Liberal Perfectionism: The Reasons that Goodness Gives 3110335263, 9783110335262, 9783110337235

Citation preview

Alexandra Couto Liberal Perfectionism

Practical Philosophy

Edited by Herlinde Pauer-Studer, Neil Roughley, Peter Schaber, and Ralf Stoecker

Volume 19

Alexandra Couto

Liberal Perfectionism The Reasons that Goodness Gives

ISBN 978-3-11-033526-2 e-ISBN 978-3-11-033695-5 ISSN 2197-9243 Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data A CIP catalog record for this book has been applied for at the Library of Congress. Bibliografische Information der Deutschen Nationalbibliothek Die Deutsche Nationalbibliothek verzeichnet diese Publikation in der Deutschen Nationalbibliografie; detaillierte bibliografische Daten sind im Internet über http://dnb.dnb.de abrufbar. © 2014 Walter de Gruyter GmbH, Berlin/Boston Druck und Bindung: Hubert & Co. GmbH & Co. KG, Göttingen ∞ Gedruckt auf säurefreiem Papier Printed in Germany www.degruyter.com

| For my Mother, whose infinite love, devotion, hard work and care have been a continuous source of awe and inspiration.

Acknowledgements This book is dedicated to my mother and my deepest gratitude goes to my parents, Branka and Leonel Couto, who have shown so much patience towards me during my long studies and have given me unwavering support and love. This book is based on my PhD dissertation at Oxford University. I would like to thank my wonderful supervisor, Mark Philp, for providing me with so many helpful comments, support and banter all along. I am also grateful to the late Jerry Cohen who encouraged me from the very start to do political philosophy and commented on an earlier draft. For his insightful comments on the whole draft, for often disagreeing with me and for his enduring love, I am grateful to Guy Kahane. For financial support during my studies at Oxford University, I am grateful to the generous Berrow scholarship. Finally, the last revisions of this book were made while I was funded by the European Research Council (Advanced Grant ‘Distortions of Normativity’).

Table of Contents 0 0.1 0.2 0.3 0.4 0.5 1 1.1 1.2 1.3 1.4 1.5 1.6 1.7 2 2.1 2.2 2.2.1 2.2.2 2.2.3 2.2.4 2.3 2.4 2.5 2.5.1 2.5.2 2.5.3 2.6 2.7

Introduction | 1  The Rejection of Neutrality | 2  Why the Rejection of Neutrality is not Enough | 3  Basic Features and Definitions of Perfectionism | 5  Re-conceptualisation of the Differences between Neutralist and Perfectionist Liberals | 7  Summary of the Argument of the Book | 10  Perfectionism: Some Basic Distinctions | 16  Defining Ethical Perfectionism, Prudential Perfectionism and Political Perfectionism | 17  Why Political Perfectionism Requires an Account of Ethical Perfectionism | 20  Prudential Perfectionism and Objective Goods | 23  Arguments for the Objective List Conception of Well-Being | 26  The Step from Prudential Perfectionism to Ethical Perfectionism | 29  The Step from Ethical Perfectionism to Political Perfectionism | 32  Conclusion | 36  Perfectionist Goods | 37  Basic Terminology | 37  What Should we include in our List of Objective Goods? | 38  Too Sparse | 38  Refer to goods that are not fundamental | 39  Contain too many goods | 42  A Plausible List of Objective Goods | 43  Realizing Goods vs. Opportunities | 44  Agency and Good | 47  Bringing Back Perspective for a Perfectionist Renaissance | 50  There is Something about Perspective | 50  Endorsement Distinctions | 52  Well-being | 53  Does Perfectionism require a Unifying Account of the Good? | 54  Could Perfectionism be based on Cultural Norms or on an Overlapping Consensus? | 60 

x | Introduction

2.8 2.9 3 3.1 3.1.1 3.1.2 3.1.3 3.1.4 3.1.5 3.2 3.3 3.4 3.5 3.6

Is the Lack of Unifying Account Damaging for Political Perfectionism? | 64  Conclusion | 67  Ethical Perfectionism: Distinctions and Objections | 68  Ethical Perfectionism as a Family of Theories | 69  Exclusive vs. Non-exclusive Perfectionism | 70  Pluralist vs. Monist Perfectionism | 71  Broad vs. Narrow Perfectionism | 72  Satisficing vs. Maximising Perfectionism | 75  Absolute vs. Relative Perfectionism | 80  Consequentialist, Virtue Ethics and Deontological Perfectionism | 81  Is Perfectionism too Self-indulgent? | 85  Praise and Blame | 90  Perfectionism and Positive Value | 92  Conclusion | 96 

4.7.1 4.7.2 4.8 4.9 4.10 4.11

The Reasons that Goodness Gives | 98  Prima Facie Arguments | 100  Well-Being and the Function of the State: The Crude Argument | 101  The Service and Well-Being Argument | 105  Is the Humanistic Principle necessary for the Service and WellBeing Argument? | 108  An Objection to the Social Forms Thesis | 110  The Service and Practical Reason Argument: The Explicit Version | 112  An Objection to the Service and Practical Reason Argument: Agentneutral vs Agent-relative Reasons | 118  The Objection | 118  Agent-relative Reasons in our Lives | 121  The Revised Service and Practical Reason Argument | 123  A Meta-ethical Objection | 124  An Objection to the Service Conception of Authority | 125  Conclusion | 126 

5 5.1 5.2

The Consistency Argument | 128  Introduction | 128  Charles Taylor’s Argument | 130 

4 4.1 4.2 4.3 4.4 4.5 4.6 4.7

Introduction | xi

5.3 5.4 5.5 5.5.1 5.5.2 5.6 5.6.1 5.6.2 5.6.3 5.6.4 5.6.5 5.6.6 5.7 6 6.1 6.1.1 6.1.2 6.2 6.2.1 6.2.2 6.2.3 6.2.4 6.3 6.3.1 6.3.2 6.3.3 6.4 6.4.1 6.4.2 6.4.3 6.5 6.5.1

Vinit Haksar’s Argument | 133  The Consistency Argument | 136  The Protection of Individual Rights and Interests | 138  In favour of the Interest Theory | 139  Is the Second Premise Really Necessary for the Consistency Argument? | 140  From Protection to Promotion | 141  The Consistency Argument | 141  Caveats | 144  Interpretation of Protection and Promotion | 145  The Normative Arbitrariness of the Distinction between Protection and Promotion of Interests | 152  In favour of the Consistency Argument | 156  Relation to Consequentialism | 157  Conclusion | 159  The Location of Unfairness | 161  Introduction | 161  The Luck Egalitarian Location of Unfairness | 163  The Luck Egalitarian Aim | 164  Location of Unfairness | 168  A Dilemma for the Basic Luck Egalitarian Intuition | 168  How can the Fundamentalist Luck Egalitarian attempt to Justify her Position? | 170  How the Existing Literature accounts for the Two Forms of luck Egalitarianism | 171  Practical Implications | 174  Same Destination, Different Routes | 175  The Same Destination, Different Routes Argument | 176  Other Instrumental Benefits of Minimising Luck | 176  Is Redistribution instrumental to the Promotion of Responsibility? | 179  The Luck Egalitarian Response | 180  Attempting an Account of the BLEI | 180  The Impact on one’s Level of Advantages | 181  The Normative Distinction between Negative and Positive Value | 181  The Location of Unfairness | 183  Inconsistency | 183 

xii | Introduction

6.5.2 6.5.3 6.5.4 6.5.5 6.6 6.6.1 6.6.2 6.7 6.7.1 6.7.2 6.8 7 7.1 7.1.1 7.1.2 7.1.3 7.2 7.2.1 7.2.2 7.2.3 7.3

What Justice Requires: Promoting the Conditions for Responsibility | 185  Justice Requires Structural Changes | 189  An Account of Responsibility | 191  The Practice of Responsibility Promotion | 192  The Luck Egalitarian Response | 193  The Good Luck Objection | 193  The Feasibility Objection | 194  Responsibility | 195  Two thought experiments | 195  ‘She did it her way’ or the Prudential Value of Responsibility | 197  Conclusion | 199  Conclusion | 202  Three Distinctive Features | 202  Ethical Perfectionism | 202  Positive Arguments | 203  Luck Egalitarianism | 204  Objections | 204  Autonomy | 204  Moral Equality | 205  Pragmatic Objections | 208  Final Thoughts | 211 

