Real-world luck egalitarianism

Social Philosophy and Policy

Volumn 27, Issue 1, 2010, Pages 218-232

  Sher, George ^a  

^a RICE UNIVERSITY   (United States)

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[No Author keywords available]

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EID: 77952628654     PISSN: 02650525     EISSN: 14716437     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1017/S0265052509990094     Document Type: Article

References (32)

1. For an influential early statement of this view, see Ronald Dworkin, "What Is Equality? Part II: Equality of Resources," Philosophy and Public Affairs 10, no.1 (Fall 1981): 283-345.
2. For important discussion, see Gerald Cohen, "On the Currency of Egalitarian Justice," Ethics 99, no.4 (July 1989): 906-44;
3. and the influential series of papers by Richard Arneson that includes "Equality and Equal Opportunity forWelfare," Philosophical Studies 56 (1989): 77-93;
4. "Liberalism, Distributive Subjectivism, and Equal Opportunity for Welfare," Philosophy and Public Affairs 19 (1990): 159-94;
5. "Luck Egalitarianism and the Undeserving Poor," The Journal of Political Philosophy 5, no.4 (1997): 327-50;
6. and "Luck Egalitarianism Interpreted and Defended," Philosophical Topics 32, nos. 1 and 2 (Spring and Fall 2004): 1-20.
7. For an influential critical discussion (in which the name "luck egalitarianism" was first introduced), see Elizabeth Anderson, "What Is the Point of Equality?" Ethics 109, no.2 (January 1999): 287-337.
8. For an excellent book-length treatment, see Susan Hurley, Justice, Luck, and Knowledge (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2003).
9. For related discussion, see Hurley, Justice, Luck, and Knowledge, 159-168
10. The existence of such an option is, of course, only a necessary condition for the resulting inequality's justice. For interesting discussion of some of what would have to be added to arrive at a sufficient condition, see the papers by Arneson that are cited in note 1.
11. I discuss a variety of cases of this sort, and their implications concerning the epistemic condition for responsibility, inmy book Who Knew? ResponsibilityWithout Awareness (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2009).
12. Richard Arneson notices the difference between these two versions of luck egalitarianism in his essay "Luck Egalitarianism Interpreted and Defended." However, Arneson does not discuss the full range of cases (or, in my opinion, the most important class of cases) about which the two versions disagree.
13. See Holly Smith, "Culpable Ignorance," The Philosophical Review 92, no.4 (October 1983): 543-571
14. George Sher, "Out of Control," Ethics 116, no.2 (January 2006): 285-301.
15. For cogent criticism, see Neil Levy, "Restoring Control: Comments on George Sher," Philosophia 36, no.2 (June 2008): 213-221
16. Cohen, "On the Currency of Egalitarian Justice," 931.
17. I introduce this term in Who Knew? For some representative discussions that assert or presuppose the searchlight view, see Barbara Herman, The Practice of Moral Judgment (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1993), 99-101;
18. R. JayWallace, Responsibility and the Moral Sentiments (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1994), 139;
19. Michael J. Zimmerman, "Moral Responsibility and Ignorance," Ethics 107 (April 1997): 410-26, esp. pp. 418 and 421;
20. and Neil Levy, "Cultural Membership and Moral Responsibility," The Monist 86 (2003): 5.
21. For further examples, see Sher, Who Knew?, chap. 2.
22. For discussion of some possible ways of defending the searchlight view, see Sher, Who Knew?, chaps. 3 and 4.
23. Dworkin, "Equality of Resources," 302.
24. Arneson said this in the version of "Egalitarianism and the Undeserving Poor" that he delivered at the 1996 Annual Meeting of the American Political Science Association, but the quotation does not appear in the published version of that paper.
25. RichardArneson, "Equal Opportunity forWelfare Defended and Recanted," The Journal of Political Philosophy 7, no.4 (1999): 489.
26. Arneson, "Equality and Equal Opportunity for Welfare," 85.
27. Cohen, "On the Currency of Egalitarian Justice," 922.
28. See, e.g., Ronald Dworkin, Sovereign Virtue: The Theory and Practice of Equality (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2000), 323.
29. Dworkin, "Equality of Resources," 306.
30. Robert Nozick, Anarchy, State, and Utopia (New York: Basic Books, 1974), 160.
31. Dworkin, "Equality of Resources," 284.
32. Nicholas Barry, "Defending Luck Egalitarianism," Journal of Applied Philosophy 23, no.1 (2006): 102.