scholarly journals COSMOPOLITANISM AND COMPETITION: PROBING THE LIMITS OF EGALITARIAN JUSTICE

2016 ◽  
Vol 33 (1) ◽  
pp. 91-124
Author(s):  
David Wiens
Keyword(s):  
Distributive Justice ◽  
Political Competition ◽  
The State ◽  
Moral Equality ◽  
Egalitarian Justice

Abstract:This paper develops a novelcompetition criterionfor evaluating institutional schemes. Roughly, this criterion says that one institutional scheme is normatively superior to another to the extent that the former engenders more widespread political competition than the latter. I show that this criterion should be endorsed by both global egalitarians and their statist rivals, as it follows from their common commitment to the moral equality of all persons. I illustrate the normative import of the competition criterion by exploring its potential implications for the scope of egalitarian principles of distributive justice. In particular, I highlight the challenges it raises for global egalitarians’ efforts to justify extending the scope of egalitarian justice beyond the state.

scholarly journals The natural duty of justice in non-ideal circumstances: On the moral demands of institution building and reform

2017 ◽  
Vol 20 (1) ◽  
pp. 45-66 ◽  
Author(s):  
Laura Valentini
Keyword(s):  
Distributive Justice ◽  
Political Theory ◽  
Status Quo ◽  
The State ◽  
Response Strategy ◽  
Macro Level ◽  
Institution Building ◽  
Institutional Agents ◽  
High Stakes ◽  
The Status

Principles of distributive justice bind macro-level institutional agents, like the state. But what does justice require in non-ideal circumstances, where institutional agents are unjust or do not exist in the first place? Many answer by invoking Rawls's natural duty ‘to further just arrangements not yet established’, treating it as a ‘normative bridge’ between institutional demands of distributive justice and individual responsibilities in non-ideal circumstances. I argue that this response strategy is unsuccessful. I show that the more unjust the status quo is due to non-compliance, the less demanding the natural duty of justice becomes. I conclude that, in non-ideal circumstances, the bulk of the normative work is done by another natural duty: that of beneficence. This conclusion has significant implications for how we conceptualize our political responsibilities in non-ideal circumstances, and cautions us against the tendency – common in contemporary political theory – to answer all high-stakes normative questions under the rubric of justice.

scholarly journals Turkey’s Hybrid Competitive Authoritarian Regime; A Genuine Product of Anatolia’s Middle Class

2016 ◽  
Vol 4 (2) ◽  
pp. 201 ◽  
Author(s):  
Nikolaos Stelgias
Keyword(s):  
New York ◽  
Middle Class ◽  
Political Power ◽  
Political Competition ◽  
Civil Liberties ◽  
Authoritarian Regime ◽  
The State ◽  
Economic Relations ◽  
Universal Suffrage ◽  
Hybrid Regime

Few years since the 9/11 Attacks in New York and following its rise to power, the AKP has gradually established a so-­called “competitive authoritarian regime,” in order to consolidate and secure its political power. This regime is hybrid and it is based on liberal principles (absence of tutelary authorities, protection of civil liberties, universal suffrage, free elections etc.). The AKP also provides for a reasonably fair level of political competition between the party in power (government) and the opposition. At the same time, however, the system shows some undemocratic features (violation of civil liberties, unfair elections, and uneven political competition.) This hybrid regime is based on three pillars: the state, the party and a newly emerged middle class in Anatolia. Through this hybrid regime Anatolia’s newly emerged middle class redefines its cultural and socio-­economic relations.

The Grounds of Justice

2012 ◽  
Author(s):  
Mathias Risse
Keyword(s):  
Political Philosophy ◽  
Distributive Justice ◽  
Global Justice ◽  
The State ◽  
Human Beings ◽  
Global Order ◽  
Systematic Theory ◽  
Comprehensive View ◽  
Principles Of Justice ◽  
Pluralist Approach

This book explores the question of what it is for a distribution to be just globally and proposes a new systematic theory of global justice that it calls pluralist internationalism. Up to now, philosophers have tended to respond to the problem of global justice in one of two ways: that principles of justice either apply only within states or else apply to all human beings. The book defends a view “between” these competing claims, one that improves on both, and introduces a pluralist approach to what it terms the grounds of justice—which offers a comprehensive view of obligations of distributive justice. It also considers two problems that globalization has raised for political philosophy: the problem of justifying the state to outsiders and the problem of justifying the global order to all.