Bibliography | 213 

0 Introduction In liberal thought, ‘neutrality’ refers to the political or philosophical restricted neutrality of the justification of the basic structure of the society with respect to different reasonable conceptions of the good. It is often claimed that neutrality in this sense is central to liberalism – it is central, for example, to John Rawls’s Political Liberalism. A commonly held view, propounded most notably by Rawls,1 assumes that, because neutrality is central to liberalism, the latter is incompatible with any form of perfectionism.2 Perfectionism, to keep it simple for now, is the view that the state could be justified in invoking a conception of the good to justify its policies. In previous writings, I argued that this widespread assumption is mistaken.3 I argued that the liberal state is not neutral and, moreover, that neutrality is not what liberal thinkers should really aim at. Of course, I am not alone in doing so: Joseph Raz,4 Thomas Hurka5 and Steven Wall6 have all defended a version of liberal perfectionism (and have thereby rejected neutrality). But what does it exactly mean to be a liberal perfectionist? Unlike illiberal perfectionists, liberal perfectionists do not recommend coercion as a legitimate form of intervention of the perfectionist state (they recommend rather the use of subsidies, tax exemptions or other non-coercive forms of encouragement such as educational schemes).7 Moreover, liberal perfectionists endorse liberal goods. In other words, liberal perfectionists differ from illiberal perfectionists both in the noncoercive type of intervention they envisage for the state and in the goods they protect and promote.8 By focusing on objections, too much of the recent literature on perfectionism has failed to capture the appeal of perfectionism. This is why, in this book, I

|| 1 Rawls J., Political Liberalism, Columbia University Press, New York, 1996, p. 194. 2 Dworkin R., A Matter of Principle, Clarendon Press, Oxford, 1986. 3 Couto A., Impartiality, Neutrality and Justice as Fairness, Mphil thesis, Oxford University, Oxford, 2004. 4 Raz J., The Morality of Freedom, Clarendon Press, Oxford, 2001. 5 Hurka T., Perfectionism, Oxford University Press, Oxford, 1993. 6 Wall S., Liberalism, Perfectionism and Restraint, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 1998. 7 Chan J., ‘Legitimacy, Unanimity and Perfectionism’, Philosophy and Public Affairs, vol. 29, n. 1, 2000. Haksar V., Equality, Liberty and Perfectionism, Oxford University Press, Oxford, 1979, p. 161‒192. Hurka T., ibid., p. 147‒160. Raz J., ibid., p. 369‒429. Wall S., ibid., p. 125‒233. 8 In this book, I make an argument in favour of liberal perfectionism, which in no way could be extended to support illiberal perfectionism.

2 | Introduction

want to develop a positive argument in support of the claim that there is a prima facie reason for the state to protect and promote certain objectively valuable goods (rejecting thereby the liberal commitment to neutrality). I discuss nevertheless some of the objections raised against perfectionism and show that these objections fail to reach their target once we distinguish among various forms of perfectionism. Theoretically, in ideal circumstances, liberal perfectionism remains undefeated. However, I concede that political perfectionism faces some serious problems when it is actually specified.9

0.1 The Rejection of Neutrality Let me briefly summarise some of the arguments against the claim that the liberal state is neutral.10 I believe that, in political philosophy, validity-claims and moral values are unavoidable. And any commitment to the truth of some moral values will narrow down the range of comprehensive views that can be adopted.11 Following Raz, I believe that epistemological abstinence is not a viable alternative for a political conception.12 Although Raz does not really make this explicit, I suggest the following defence of this claim. To claim a foundational value as really true commits the claim-holder to a meta-ethical view about the status of moral values. Therefore, the claim-holder forfeits his philosophical neutrality and adopts a cognitivist meta-ethical view. In other words, epistemic abstinence is not a viable stand when one is doing political philosophy. This is true also in the case of Rawls; contrary to his official view, Rawls does make a range of validity claims: there are moral values implicitly present in the idea of public reason and implicit validity-claims present in the concept of ‘the reasonable’ in Rawls’s Justice-as-Fairness. Moreover, I have argued elsewhere that these moral values are necessary to motivate citizens to act in conformity with the principles of justice.13 To sum up, I believe that liberals, and Rawls in particular, should affirm the ethical values that ground liberal thought, even if

|| 9 I discuss pragmatic objections arising from such specification of the perfectionist view in the conclusion. 10 See Couto A., Impartiality, Neutrality and Justice as Fairness, Mphil thesis, Oxford University, Oxford, 2004. 11 Raz J., ibid. 12 Raz J., ‘Facing Diversity, the Case of Epistemic Abstinence’, Philosophy and Public Affairs, vol. 19, n. 1, 1990, p. 3‒46. 13 Couto A., Impartiality, Neutrality and Justice as Fairness, Mphil thesis, Oxford University, Oxford, 2004.

Introduction | 3

these commit them to a partial conception of the good, as these ethical values are constitutive of liberalism.

0.2 Why the Rejection of Neutrality is not Enough Even if it is granted by liberals that the liberal state is not fully neutral and that neutrality is only an ideal, the question that still needs to be asked is whether there is nevertheless significant value in state neutrality. If state neutrality is a valuable ideal, then recognition that the state falls short of that ideal does not imply that the state ought to move towards the endorsement of a particular conception of the good. Brian Barry has argued along similar lines in response to multiculturalism: even if total cultural neutrality is impossible, this does not mean that liberalism should abandon neutrality as an ideal.14 Barry argues that what critics like Charles Taylor demand from cultural neutrality is that it would remain compatible with all other beliefs. This, Barry claims, is too much to ask and thus cannot be a serious objection to cultural neutrality. As he argues: It would seem that for liberalism – or any other doctrine for that matter – to be culturally neutral, there would have to be no existing (or possible?) world view with which it conflicts. Since this is manifestly absurd, the assertion that liberalism is not culturally neutral asserts something that could not conceivably be denied.15

On Barry’s view, one cannot expect too much from neutrality. Even if liberalism fails to be unqualifiedly neutral, there might be value in approximating the ideal of neutrality. This is why, in order to argue for perfectionism, the claim that liberalism fails to be neutral isn’t in itself enough to clear the ground. We need to argue that liberals would do better by rejecting neutrality and endorsing a form of liberal perfectionism. Moreover, there is another reason why the rejection of neutrality is not enough to establish the validity of liberal perfectionism. It is not only perfectionists who oppose neutrality and recommend the promotion of a conception of the good: communitarians, multiculturalists and neoconservatives all share this view. Therefore, if we want to defend liberal perfectionism in particular, we need to show why liberal perfectionism has an appeal that these other competing views do not have.

|| 14 Barry B., Culture and Equality, Harvard University Press, Cambridge (Mass.), 2002. 15 Barry B., Culture and Equality, Harvard University Press, Cambridge (Mass.), 2002, p. 27.

4 | Introduction

These views differ from liberal perfectionism, in so far as they do not ground the conception of the good they wish to promote in claims about objective values. As, for example, Charles Taylor writes: ‘communitarianism suggests that the specific normative directives that flow from the good society model are historically and culturally contingent.’16 Multiculturalists share such a particularist viewpoint with communitarians, but differ from them in valuing the diversity of conceptions of the good as such.17 Thus both communitarianism and multiculturalism ground the particular conceptions of the good life they advocate in existing cultures or traditions.18 Perfectionists argue very differently: they would want to promote a specific conception of the good not because some individuals endorse it but because it is valuable in itself. But what about neoconservatives? While neo-conservatives might be less prone to relativism, their substantive conception still differs greatly from liberal perfectionism.19 This said, one could conceive of views very similar to communitarianism and multiculturalism that would be compatible with liberal perfectionism, but these views do not correspond to actual communitarian and multiculturalist views.20 || 16 Taylor C., ‘No community, no democracy’ in The Communitarian Reader, Etzioni A., Volmert A., Rothschild E., Rowman & Littlefield publishers, Inc., 2004, p. 3. 17 A brief look at the beginning of Amitai Etzioni’s book ‘The spirit of the community’ gives a good summary of communitarians’ main tenets. See Etzioni A., The Spirit of the Community, Fontana Press, New York, 1995, p. 1‒2. 18 Moreover, communitarians also attach intrinsic value to the community itself and to the relationships between the members of the community. Avineri De-Shalit, in Communitarianism and Individualism, Avineri and de-Shalit (eds.), Oxford University Press, Oxford, 1992, p. 5‒6. 19 Others have pointed to two crucial differences between liberal perfectionists and neoconservatives. Where neo-conservatives insist on the value of self-reliance, liberal perfectionists tend to focus on the importance of the role played by social and economic opportunities. Another key difference is that while neoconservatives are keen to make judgmental assessments of the value of people’s lives, liberal perfectionists are not committed to such judgments. See Dzur A. W., ‘Liberal Perfectionism and Democratic Participation’, Polity, 30, 1998, p. 667‒690, p. 673. I will criticize the claim that liberal perfectionists are committed to an ethical evaluation of individuals in chapter 3, section 4. 20 For that to be the case, they would need to be fundamentally objectivist. The particular instantiations of the goods they protect and promote might remain culturally specific, but the general goods themselves would need to be objectively valuable. One would then understand the substantive goods or practices defended by multiculturalists and communitarians as specific tokens of the more general and abstract goods endorsed by liberal perfectionists. If that is the view endorsed, this would of course transform the foundations of existing communitarian and multiculturalist views but it might not change them much at a substantive level (except in so far as there would be an added constraint on the kind of practices that could be protected and promoted by the state; they would need to be genuine instantiations of objective goods). Note that if a practice belongs to a culture but fails to be an instantiation of an objective good,

