Academic

Raz on Distributional Equality

By Lawrence Solum

Joseph Raz (University of Oxford - Faculty of Law) has posted On the Value of Distributional Equality on SSRN.  Here is the abstract:

The paper returns to the question whether equality in distribution is valuable in itself, or, if you like, whether it is intrinsically valuable. Its bulk is an examination of two familiar arguments against the intrinsic value of distributional equality: the levelling down objection and the objection that equality violates some person-affecting condition, in that its realisation does not improve the lot of people.

And from the text:

Some of the objectors may persist and protest that things cannot be better in any respect if one person is worse off and no one is better off.

This claim does not vindicate the levelling down objection in any of the forms it is commonly given. But it reveals a common assumption which is not always noticed by those who share it. At its crudest it is the assumption that values are subservient to human interests. That

If realising or instantiating any putative value benefits no one, then that putative value is no value. I?ll refer to that thought as the crude and simple version of the Person-affecting condition.

The objector points to the situation in which equality is established by levelling down, i.e. by adversely affecting someone without benefiting anyone, as proof that equality fails to meet the person-affecting condition and is therefore of no value. I will call this the person-affecting objection. Is it sound? Egalitarians may wish to pursue at least two avenues of reply. First, they may wish to deny that equality does not benefit people. Second, they may wish to reject the person-affecting condition.

Given its historical and political background, egalitarianism may well wish to pursue the first avenue even if the person-affecting condition is false. Even if there are values which cannot benefit people the view that equality is among them would surprise and disappoint most egalitarians, as the ethos of egalitarianism is deeply humanist, that is concerned with the fortunes of people. Be that as it may, does equality benefit people?

The question is not whether realisation of equality is associated with other changes which benefit people. The question is whether equality itself benefits people. That is why the arguments turn on levelling down. Securing equality between Jane and John by providing the latter with more food is an example of a case in which improving the lot of a person also happens to realise equality. But it is not the equality which improves his lot. It is the extra food. And the food is not necessary for the realisation of equality. Equality can be realised by denying Jane some of the food she has and wasting it. Hence the argument that equality itself does not benefit people, that it is indifferent to their fate. It violates the person-affecting condition.

But have not the objectors been looking in the wrong place? If you consider the food benefits for people then obviously equality itself does not benefit them, only food provides a food-benefit. We need to ignore the coincidental benefits (where they exist) and ask whether equality itself is a benefit. How can it be? One line of thought is to draw an analogy with other ?environmental? benefits, as I will call benefits which consists in nothing more than living in a certain environment, e.g. in a beautiful mountainous valley. Just living there is a benefit. By and large such environmental benefits are recognised by people. Even those who prefer living in a big city with all its social and cultural amenities recognise that those who would rather live in the mountainous valley gain something which they lack. Nor is the benefit exhausted by the opportunities the mountain provides: opportunities to climb the peaks, to watch the birds, etc. Just living in those surroundings is of value.

Highly recommended.

Full post as published by Legal Theory Blog on October 28, 2008 (boomark / email).