The equality of lotteries

Philosophy

Volumn 83, Issue 325, 2008, Pages 359-372

  Saunders, Ben ^a  

^a UNIVERSITY OF OXFORD   (United Kingdom)

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[No Author keywords available]

Indexed keywords

EID: 62149088565     PISSN: 00318191     EISSN: 1469817X     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1017/S0031819108000727     Document Type: Review

References (22)

1. A. O'Hear, 'Editorial: The Equality Lottery', Philosophy 82, No. 2 (April 2007), 209-10
2. For examples of mass media debate, see G. Paton 'Schools can use lotteries for 'fairer' admissions, says minister', The Daily Telegraph (Thursday 01/03/07) 15
3. and S. Laville and R. Smithers 'War over school boundaries divides Brighton', The Guardian (Thursday 01/03/07), 4
4. The confusion surrounding equality of opportunity is well-exposed in J.R. Richards, 'Equality of Opportunity', Ratio X, No. 3 (December 1997), 253-79. It is equality of opportunity, rather than lotteries per se, that seems to motivate O'Hear's complaint
5. For others who stress the second-best nature of lotteries, see J. Broome 'Fairness' in his Ethics Out of Economics (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1999), 119-21
6. and P. Stone 'Why Lotteries Are Just', The Journal of Political Philosophy 15, No. 3 (September 2007), 284 and 294
7. D. Parfit, 'Equality', Ratio X, No. 3 (December 1997), 211 and passim
8. Richards, op. cit., 217 offers the example of running shoes in a race. If only half the competitors have shoes, it seems fair to make all run barefoot
9. For examples of such claims, see B. Williams, 'The Idea of Equality' in his Problems of the Self: Collected Papers 1956-72 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1973), 240-1
10. and M. Walzer, Spheres of Justice: A Defence of Pluralism and Equality (Oxford: Blackwell, 1983), passim
11. For discussion of Hohfeld's influential classification, see J. J. Thomson, The Realm of Rights (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1990), ch.l
12. and L. W. Sumner, The Moral Foundation of Rights (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1987), ch.2
13. and S. Hurley, Justice, Luck, and Knowledge (2003), ch.4. I address the question whether geographical proximity really can serve as a natural lottery below
14. J. Harsanyi, 'Cardinal Utility in Welfare Economics and in the Theory of Risk-taking', Journal of Political Economy, 61, No. 5 (October 1953), 434-5
15. and 'Cardinal Welfare, Individualistic Ethics, and Interpersonal Comparisons of Utility', Journal of Political Economy, 63, No. 4 (August 1955), 314-5
16. Stone, op. cit., 282, contrasts Harsanyi's contractarian account of justice to utilitarianism
17. see utilitarianism as a first-order moral theory, and contractarianism a meta-theory by which it may be justified. Cf. T. M. Scanlon 'Contractualism and Utilitarianism' in Utilitarianism and Beyond, B. Williams and A. Sen (eds.) (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1982)
18. Rawls, op. cit., for example, 11-2 and 153-4
19. and 'Outline of a Decision Procedure for Ethics', The Philosophical Review, 60, No. 2 (April 1951), 193. I argue below that lotteries can indeed be recommended from Rawls' original position
20. A requirement Rawls, (1999) op. cit., 153-4, refers to as the 'strains of commitment'. Note that this consideration comes in because Rawls explicitly uses the original position to determine general principles to regulate the basic structure of society. There is no suggestion that similar reasoning applied directly to particular problems will lead to satisfactory conclusions
21. and What We Owe to Each Other (Cambridge, Mass.: Belknap Press of Harvard University Press, 1998)
22. and T. Christiano, The Rule of the Many (Boulder, Colo.: Westview Press, 1996), 55