Introduction

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Joseph Harris
Keyword(s):  
South Africa ◽  
Developing World ◽  
Political Competition ◽  
Healthcare Access ◽  
Access To Healthcare ◽  
The State ◽  
Relative Success ◽  
Legal Expertise

This chapter focuses our attention on an unexplained puzzle: how parts of the developing world transitioned from a moment characterized by exclusion from healthcare access (“aristocratic healthcare”) to an altogether different moment characterized by “health universalism.” Grounded in a study of Thailand, Brazil, and South Africa, it highlights the surprising role played by elites from esteemed professions who, rationally speaking, aren’t in need of healthcare or medicine themselves and who would otherwise seem to have little to gain from such policies. The chapter points to the relative success of these “professional movements” in expanding access to healthcare and AIDS treatment in Thailand and Brazil and their relative failure in South Africa. And it draws attention to the importance of holding privileged positions in the state and legal expertise in the respective policy domains during moments of heightened political competition.

Utilitarianism

2019 ◽  
pp. 9-21
Author(s):  
Torbjörn Tännsjö
Keyword(s):  
Distributive Justice ◽  
Crucial Role ◽  
Moral Theory ◽  
The State ◽  
Point Of View ◽  
Subjective Time ◽  
Worth Living ◽  
Common Currency ◽  
Exact Number ◽  
Single Scale

Utilitarianism is the idea that we ought to maximize the sum total of happiness. The notion of happiness is clarified. Happiness is taken in a subjective and empirical sense, as a kind of mood. Affirmative answers to the following questions are provided: What is happiness? Can it be measured? Can we compare it between persons? Can it function as a common currency when the different theories of distributive justice are compared? What about the heterogeneity objection? Can very different kinds of happiness be measured on a single scale? In the answers to these questions the idea of a least noticeable difference with respect to happiness plays a crucial role. It is conjectured that, if a person is in a certain mood (momentarily), then there exists an exact number of just noticeable changes for the worse or the better to the point where life is just worth living. Many different conditions can contribute to cause a person to be at the state where she is. A distinction of the utmost importance between physical and subjective time is introduced and a claim is made that what matters, from the point of view of moral theory, is subjective time.

Justice, international

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Brian Barry ◽  
Matt Matravers
Keyword(s):  
Distributive Justice ◽  
Moral Community ◽  
The State ◽  
International Justice ◽  
Human Beings ◽  
Human Equality ◽  
International Obligations ◽  
Political Conditions ◽  
State Relations

Although it has been denied (by, for example, F.A. Hayek 1976) that the concept of distributive justice has application within states, it is not controversial that there can be unjust laws and unjust behaviour by individuals and organizations. It has, however, been argued that it makes no sense to speak of justice and injustice beyond the boundaries of states, either because the lack of an international sovereign entails that the conditions for justice do not exist, or because the state constitutes the maximal moral community. Both arguments are flawed. Without them, we are naturally led to ask what are the implications of the widely-held idea of fundamental human equality, the belief that in some sense human beings are of equal value. This cannot be coherently deployed in a way that restricts its application to within-state relations. In either a utilitarian or Kantian form it generates extensive international obligations. An objection that is often made to this conclusion is that the obligations derived are so stringent that compliance cannot reasonably be asked under current political conditions. But this shows (if true) that current political conditions are incompatible with international justice.

7. Basic Income and Distributive Justice

2021 ◽  
pp. 93-108
Author(s):  
William Abel ◽  
Elizabeth Kahn ◽  
Tom Parr ◽  
Andrew Walton
Keyword(s):  
Distributive Justice ◽  
The State ◽  
Economic Sustainability ◽  
Basic Income ◽  
Justice As Fairness ◽  
The Third ◽  
Democratic Equality

This chapter defends basic income. This policy requires the state to make regular cash payments to each member of society, irrespective of their other income or wealth, or willingness to find employment. It starts by describing three effects of basic income. The first is that it will raise the incomes of the least advantaged. The second is that it will protect against the threats of exploitation and abuse. The third is that it will remove one obstacle to finding employment. The chapter then explains the significance of these effects by drawing on ideas about distributive justice, emphasizing the relevance of John Rawls’s justice as fairness and Elizabeth Anderson’s democratic equality. It also considers the claim that basic income should be rejected because it would require the state to interfere with the lives of those who would be taxed to fund it, arguing that it is a mistake to oppose taxation in such a wholesale way. The chapter concludes with a reflection on the economic sustainability of basic income.