Introduction | 5

0.3 Basic Features and Definitions of Perfectionism Steven Wall has claimed that political perfectionism can be described as the combination of four claims: 1) Some ideals of human flourishing are sound and can be known to be sound 2) The state is presumptively justified in favouring these ideals 3) A sound account of political morality will be informed by sound ideals of human flourishing 4) There is no general moral principle that forbids the state from favouring sound ideals of human flourishing, as well as enforcing conceptions of political morality informed by them, when these ideals are controversial and subject to reasonable disagreement.21 I take some version of all these claims to be necessary features of liberal perfectionism. The first claim is equivalent to the view that there are some intrinsically and objectively valuable goods and that these goods can be known to us. The first two chapters try to make a case for the first claim. The second claim holds that there is a strong justification for the state protecting and promoting these goods. In other words, the second claim supports what I below call Prima Facie Perfectionism. The fourth and fifth chapters of this book will be providing arguments for Prima Facie Perfectionism. The third claim makes the assumption that goods defined in the ethical realm have a positive role to play in our political decisions. This claim is crucial to the move from Ethical Perfectionism (an ethical view) to Political Perfectionism (a political view). In chapter 5, I argue that objectively and intrinsically valuable goods already inform our political concept of rights. Although the fourth claim assumes that the ideals of human flourishing are subject to reasonable disagreement, I endorse a version of this fourth claim, which does not take the contentious character of these goods to be necessary for perfectionism.22 The version of the fourth claim that I favour states that ‘there is no general moral principle that forbids the state from favouring sound ideals of human flourishing, as well as enforcing conceptions of political || then its belonging to a culture would not be enough to protect and promote it. In this way, liberal perfectionism can be more reformative than multicultural and communitarian views: it can recommend a criticism of traditions as it does not justify itself by merely invoking historical contingencies or traditions). But we can set aside this possible view here. 21 Wall S., ibid., p. 8. 22 Many of the items on the list I suggest in chapter 2 are widely accepted and are not more contentious than the normative values that liberals themselves rely on.

6 | Introduction

morality informed by them’. This reformed version amounts to what I call the ‘modest definition’ of perfectionism: The Modest Definition: The state is permitted23 to protect and promote intrinsically valuable goods on the basis of their intrinsic value.24 should be distinguished from The Bold Definition: The state ought to protect and promote intrinsically valuable goods on the basis of their intrinsic value. Bold Perfectionism implies Modest Perfectionism, but in order to argue for bold Political Perfectionism, it might be easier to start to argue in favour of Modest Perfectionism. However, if we wanted to make a case for Bold Political Perfectionism, we would need to satisfy many other conditions. First, we would need to claim that the liberal state ought not to be neutral. In chapter 5, I argue that it would be inconsistent for the liberal state to uphold state neutrality. Second, we would need to reject one by one theoretical and practical objections to Political Perfectionism. In chapters 1 to 3 of this book, I suggest many qualifications that would restrict and weaken the objections that could be raised against Political Perfectionism. In the conclusion, I briefly address some of the objections that I do not have the space to fully discuss. However, this book does not address exhaustively the objections that have been made to Political Perfectionism. I do not argue for Bold Political Perfectionism, because I believe that there are many legitimate circumstances in which the state ought not to be perfectionist. Instead, I will argue that one needs to combine the modest perfectionist claim with what I call Prima Facie Perfectionism in order to defend Full Political Perfectionism, which I will call Political Perfectionism tout court. First, let us look at the definition of prima facie perfectionism:

|| 23 I use ‘permitted’ in the Modest Definition in the weak sense of claiming that there is no general principle against it, not in the strong sense of allowed in all specific cases. The Modest Definition rejects the neutrality thesis, but does not suggest that perfectionism is always permitted. 24 I take Raz’ definition to amount to be a modest definition of Political Perfectionism: ‘[perfectionism] is the view that whether or not a particular moral objective should be pursued by legal means is a question to be judged on the merit of each case, or class of cases, and not by a general exclusionary rule…’ Raz J., ‘Facing up’, p. 1231.

Introduction | 7

Prima Facie Political Perfectionism: There is at least some reason for the state to protect and promote intrinsically valuable goods on the basis of their intrinsic value (OR the state has some justification to protect and promote intrinsically valuable goods on the basis of their intrinsic value). In order to defend Prima Facie Political Perfectionism, there is no need to address every objection to perfectionism. Note also that this definition does not assume that the state is permitted to act in order to protect and promote goods. In other words, there might be some reason for the state to do x but there might be a general objection against the state doing x. Recall the different claims made by Wall mentioned above. The state might be presumptively justified in furthering some ideals of human flourishing but that does not imply that there is no general moral reason against it doing so. Finally, let us now look at my definition of Political Perfectionism tout court: Political Perfectionism: the state is permitted to and justified in protecting and promoting intrinsically valuable goods on the basis of their intrinsic value. This definition stipulates that, in order to be a perfectionist, you must claim both that there is no general principle against perfectionism and some reason in favour of it. This does not entail that, if you are a perfectionist, you believe that the state ought to act in a perfectionist way in every circumstance.

0.4 Re-conceptualisation of the Differences between Neutralist and Perfectionist Liberals Many objections to liberal perfectionism take the state to be the wrong kind of actor to protect and promote intrinsically valuable goods. But from a perfectionist perspective, the question of the legitimacy of state intervention to protect and promote the goods is to be understood in the context of what would occur without such a state intervention. In this context, it is important to point out that arbitrary forces affect the opportunities individuals have to engage with the goods, even in the absence of state interference. The difference between neutralist liberals and liberal perfectionists could thus be re-conceptualised in the following way: the neutralist liberal denies that the government can legitimately intervene in structuring the choices of individuals, while the liberal perfectionist rejects the legitimacy of individual

8 | Introduction

choices being constrained ‘by external forces like existing social and economic institutions, or internal forces like learning disabilities or poor impulse control.’25 In other words, common liberal worries about political perfectionism seem to depend on a distinction between the influence of the state and other non-state actors on the opportunities individuals face. After all the market and civil society actors have a huge impact on society and play a dramatic role in shaping opportunity.26 It is odd to be so adamant about the state stepping in to promote some conception of the good, when market mechanisms and the civil society as a whole are left free to influence (and even determine) the conceptions of the good that are prevalent in a society and thereby citizens’ choices to engage with certain goods or fail to do so.27 If the market is allowed to have such an impact, why are liberal neutralists exclusively concerned about state interference, and not about market and civil society interference? As Joseph Chan asked: …as we allow individuals and social, cultural and religious associations to further their conceptions of the good and influence citizens’ thinking and lives, why should we not allow states to do the same?28

Why then do not neutralist liberals have a problem with the market and civil society actors interfering with the structure of opportunities available for individuals? This, I believe, can be traced to two reasons. On one hand, the neutralist might claim that there is a big distinction between violating someone’s freedom through coercion and changing the incentive structures. But the liberal political perfectionism I recommend is not coercive and there is thus no difference between non-state actors, the market and the state in the kind of intervention that is involved: both merely change the incentive structure available for individuals by intervening at the level of the price structure of different options.29 On the other hand, the neutralist might have issue with the intentionality of the state intervention. But, if that were the case, the neutralist would have issue not only with perfectionist interventions instigated by the state, but also with || 25 Druz A.W., ibid., p. 678. 26 Some have argued that a good social practice should be able to survive without legal institutions. Waldron J., ‘Autonomy and Perfectionism in Raz’s Morality of Freedom’, Southern California Law Reviews, 1988, p. 1138. 27 Kymlicka has introduced the distinction between state and social perfectionism. Kymlicka W., Liberal Individualism and Liberal Neutrality’, Ethics, 99, 1989. 28 Chan J., ibid. 29 Chan J., ibid., p. 14‒15.

Introduction | 9

those instigated by civil society actors, which are also intentional. However, this would justify neutralists allowing for the market to shape opportunities, but restricting interventions by the state or civil society actors. It would be nevertheless hard to justify why the neutralist is only concerned with intentional interventions. One could plausibly argue that intentional interventions are superior to non-intentional ones; the outcome of intentional interventions would be much less random. Moreover, intentional interventions could be geared towards good outcomes instead of letting random factors affect the outcome in a possibly negative way. However, the neutralist could make a case by claiming that it isn’t the intentionality as such that is problematic but what comes with it. For instance, only intentional decisions can be paternalist, in the unusual judgmental sense defined by Jonathan Quong in his new book, Liberalism Without Perfection. According to him, the ‘presumptive wrongness of paternalism is not to be found in terms of some harm or damage to the paternalizee’s interests or autonomy, but instead is to be found in a particular conception of moral status.’30 His judgmental definition of paternalism claims that the paternalist is motivated by a negative judgment about the paternalizee’s abilities and he claims further that perfectionism is necessarily paternalist in this sense. I will deny in this book that perfectionism is paternalist in this sense. Finally, the distinction could be conceived as pertaining to the willingness of the liberal state to intervene only in certain delimited spheres and its reluctance to do so in others. According to the negative responsibility argument proposed by Nagel, one can justify the liberal state reluctance to intervene when it pertains to conceptions of the good because the state is not responsible for the disappearance of a conception of the good if it does not intervene to support it.31 In contrast, the state is responsible if it does not intervene in matters of social justice, because its own institutions are already involved in a certain distributive outcome. Joseph Chan has convincingly argued against the negative responsibility argument.32 He has claimed that assuming that the state cannot be negatively responsible for the disappearance of a conception of the good amounts to assuming the neutrality of the liberal state instead of arguing for it.

|| 30 Quong J., Liberalism without Perfection, Oxford University Press, Oxford, 2011, p. 99. 31 Nagel T., Equality and Partiality, Oxford University Press, Oxford, 1991, chap. 14. 32 Chan J., ‘Legitimacy, Unanimity and Perfectionism’, Philosophy and Public Affairs, vol. 29, n. 1, 2000.

