luck egalitarians who might object to my attempt to limit the choice/luck principle to the domain of distributive justice on the grounds that poor choosers need not be entitled to assistance if a trade-off between them and wise choosers is necessary.
34.
Rawls (n. 10), p. 337.
35.
Pace Freeman (n. 3), pp. 134-5.
36.
E.g. Rawls (n. 7), p. 15; 2001: 55.
37.
Rawls (n. 7), p. 63.
38.
See e.g. Susan Hurley ( 2003) Justice, Luck and Knowledge. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press. See response by Freeman in ‘Rawls and Luck Egalitarianism’ (n. 3).
39.
While no luck egalitarians have claimed their principle to be fundamental for the whole of morality (though note some exceptions), few if any have actually explicitly made the case for the special domain of the luck/choice principle.
40.
Beitz (n. 1). Pogge (n. 1). Moellendorf (n. 1), pp. 78-9; also Caney (n. 1) and Brown (n. 2).
41.
That democratic equality and luck egalitarianism each offers different accounts of why equality matters of course does not mean that they must differ normatively in their substantive commitments. Both democratic and luck egalitarians can conceivably arrive at the same distributive commitments and principles for a society albeit for different reasons. E.g. we can imagine luck egalitarians coming to endorse the difference principle as the substantive principle, although Rawls himself arrives at this principle via a democratic equality. And democratic egalitarians can themselves depart substantively among themselves. E.g. Anderson and Rawls, though both are democratic egalitarians, do not share similar substantive distributive commitments, Anderson’s being rather more modest than Rawls, concerned primarily with capacity for democratic deliberation (Anderson (n. 13), p. 317). Moreover, as I noted in the opening section, even though the debate on global justice (to my mind) brings to the forefront the normative differences between luck and democratic egalitarianism, it is not in principle ruled out, as I also noted, that a case for global egalitarianism can be made on democratic equality grounds. Still, it is significant that, given each position’s different views as to why equality matters, different considerations and factors and fact are taken as relevant in their argumentation, and it is for this reason that luck egalitarians tend to be more disposed toward global egalitarianism than democratic egalitarians. The difference between democratic equality and luck egalitarianism is thus not solely theoretical and philosophical but does influence our normative views about equality, in particular our views about the global scope of equality, a subject that I will turn to in the next section.
42.
Ibid.
43.
For a recent discussion on the relationship between natural resource distribution and global institutions, see Tim Hayward (2006) ‘Global Justice and the Distribution of Natural Resources’, Political Studies54(2): 349-69.
44.
G.A. Cohen ( 2000) If You’re an Egalitarian, How Come You’re So Rich?, p. 130. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.
45.
Moellendorf (n. 1), p. 37. Indeed, this suggests that the absence of a global democratic order doesn’t make considerations of justice moot, but makes them even all the more salient. For discussions on the global democratic deficit see David Held (1992) ‘Democracy: From City States to a Cosmopolitan Order?’, Political Studies, special issue, 40: 10-39.
46.
So while Moellendorf does not make explicit the connection between his luck egalitarian premises and his associative view of global justice, his global luck egalitarian account in the end may be institutional as well in my sense.
47.
It is also worth noting that what I have said of institutional impact differs from Pogge’s account (2002) World Poverty and Human Rights. Cambridge: Polity Press . Pogge is concerned with the problem of abject poverty and his institutional approach refers to the harms institutions cause in this regard, whereas my project here is with distributive equality and I am concerned here with the inequalities due to institutional handling of natural facts.
48.
Van Parijs ( 2010) ‘Global Distributive Justice’, in Robert Goodin, Phillip Pettit and Thomas Pogge (eds) The Blackwell’s Companion to Political Philosophy, pp. 638-52. Oxford : Blackwell.
49.
E.g. Cecile Fabre introduces and rejects this objection (n. 19), p. 151; and Michael Blake introduces and sustains a more down to earth version of this objection in (2001) ‘Distributive Justice, State Coercion and Autonomy’, Philosophy and Public Affairs30(3): 257-96.