The Market, Preferences, and Equality

1994 ◽  
Vol 7 (1) ◽  
pp. 97-110 ◽  
Author(s):  
Colin M. Macleod
Keyword(s):  
Economic Theory ◽  
Political Philosophy ◽  
Distributive Justice ◽  
Ronald Dworkin ◽  
Individual Liberty ◽  
Equitable Distribution ◽  
Political Morality ◽  
Mutual Advantage ◽  
Distribution Of Resources ◽  
Egalitarian Justice

The perfectly competitive market of economic theory often enters political philosophy because it can be represented as illuminating important values. Theorists who are enthusiastic about the heuristic potential of the market claim that we can learn much about individual liberty, the promotion of mutual advantage and efficiency in the distribution of goods by studying it. However, a principal limitation of the market for many theorists is its supposed insensitivity to the demands of egalitarian justice. According to the standard charge, markets—even idealised ones—are hostile to the achievement and maintenance of an equitable distribution of resources. It is striking, then, that a leading exponent of egalitarian justice like Ronald Dworkin should argue that there are very deep and systematic links between equality and the market. He contends that, contrary to the received view, “the best theory of equality supposes some actual or hypothetical market in justifying a particular distribution of goods and opportunities.” Moreover, the articulation of Dworkin’s influential egalitarian account of liberal political morality depends on acceptance of the market as an ally of equality. Thus Dworkin claims not only that the market plays a crucial role in the elaboration of a doctrine of distributive justice but also that it illuminates the distinctively liberal commitments to the protection of extensive individual liberty and to the requirement that the state must be neutral between different conceptions of the good. The aim of this paper is to raise some doubts about the soundness of one of the fundamental onnections Dworkin draws between the market and distributive justice.

Global Justice and the Role of the State

2020 ◽  
pp. 13-35
Author(s):  
Miriam Ronzoni ◽  
Laura Valentini
Keyword(s):  
Global Justice ◽  
The State ◽  
Role Of The State ◽  
The Creation ◽  
Principles Of Justice ◽  
Egalitarian Justice

The chapter critically analyzes the role played by the state in the global justice debate. It surveys the different ways in which statists and cosmopolitans invoke the state either to justify the scope and content of their preferred principles of justice or to explain how such principles might be realized. The chapter also distinguishes between two conceptualizations of the state: as a system of institutions and as an agent in its own right. On the basis of this analysis, the authors conclude that both at the level of justification and at that of realization, the most plausible positions with respect to global justice lie somewhere in between full-blown cosmopolitanism and full-blown statism. While principles of egalitarian justice are not confined to the state, they do not extend in identical form to the global realm. Similarly, while the state—as we know it—is insufficient to realize plausible principles of justice (be they statist or cosmopolitan), what realizing justice requires falls short of the creation of a comprehensive global sovereign.

scholarly journals Concessions and Repression in Conflict

2016 ◽  
Vol 16 (2) ◽  
pp. 865-899
Author(s):  
Akifumi Ishihara ◽  
Prakarsh Singh
Keyword(s):  
Civil War ◽  
Civil Wars ◽  
Political Competition ◽  
The State ◽  
Electoral Participation ◽  
Threshold Estimation ◽  
Perpetual Peace ◽  
Rebel Group ◽  
The Government

Abstract We build a model for predicting civil wars where the government bargains with a rebel group using concessions and repression. The equilibrium is either a state of perpetual peace where there are concessions but no repression or a state of repressive equilibrium that can lead to civil wars. At the lowest levels of political competition, a move towards open electoral participation decreases the ability of the state to use repression to limit challengers, increasing the likelihood of war. At higher levels, an increase in competition decreases the probability of war by increasing concessions to the rebel group. Increasing concessions makes war less likely because it decreases the spoils of war and provides one explanation for the non-monotonicity found between probability of civil war and democracy. We test the prediction of this non-linearity using the technique in [Hansen (2000). “Sample Splitting and Threshold Estimation.” Econometrica 68:575–603] and find evidence consistent with the model.

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