10 | Introduction

0.5 Summary of the Argument of the Book This book investigates what a plausible liberal perfectionism would be like. Two different ways of understanding what I call Ethical Perfectionism will be considered. On the one hand, some authors take perfectionism to refer only to the so-called ‘objective list’ conception of well-being.33 On the other hand, many contemporary perfectionist authors understand perfectionism to be an ethical theory, which is distinctive in so far as it gives a fundamental role to the objective goods in defining the right. I will argue that Ethical Perfectionism is best understood as a distinctive ethical theory that is based on an Objective List conception of well-being. An Objective List conception of well-being claims that an individual’s well-being is constituted by an engagement with intrinsically and objectively valuable goods. An example of such a list of objective goods would be: knowledge, understanding, aesthetic appreciation, deep personal relationships, autonomy, pleasure, etc. I will critically discuss such lists of objective goods in chapter 2. Common intuitions about value support an Objective List view of wellbeing. But once we adopt an Objective List view of well-being, it is hard to deny that individual well-being matters ethically and that we therefore have ethical reasons to promote engagement with these objective goods. This takes us to Ethical Perfectionism. From Ethical Perfectionism, it is a relatively short step to an argument in favour of the political promotion of engagement with objective goods: the demands of practical reason commit us to the promotion of the things we take to be valuable.34 I said earlier that we needed more than a negative argument that complete neutrality is philosophically impossible. We needed to provide a positive argument claiming that the state has at least a prima facie reason to protect and promote certain objectively valuable goods. A primary aim of this book is thus to clarify and defend the existence of such reason. The argument will start with the claim that we have firm intuitions about value. If there are strong intuitions

|| 33 Objective list theories of well-being, with hedonism and desire-satisfaction theories, are currently the three dominant conceptions of well-being. Hedonism defines an agent’s good as enjoying certain psychological states. Desire satisfaction theories claim that an individual’s well-being consists in the satisfaction of his preferences. Objective list theories hold that an agent’s well-being is constituted by the engagement of the agent with some intrinsically and objectively valuable goods. 34 Thomson J.J., Goodness and Advice, Princeton University Press, New Jersey, 2001, p. 76. Sher develops an account of autonomy in terms of responsiveness to reasons. Sher G., Beyond Neutrality, Perfectionism and Politics, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 1997.

Introduction | 11

in favor of the intrinsic value of some general goods and if these goods are constitutive of individual well-being, we need very little to move to the claim that the liberal state has a reason to protect and promote these goods.35 In order to move from a discourse about what we as individuals have reasons to do to a discourse about what the state has reasons to do, I will invoke a specific conception of legitimacy, the Service conception of legitimacy, which takes a state to be legitimate if and only if its directives generally stem from reasons that already apply to individuals. The first three chapters distinguish between Prudential, Ethical and Political Perfectionism, and clarify these views and their possible relations. Although a considerable amount of space in these chapters is devoted to questions of value theory, this is always with an eye to the grounding of a political conception. Much discussion of Political Perfectionism is deficient because it ignores these foundational ethical questions which can make an important difference to the plausibility of the political conceptions based upon them. Chapters 4 and 5 next consider a range of arguments in favour of Political Perfectionism. Chapter 6 examines what view of social justice would be most compatible with political perfectionism. In the first chapter, I distinguish between Prudential, Ethical and Political Perfectionism. I define Prudential Perfectionism as endorsing both the claims that there is a list of objective goods that are constitutive of well-being and that we should strive for them for our own good. I take Ethical Perfectionism to make the further claim that we have moral reasons to generally promote these goods. I discuss Ethical Perfectionism first, because I take Ethical Perfectionism to be more fundamental than Political Perfectionism. Political Perfectionism would have little plausibility if Ethical Perfectionism is not correct. After drawing some basic conceptual distinctions, I will argue that what is distinctive about Prudential Perfectionism is that its conception of the good life is based on identifying a variety of goods that are intrinsically and objectively valuable while being constitutive of well-being. I will present some negative arguments against hedonist and desire-based conceptions of well-being and point to some intuitions in favour of an Objective List conception of well-being. Once Prudential Perfectionism has been defended in this way, I argue that the step from Prudential Perfectionism to Ethical Perfectionism is fairly simple, and so is the step from Ethical Perfectionism to Political Perfectionism. I identify two main ways in which Political Perfectionism has been defined. On the modest

|| 35 Raz J., ‘Facing Up: A Reply’, Southern California Law Review, 62, 1989, 1230‒1232. See also Chan J., ibid., p. 5‒6.

12 | Introduction

definition, a political perfectionist merely argues that the state is permitted to protect and promote intrinsically valuable goods on the basis of their intrinsic value. On the bold definition, a political perfectionist goes further and claims that the state ought to protect and promote intrinsically valuable goods on the basis of their intrinsic value. I offer an alternative definition of Political Perfectionism which holds a middle ground between these two definitions by defining Political Perfectionism as the state being permitted to and justified in protecting and promoting intrinsically valuable goods on the basis of their intrinsic value. In the second chapter, I consider the crucial question of what should count as intrinsically and objectively valuable goods. I critically examine several lists of such goods offered by various authors, and defend my own list, which includes both actions and states of affairs. I will argue that when we move from Ethical Perfectionism to Political Perfectionism, we should shift our focus from direct promotion of goods to promotion of opportunities to engage with these goods, so as to safeguard the autonomy of individuals. The most important part of this chapter is a critical examination of George Sher’s attempt to provide a unifying account of the goods on the objective list. I argue that attempts to provide a unifying account of these goods are unsuccessful. But I also argue that this is no tragedy for Political Perfectionism because such an account is not really needed. I then turn to consider Martha Nussbaum’s attempt to ground political perfectionism in an overlapping consensus. I will suggest that, although it would be beneficial for Political Perfectionism to be based on a list of goods that command such an overlapping consensus, the relevant list of goods cannot be appropriately justified by such an overlapping consensus. Perfectionist goods are objectively valuable goods and their standing as goods cannot thus be grounded in the actual endorsement of individuals. In the third chapter, I show that we can resist some of the objections that have been levelled against Political Perfectionism by identifying a form of Ethical Perfectionism that is both independently compelling, and ground a more plausible and attractive Political Perfectionism. Many objections to Political Perfectionism arise only because implausible forms of Political Perfectionism are considered. I therefore spend some time considering a range of key distinctions that both clarify the possible forms Ethical Perfectionism can take, and are helpful in countering objections to Political Perfectionism. I examine several distinctions that have been made in the perfectionist literature, and discuss their relevance and application. These distinctions are important because too often the literature discusses perfectionism without differentiating between very different views, ignoring possible attractive variants of perfectionism. In particular, I argue that the most plausible form of EP is non-exclusive, pluralist, broad, rela-

Introduction | 13

tive to the talents of the agent and satisficing. I will also argue that a plausible form of EP would mix consequentialist and deontological elements. In chapter 4, I consider two arguments, in favour of both the modest and the prima facie versions of Political Perfectionism identified in the first chapter of this book. The first Service and Well-Being Argument, a reconstruction of one of the arguments implicit in Joseph Raz’s The Morality of Freedom. One of the limitations of the Service and Well-Being Argument is that it relies both on a contentious conception of authority, the Service Conception, and on a specific conception of well-being. The second argument, which I call the Service and Practical Reason Argument, is based on an explicit argument articulated by Raz and it argues for the modest version of Political Perfectionism, according to which the state is permitted to protect and promote intrinsically valuable goods on the basis of their intrinsic value. I examine some problems with this argument and suggest ways of improving it. For this purpose, I also argue against Thomas Nagel’s suggestion that there might be agent-relative reasons unaccompanied by agent-neutral reasons. I further argue that it is a mistake for Raz not to be committed to a meta-ethical view and that such a commitment is necessary for the Service and Practical Reason Argument to stand scrutiny. Finally, I consider what I take to be the strongest objection against the Service and Practical Reason argument: its endorsement of a Service Conception of authority will narrow its support basis. Both Scott Hershowitz and Allen Buchanan have convincingly argued that the Service Conception of authority on its own is insufficient to ground authority.36 Against this objection, I argue that a valid account of legitimate authority ought to endorse both a substantive and a procedural criterion. I suggest thus that proponents of competing accounts of legitimacy will have to endorse some substantive conditions for a state to be legitimate. Such a substantive condition would be most plausibly of an instrumentalist kind. In other words, you do not need to endorse a Service conception of authority to accept both the Service and Well-Being and the Service and Practical Reason Arguments. As long as the conception of authority you endorse contain some substantive constraints on political legitimacy requiring from a state to be beneficial to individuals’ well-being, you can accept both Arguments with all their premises. In chapter 5, I will argue that it is inconsistent for the liberal state to refuse to promote certain perfectionist goods, given that it is already committed to the

|| 36 Buchanan A., ‘Political Legitimacy and Democracy’, Ethics, 2002, p. 689‒719. Hershovitz S., ‘Legitimacy, Democracy and Razian Authority’, Legal Theory, 2003, p. 201‒220.

14 | Introduction

protection of certain interests. This argument, the Consistency Argument, is thus at once a positive argument in favour of my definition of Political Perfectionism and a direct critique of neutralist liberalism. Neutralist liberals oppose the promotion of goods but they are nevertheless happy to protect the same goods. It is implicit in many neutralist liberal views that if something is valuable, then one ought to protect that thing. I argue that if one accepts that something is valuable, then it is hard to deny that one has a prima facie duty to both protect and promote it. The sixth and final chapter formulates a perfectionist criticism of luck egalitarianism. The first half of the chapter is negative to the extent that it focuses on developing objections to luck egalitarianism. The second half of this chapter considers the implications that a perfectionist commitment to the intrinsic value of autonomy might have for a theory of justice and in particular for the role given to responsibility. I argue for the perhaps surprising conclusion that the promotion of responsibility should be a primary (though not exclusive) aim of a theory of justice. I start the chapter by arguing that the luck egalitarian understanding of the value of responsibility gets things upside down. Luck egalitarians claim that unfairness results when individuals end up with relative disadvantages through no fault of their own.37 I will argue that the source of unfairness is due more fundamentally to the interference of luck in our lives. The identification of a different location of unfairness has implications not only at the theoretical level, but also at the practical level. I will suggest that if we identify unfairness as the interference of luck within our lives, we will see justice as requiring not only compensation for those who are disadvantaged due to bad luck, but also the positive promotion of individual responsibility – the positive promotion of the degree of control we have over our own lives. Indeed, I will argue that such a commitment to the promotion of responsibility follows from one possible interpretation of the luck egalitarian position. Luck egalitarians take responsibility to be the opposite of the interference of luck in one’s life: ‘Brute luck is held, by Luck Egalitarians, to reflect the absence of control or responsibility: they therefore regard brute luck and responsibility as conceptual mirror images of each other.’38 If unfairness is identified as the interference of luck, the promotion of responsibility should be a central aim of our theory of justice. This does || 37 Depending on the currency of justice that is chosen, the interpretation of what is meant by a disadvantage could be either a relative deprivation of resources, or a relative deprivation of welfare or a relative deprivation of capabilities through no fault of one’s own. 38 Lang G., ‘Luck Egalitarianism, Permissible Inequalities and Moral Hazard’, Journal of Moral Philosophy, vol. 6, n. 3, 2009, p. 317‒338, p. 317.

Introduction | 15

not prevent compensation from having any role in social justice, but it does shift it to a more subsidiary role.

1 Perfectionism: Some Basic Distinctions A serious flaw of the current literature on perfectionism, I believe, is that Prudential, Ethical and Political Perfectionism aren’t always properly distinguished. This chapter will be devoted to clarifying the relation between Political Perfectionism – a conception of politics – and Prudential Perfectionism and Ethical Perfectionism – a conception of the good life, and a type of ethical theory. I will start by defining Ethical and Prudential Perfectionism and discuss their main features. I will suggest that Ethical Perfectionism is best seen as grounded in Prudential Perfectionism, which I take to be equivalent to an Objective List conception of the good life. However, I will argue that it’s possible to endorse Prudential Perfectionism without being committed to Ethical Perfectionism, as one might believe in a perfectionist conception of the good life, while also holding that this conception of the good life should not ground one’s ethical theory (and further that this conception of the good life does not ground one’s political theory). As it is uncommon for a political perfectionist to begin with a discussion of Ethical Perfectionism, it might be worth briefly explaining why I think that this is an important, and indeed necessary, starting point. I believe that we need to start with an account of Ethical Perfectionism for three reasons: First, political theories are almost invariably committed to at least some ethical beliefs and it is better to be explicit about these commitments. Second, Political Perfectionism lacks a concrete content if its ethical underpinnings are not specified. Third, I believe that it is easier to motivate a Political Perfectionism that is associated with some explicit moral claims, given that moral commitments have priority over other kinds of commitments. After setting out these basic distinctions, I will turn to clarify the nature of Prudential Perfectionism. I will examine the relationship between well-being and intrinsically and objectively valuable goods. Prudential Perfectionism is distinctive in that its conception of the good life is based on identifying a variety of goods that are intrinsically and objectively valuable and constitutive of wellbeing. I will then argue in favour of prudential perfectionism. For that purpose, I will present some negative arguments against hedonist and desire-based conceptions of well-being. I will then point to some intuitions in favour of Prudential Perfectionism. Finally, I will argue that the steps from Prudential to Ethical Perfectionism and from Ethical Perfectionism to Political Perfectionism are easy enough to make.

Defining Ethical Perfectionism, Prudential Perfectionism and Political Perfectionism | 17

1.1 Defining Ethical Perfectionism, Prudential Perfectionism and Political Perfectionism If one has the intention of identifying a set of features that group together all the different texts that have been labelled as perfectionist in the history of Western culture, I would have to agree with Stanley Cavell that no such definition can be given.39 However, I am presenting here not a historical account of perfectionist theories, but a theoretical account of what I take to be the most plausible version of what I will call Ethical Perfectionism. For that purpose, a more precise definition is both feasible and advisable. For now let us provisionally define Ethical Perfectionism (EP) as an ethical theory that combines the following three claims: (a) certain goods and activities are objectively and intrinsically valuable; (b) an engagement with these goods constitutes an agent’s well-being; (c) these goods play a foundational role in determining what is morally right. The two first features (a) and (b) are critical because they distinguish perfectionism from, on one hand, hedonist and desire-satisfaction theories of well-being and, on the other hand, at the political level, a neutralist conception of the good, such as Rawls’s, which recognises only some goods as all-purpose goods (goods that could be instrumental to diverse conceptions of the good). It is important to distinguish Ethical Perfectionism (henceforth, EP) from Prudential Perfectionism.40 On my view, Prudential Perfectionism endorses only (a) and (b) (i.e. an objective list conception of well-being (henceforth OL)), while EP endorses (a), (b) and (c). The distinction between Prudential Perfectionism and EP is useful because some authors that are taken to be perfectionists in fact seem committed only to an Objective List conception of well-being (that is, only to Prudential Perfectionism). These include, on my reading, Brad Hooker, Richard Arneson,41 and George Sher42. I will refer to these authors as Prudential Perfectionists.

|| 39 ‘That there is no closed list of features that constitute perfectionism follows from conceiving of perfectionism as an outlook or dimension of thought embodied and developed in a set of texts spanning the range of Western culture…’ Cavell S., ‘Moral Perfectionism’, in Mulhall S. (ed.), The Cavell Reader, Blackwell Publishers, Oxford, 1996, p. 357. 40 Griffin J., Well-Being: Its Meaning, Measurement and Moral Importance, Clarendon Press, Oxford, 1989, p. 56. 41 Arneson R.J., ‘Perfectionism and Politics’, Ethics, 2000, p. 38.

18 | Perfectionism: Some Basic Distinctions

Let us start then by clarifying Prudential Perfectionism. On this view, there is a list of objective43 goods (perfections or excellences)44 that are constitutive of well-being and that we should strive for our own good. EP makes a further ethical claim. In its strongest and simplest form, it claims that to strive for objective goods is what is morally right: right action is constituted by the promotion of these goods. But to be perfectionist, it’s enough if a theory accepts an OL conception of well-being and gives a foundational moral role to the promotion of objective goods; perfectionists can thus recognise other moral considerations apart from the promotion of excellences. Now this foundational role given to the promotion of the good in defining the right is of course not distinctive of perfectionism, since consequentialism and virtue ethics hold roughly the same view on the relation between the right and the good.45 In chapter 3, I will clarify the relation between EP and these distinct views. As I have defined it, EP presupposes Prudential Perfectionism. However, the endorsement of Prudential Perfectionism does not commit us to EP. A Prudential Perfectionism approach takes certain objective goods to be prudentially valuable, but this needn’t imply a particular stand on moral rightness.46 Now, you might ask: What is the relationship between Prudential Perfectionism and Ethical Perfectionism, on one hand, and Political Perfectionism, on the other hand? I define Political Perfectionism as the claim that the state is permitted and justified to protect and promote the opportunities for citizens to || 42 Sher G., Beyond Neutrality: Perfectionism and Politics, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 1997, p. 10. 43 I mean by that exactly what Tim Scanlon means: ‘a criterion that provides a basis for appraisal of a person’s level of well-being which is independent of that person’s tastes and interests, thus allowing for the possibility that such an appraisal could be correct even though it conflicted with the preferences of the individual in question…’. Scanlon T., ‘Urgency and Preference’, The Journal of Philosophy, 1975, p. 658. 44 It is important to note that not all goods are perfections or excellences in the everyday use of the term. Pleasure can belong to the list of goods promoted by perfectionism, even though it would be odd to speak of pleasure as an excellence. I will say more about this later. 45 Consequentialist theories ‘treat good as explanatorily prior and always identify the right act by how much good it produces.’ Hurka T., Perfectionism, Oxford University Press, Oxford, 1993, p. 57. 46 Prudential Perfectionism can adopt three different attitudes towards moral rightness. First, it can assess moral rightness in relation to the well-being of agents. Second, it can reject altogether the existence of moral rightness. Nietzsche could be interpreted as the paradigm proponent of the latter. In other words, Prudential Perfectionism is compatible with ‘rational egoism’, and thus does not imply EP. Finally, Prudential Perfectionism could endorse a nonperfectionist ethical theory, such as Kantian ethics, acquiescing to a gap between prudential value and moral rightness.

Defining Ethical Perfectionism, Prudential Perfectionism and Political Perfectionism | 19

engage with intrinsically valuable goods. The short reply to the question of what is the relationship between these three notions is that Ethical Perfectionism (and thus also Prudential Perfectionism) is necessary for a plausible conception of Political Perfectionism. EP offers a substantive account of the good (Prudential Perfectionism) and argues that we are ethically required to promote these goods. I will argue below that it is necessary to endorse these two claims in order to defend Political Perfectionism. But beware as the reverse is not true; Ethical Perfectionism does not entail the endorsement of Political Perfectionism. The endorsement of Ethical Perfectionism gives us a reason to protect and promote the well-being of individuals, but there might be other considerations that would bar the extension of EP into Political Perfectionism. An example of such considerations would be to claim that it is not the proper role of the state to enforce ethical values on its citizens; i.e. a commitment to neutrality (according to which the state should refrain from justifying a particular policy by referring to a particular moral theory or conception of the good). The endorsement of Ethical Perfectionism can thus be compatible with the endorsement of political neutrality. Although EP is compatible with political neutrality, it is fundamentally incompatible with philosophical neutrality. Philosophical neutrality is neutrality applied to philosophical theories, that is, the absence of commitment to any specific philosophical conception. In ethics, philosophical neutrality would require no commitment to any ethical or meta-ethical view. One can thus combine a commitment to a conception of the good at the ethical level with nonperfectionist politics, as Douglas B. Rasmussen and Douglas J. den Uyl’s have done in their book Norms of Liberty.47 I will discuss different arguments in favour of Political Perfectionism in chapter 4 and chapter 5 and reject the claim that the liberal state could be neutral. Earlier, I distinguished the OL view from hedonic and desire-satisfaction conceptions of well-being. Now I will distinguish the OL list of goods from a neutralist list of goods. A neutralist list of goods is not a competing conception of well-being. It is used in a political context, to compare the well-being of individuals. Both perfectionists and neutralists may endorse a list of goods that are crucial for an agent’s well-being. They nevertheless have a different understanding of the relation between these goods and well-being. On the neutralist conception of well-being, the goods are merely instrumentally valuable to promoting well-being. The goods on the index of primary goods are not excellences, because they do not have intrinsic value; they are taken to be only

|| 47 Rasmussen D.B and den Uyl’s D., Norms of Liberty, Pennsylvania State University Press, Pennsylvania, 2005.

20 | Perfectionism: Some Basic Distinctions

means to the realisation of individuals’ different conceptions of the good: ‘… primary goods are things that men generally want in order to achieve their ends whatever they are….But of course accepting them for the purpose of an index does not establish a standard of excellence.’48 However, on a perfectionist view, the goods are intrinsically valuable and constitutive of well-being. Even a partial liberal account of the good might be said to be perfectionist as long as it affirms certain goods to be objectively and intrinsically valuable and does not ground the list of goods on an overlapping consensus. William Galston, for instance, suggests also a liberal account of the good, which is ‘deliberately thin’.49 Galston claims that this liberal account of the good constitutes a kind of ‘minimal perfectionism’ in that it defines a range of normal human functioning.

1.2 Why Political Perfectionism Requires an Account of Ethical Perfectionism Political perfectionism is often considered independently from its ethical foundations. The first question that needs to be answered is thus: Why should we start with EP and not proceed directly to the examination of Political Perfectionism (henceforth PP)? After all, some authors have defended PP without explicitly committing themselves to EP. Even Raz who argues for an Objective List conception would prefer, somewhat inconsistently, his PP to remain indifferent with respect to desire-based conceptions of the good and objective list conceptions of the good.50 Steven Wall takes a similar position but he ultimately admits that PP would benefit from endorsing a conception of the good.51 I think that there are three main reasons for providing an account of EP before examining PP. First, I reject the plausibility of a political philosophy that is ‘epistemically abstinent’, to use Raz’s phrase, where epistemic abstinence refers to the refusal

|| 48 Rawls J., A Theory of justice (Revised Edition), Oxford University Press, Oxford, 1999, p. 288. 49 Galston W.A, Liberal Purposes: goods, virtues and diversity in the liberal state, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 1998, p. 174‒177. 50 ‘The use of ‘goals’ is, however, meant to preserve the ambivalence between the view that it is the fact that they are wanted and the view that it is what they are wanted for which makes them relevant to practical reason.’ Raz J., The Morality of Freedom, Oxford University Press, Oxford, 1988, p. 291. 51 Wall S., Liberalism, Perfectionism and Restraint, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 1998, p. 10‒13.

Why Political Perfectionism Requires an Account of Ethical Perfectionism | 21

by Rawls and his followers to endorse truth-claims.52 Rawls held that political theories should be neutral between competing conceptions of the good.53 This decision (of epistemic abstinence) may be interpreted as scepticism, as Brian Barry does. But Rawls is very clear on this: he chooses epistemic abstinence because it allows him to satisfy the aim of political philosophy, the achievement of a consensus. Raz argues, however, that endorsing epistemic abstinence while defending a political theory is paradoxical: ‘To recommend one [political theory] as a theory of justice for our societies is to recommend it as a just theory of justice, that is, as a true, or reasonable, or valid theory of justice.’ A political theorist cannot refrain from making judgements about the true and the right as the promotion of a political theory requires the conviction that it is a justified or valid theory. Furthermore, Raz argues that claiming the truth of a limited number of moral values delimits the range of comprehensive views that can be adopted.54 Although Raz does not develop this point further, I suggest the following: to claim a foundational value as true commits the claim-holder to a meta-ethical view about the status of moral values. That would lead to the forfeiture of philosophical neutrality and a commitment to cognitivist meta-ethical views. Onora O’Neill similarly argues that any political theory that takes rights and equality seriously ought to refrain from metaphysical agnosticism. This has for implication that liberal neutralist could be charged not only of epistemic abstinence but also of metaphysical abstinence, as Vinit Haksar has argued in Equality, Liberty and Perfectionism.55 In light of the above, I reject an epistemically abstinent approach such as Rawls’s and Nussbaum’s, where a political perfectionism centred around the promotion of good and valuable lives nevertheless refuses to explicitly endorse some conception of the good as objectively true. Second, EP has more normative force than Prudential Perfectionism and as such can give more legitimacy to Political Perfectionism. PP is contentious enough and many would be suspicious of the thought that it would be legiti-

|| 52 Raz J., ‘Facing Diversity, the Case of Epistemic Abstinence’, Philosophy and Public Affairs, 1990, p. 3‒46. 53 Rawls J., ‘Justice-as-Fairness: Political Not Metaphysical’, Freeman E. (ed.), Collected Papers, Harvard University Press, Cambridge (Massachusetts), 1999. 54 Raz J., ibid. 55 Being metaphysically abstinent refers to a suspension of judgment with respect to the existence or non-existence of a correct conception of the good. Being epistemologically abstinent refers here to a suspension of judgment with respect to whether or not we, as human beings, can know which conception of the good is the right one. O’Neill O., ‘Book Review: Equality, Liberty and Perfectionism by Vinit Haksar’, Mind, p. 629.

22 | Perfectionism: Some Basic Distinctions

mate to promote through political means a particular conception of the good. If we skip the crucial stage of examining EP, it would be even harder to make the legitimacy of this goal persuasive. In other words, given that PP recommends that state actions should be given more scope, it is important to provide a convincing philosophical and moral grounding for that increase in state power. Third, Political Perfectionism would be underdetermined without a specification of the Ethical Perfectionism on which it is grounded. Political Perfectionism requires some account of the good and the morally valuable to have genuine content. Without it, there is a great range of possible Political Perfectionisms, from the weakest forms of Political Perfectionism that would be difficult to distinguish from non-perfectionist liberalisms, to the most extreme and elitist perfectionist views. Without specification of EP and an account of how EP applies to PP, it is difficult to see what Political Perfectionism would be like. As Richard Arneson puts it: The short answer to the question: ‘what perfectionism implies for politics’ is ‘not much’. Or, more circumspectly, it all depends. What kind of perfectionism is held to be true, what views of political morality, this perfectionism is yoked to, and what empirical conditions hold in the setting to which perfectionism is to be applied all shape the doctrine’s political implications.56

In other words, Arneson claims three different things in this quoted passage. First, PP would remain underdetermined if we do not specify EP. In this and the following chapters I will consider a wide range of forms that EP might take; the variety of possible forms that PP can take is correspondingly numerous. Therefore, before developing Political Perfectionism, it is only natural to be clear about EP and what forms it might plausibly take, as the form of EP we adopt could make a dramatic difference to the ways Political Perfectionism can be developed, and to its ultimate plausibility and feasibility. Second, Arneson also claims that the implication perfectionism has for politics would depend on views about political morality. I take views about political morality to be claims about what ethical values should be invoked in the political realm. I also argued in the introduction that the endorsement of EP would not commit us to PP. In the fifth chapter, I will argue for a certain view of political morality. Third, Arneson claims that what perfectionism implies for politics would depend on the specific empirical conditions occurring in a certain situation. I agree with him again; in chapter 5, section 6.4., I claim that scarcity and conflict of interests might block perfectionist interventions. This is why I do not endorse a bold

|| 56 Arneson R.J., ‘Perfectionism and Politics’, Ethics, 2000, p. 39.

Prudential Perfectionism and Objective Goods | 23

definition of perfectionism, which would imply that the state always ought to act in a perfectionist fashion. My definition of Political Perfectionism recognises that empirical circumstances could bar the state from perfectionist action. I suggested earlier that Ethical Perfectionism (EP) is an ethical theory that combines the three following features: (a) certain goods and activities are objectively and intrinsically valuable; (b) an engagement with these goods constitutes the agent’s well-being; (c) these goods play a foundational role in determining what is morally right. In the following sections I shall try to clarify these claims, and consider what might support them. As we saw, Prudential Perfectionism – the conjunction of (a) and (b) – amounts to an endorsement of an OL view. After clarifying what is distinctive of Prudential Perfectionism, I will suggest some arguments for it. Once an argument in favour of Prudential Perfectionism has been made, the step to (c), whilst not logically necessary, is nevertheless relatively simple.

1.3 Prudential Perfectionism and Objective Goods The core of Prudential Perfectionism is the claim that some identifiable goods are objectively and intrinsically valuable. All forms of perfectionism start by the assumption that some goods are more valuable than others and that for a life to go well is for it to engage with (or contain) these goods. In other words, perfectionism imposes definite limits on what can count as valuable goods. This is what Griffin calls the ‘good point buried in perfectionism’.57 Trivially, any definition of the good would include a restricted number of elements in order to delimit the scope of prudence (I take prudence to refer to the set of non-moral selfregarding reasons each of us has to promote his/her own well-being over a lifetime). We can make sense of Griffin’s remark, however, by focusing on the objective list theory that underpins any form of perfectionism. It is not enough to value certain goods for a conception of the good to be perfectionist; these goods need to possess value in a special way: perfectionism attributes intrinsic and objective value to some goods. Goods have intrinsic value if their value does not derive from another good to which they are instrumental; the goods are thus valuable not because they contribute to another more fundamental value (say,

|| 57 Griffin J., Well-Being, Oxford University Press, Oxford, 2002, p. 70.

24 | Perfectionism: Some Basic Distinctions

pleasure), but in themselves.58 Unlike hedonist theories, which recognise only the value of pleasure as intrinsic, perfectionism thus recognises a range of intrinsic values besides pleasure such as knowledge, beauty and deep human interaction (see below). Furthermore, perfectionism attributes objective value to these goods; their value does not depend on individuals’ desires, unlike desiresatisfaction conceptions of the good. Perfectionism is thus committed to the objective value of, say, knowledge, independently from the desire of individuals to gain knowledge. Objective list theories identify some intrinsically and objectively valuable goods as constitutive of well-being (I will use the terms well-being, happiness and the good life interchangeably); individuals contribute to their well-being by engaging with these intrinsically and objectively valuable goods. ‘Objectively valuable’ here means valuable independently from our subjective attitudes. When I speak of ‘objective’, I mean desire-independent.59 On a desire independent account of value, if I do not desire to see Titian paintings, it does not follow from that they are not valuable. The value of Titian paintings is independent from my desiring or not desiring to see them. This needn’t commit me to the stronger claim that values are objective in an unqualified mind-independent sense.60 I will thus only be concerned with objective value in the weaker, desireindependent sense. In Derek Parfit’s words, these goods are ‘good or bad for us, whether or not we want to have the good things, or to avoid the bad things’.61 I will refer to those ‘objectively and intrinsically valuable goods’ as goods, for short, but also occasionally as excellences or perfections.62 It is useful to keep in mind that some of the goods on the list might be good in an impersonal, agent-neutral sense, and contribute to a person’s good because they are independently valuable. In these cases, the value of the good in question is not dependent on the contribution of this good or activity to one’s well-being. It is rather the opposite; the intrinsic value of the good explains why || 58 Frankena W.K., Ethics, Second Edition, 1973. This is a common use of ‘intrinsic value’. Some philosophers prefer to describe such values as final, and reserve ‘intrinsic value’ to what has value only in virtue of its intrinsic properties (cf. Korsgaard C., ‘Two conceptions in goodness’). But this distinction is not important for our purposes. Korsgaard C., ‘Two conceptions in goodness’, The Philosophical Review, XCII, n. 2, 1983. 59 Scanlon T., ‘Preference and Urgency’, The Journal of Philosophy, 1975, p. 658. 60 I am inclined to think that a self-created ‘beautiful’ painting lost in a galaxy in which there is no trace of biological life has no value (cf. G.E. Moore in Principia Ethica). It would be implausible to claim the opposite, that is, that a self-created Titian painting would have value independently from the existence of human beings. 61 Parfit D., Reasons and Persons, Clarendon Press, Oxford, 1992, p. 493. 62 I favour ‘goods’ as it is the least misleading term.

Prudential Perfectionism and Objective Goods | 25

engaging with that good contributes to the individual’s well-being. Darwall expresses this quite clearly: They [virtuous actions] have an intrinsic (agent-neutral) value or merit that is distinct from the contribution they make to eudaemonia, the agent’s own good or welfare, and they are chosen for the sake of that value… There is a way of appreciatively engaging in valuable activities that involves an experienced rapport to the value as exemplified in particular activities. We come to appreciate the value of the activity through a distinctively evaluative mode of awareness we have toward the activity itself.63

This is one way of developing the OL view, and is more plausible for some goods than for others. It is most plausible, as in the quote above, for moral virtue. But it is less clearly plausible for pain or enjoyment. It is plausible to hold the view that physical pleasure is intrinsically valuable, but that the value of pleasure cannot be understood independently because it is a valuable experience and its value derives exclusively from the nature of that experience undergone by an agent. However, I will argue somewhat contentiously that the claim that pleasure cannot be understood independently from the experience undergone by the agent does not imply that pleasure necessarily contributes to the well-being of the agent, or that its value derives from its contribution to individual well-being. There is one consideration that might prevent us from making that step. The contribution of pleasure to well-being will depend on whether or not the agent is endorsing this pleasurable experience. In section 5 of chapter 2, I argue that without the endorsement of the agent, engagement with the goods does not contribute to individual well-being. This claim might seem especially puzzling in cases that involve pleasure. How could I claim that, when it is not endorsed, experiencing pleasure does not contribute at all to the agent’s wellbeing? For now, I will just give an example: Take the case of a woman sitting in a bar listening to some joke told by an acquaintance. The joke is sexist, yet she laughs. Her laughter is pleasurable, she clearly experiences pleasure in listening to the joke. Yet at the same time she regrets this experience and feels betrayed by herself in somehow enjoying the joke and showing that she enjoyed the joke. In other words, she does not endorse the pleasure she experienced. I think it would be intuitive to say that her experiencing pleasure does not contribute to her well-being. Of course, another way to account for this would be to say that she both experienced pleasure and regrets (and thus pain) at the telling of the joke. Both compensate for each other and that explains why the result is no increase in well-being. But I think that this is not how we can really make

|| 63 Darwall S., Welfare and Rational Care, Princeton University Press, Princeton, 2002, p. 18.

26 | Perfectionism: Some Basic Distinctions

sense of this example. It is not merely that pleasure is outweighed by pain, but that the experience of pleasure is undermined by it not being endorsed by the individual. So pleasure’s intrinsic value needn’t derive from its contribution to well-being. Moreover, the extent to which a unit of pleasure will contribute to wellbeing is not a strict reflection of its value (but this is an insight that is already integrated by classical utilitarianism via the use of the notion of marginal utility). The extent of the contribution of a token experience to individual wellbeing will be related to the number and quality of other experiences undergone by the individual. Consider the following example. Imagine an individual who experiences daily a huge amount of pleasure. Let us call this individual Joy. Joy has so much pleasure in her life that she cannot enjoy any other goods, as her attention is constantly distracted by the enormously pleasurable states she is in at all times. Now, let us imagine that we could give Joy an extra tiny unit of pleasure, by, say, tickling her nose with a feather. This extra tiny unit of pleasure would not, I believe, contribute much to her well-being. It would not contribute much to her well-being, because, given the amount of pleasure she has, and the competition that pleasure has in her life with other goods, it would be better for her not to have this added unit of pleasure. This added unit of pleasure might add to her total well-being value as it were, but it adds less units of total well-being value than if Joy was engaging with another good. However, this does not change the fact that this tiny unit of added pleasure is intrinsically valuable. In any case, perfectionism need not claim that the goods on the list are valuable independently of the contribution they make to the individual’s wellbeing.

1.4 Arguments for the Objective List Conception of Well-Being In order to argue for EP, we first need to defend its prudential component, namely the Objective List conception of the good. I will use a definition of wellbeing suggested by Roger Crisp, according to which well-being is for a certain agent ‘how good her life is for her’.64 Given that the Objective List conception of well-being has become a dominant view in recent discussions of well-being, I will only briefly repeat some of the main arguments that have been used to criticise hedonist and desire-satisfaction views of well-being. I will then point to

|| 64 Crisp R., ‘Raz on Well-Being’, Oxford Journal of Legal Studies, 1997, p. 500.

Arguments for the Objective List Conception of Well-Being | 27

certain intuitions that have been used in order to argue more positively in favour of an Objective List conception of well-being. To begin with, let us look at the negative arguments that have been used to show that the competing conceptions of well-being are inadequate. For example, Nozick argued against hedonist conceptions of well-being by using a now well-known thought experiment: the experience machine.65 Imagine that neuropsychologists could plug you into a tank within which you would have all the positive experiences you could think of (writing a great novel, making friends, etc.) without realising that you are in the tank. The question Nozick asks is: should you plug in? Nozick argues that there is a strong intuition that you shouldn’t because you probably want to do certain things, not only to experience them. And these intuitions are not compatible with hedonic conceptions of well-being. Let us consider next arguments against desire-based conceptions. Rawls gives the following example: Imagine someone who has great mathematical skills. His deepest desire is to spend his life counting blades of grass instead of using his skills otherwise.66 According to the desire-based conception, this individual has a good life if he fulfils this desire. But our intuitions are that, even if this choice were fully informed, the agent in question would not have a good life if he were to spend it counting blades of grass. Parfit suggests a further counter-example to desire-based conceptions. He claims that an individual who could fulfil his desire to maximise the amount of pain he causes to other people in total impunity would not have a good life.67 In this case as well, it seems true to say that, even if the agent might be procedurally rational in his deliberation, we would still think of his life as falling short of being a good one.68 Kraut expresses the same point in a different way. He argues that such desire-based theories do not pay enough attention to the content of one’s psychological attitudes. According to desire-based conceptions, ‘it is not what you desire that matters but the fact that you desire it…’.69 In other words, desirebased conceptions of the good seem to focus on psychological states instead of the objects of value themselves. This focus on psychological states causes them to have a ‘wrong direction of fit’. If it is claimed that ‘nothing is good except that || 65 Nozick R., Anarchy, State and Utopia, Blackwell Publishing, Oxford, 2003, p. 42‒43. 66 Rawls J., A Theory of Justice (Revised Edition), Oxford University Press, Oxford, 1999, p. 372. 67 Parfit D., Reasons and Persons, Oxford University Press, Oxford, 1992, p. 500. 68 For detailed arguments by a perfectionist against desire-based conceptions of the good, see Sher G., Beyond Neutrality, Perfectionism and Politics, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 1997, chapter 8. 69 Kraut R., What is Good and Why, Harvard University Press, Cambridge, MA, 2007, p. 108.

28 | Perfectionism: Some Basic Distinctions

wanting or planning makes it so’, this is difficult to reconcile with our more fundamental intuition that the order of explanation goes the other way around: we desire things because they are good. For example, it seems that we desire pleasure because it is good (and it is not made good because of our desiring).70 This argument of Kraut implies that even the most sophisticated form of desirebased conception of the good (one that reads ‘what is good for someone is the satisfaction of his properly informed and rational desires’), would still fail to stand up to scrutiny. So far I have looked only at negative arguments against hedonist and desire-based conceptions. There are two kinds of positive arguments in favour of an OL view. One kind of positive argument invokes human nature.71 This kind of argument points to essential features claimed to constitute human nature, so as to derive from them a series of goods. The value of all the goods, on this view, derives from these specifically human features. I believe that this kind of argument fails for reasons I discuss in chapter 2 section 6. The second kind of positive argument is not so much an argument as a series of intuitions about the goodness of various states and activities, independently of the pleasure they produce or desires they might satisfy.72 The use of such an intuitive approach to justify Objective List conception of the good might be seen as a weakness. However, I believe that these are strong intuitions about the intrinsic value of e.g. personal relationships, knowledge or achievement. Moreover, they are relied upon on a daily basis by most individuals. Among political philosophers, even those who reject political perfectionism subscribe to these intuitions. For instance, although Rawls rejects perfectionism, he does not deny that on a daily life basis, ‘comparisons of intrinsic value can obviously be made… [and] judgments of value have an important place in human affairs’.73 Another example is Martha Nussbaum. To those who deny that they are committed to holding certain values as intrinsically valuable, Nussbaum offers the following behavioural test: ‘in certain specific argumentative contexts, we may point out that our in-

|| 70 Kraut R., ibid., p. 99. Judith Jarvis Thompson makes a similar argument when discussing the relationship between hypothetical consent and justice. Thomson argues that it is not because citizens in informed and rational conditions would consent to a set of rules that make them just; it is because these rules are just that citizens in their ‘right’ mind would consent to them. Judith Jarvis Thompson, The Realm of Rights, Harvard University Press, 1990, p. 188. 71 Hurka T., Perfectionism, Oxford University Press, Oxford, 1993. Foot Philipa, Natural Goodness, Oxford University Press, Oxford, 2010. Sher G., ibid. 72 Raz J., The Morality of Freedom, Oxford University Press, Oxford, 1988. Moore G.E., Principia Ethica. Hurka T., Virtue Vice and Value, Oxford University Press, Oxford, 2003. 73 Rawls J., A Theory of justice (Revised Edition), Oxford University Press, Oxford, 1999, p. 288.

The Step from Prudential Perfectionism to Ethical Perfectionism | 29

terlocutor’s very behaviour shows that she grants the centrality of the element on whose centrality we are insisting. There would thus be a pragmatic selfcontradiction were she to reply by denying its importance. Thus it would be selfcontradictory to engage in philosophical argument about the ends of human life and then deny that reason and argument have any importance.’74 Naturally, many who deny the intrinsic value of the goods on the list might be found to contradict their own publicly held convictions if their own lifestyles are scrutinized. Thus an Objective List conception of the good may better reflect our intuitions on what matters. Our intuitions about well-being and the good life seem to have a strong objective component that goes beyond hedonism or even the satisfaction of subjective desires and preferences.75 Although hedonic and desiresatisfaction conceptions have supported neutralism, the view that there are objective goods have been gaining ground and is supported by strong intuitions. The implications of this shift for political philosophy have not been fully drawn.

1.5 The Step from Prudential Perfectionism to Ethical Perfectionism I have focused so far on Prudential Perfectionism which is a conception of wellbeing. Let us turn now to EP, which is a distinctive ethical theory based on such Objective List conception of well-being. Hurka endorses Ethical Perfectionism; he claims that perfectionism is a specific ethical theory which identifies the morally right as the promotion of the goods on an Objective List conception of well-being. According to Hurka, perfectionism is a moral theory according to which certain states or activities of human beings, such as knowledge, achievement and artistic creation, are good apart from any pleasure or happiness they bring, and what is morally right is what most promotes these human ‘excellences’ or ‘perfections’.76

|| 74 Nussbaum M., ‘Aristotle, Politics and Human Capabilities: A Response to Antony, Arneson, Charlesworth and Mulgan’, Ethics, vol. 111, n. 1, 2000, p. 122. 75 Even Ronald Dworkin who has famously claimed that neutrality was the distinctive feature of liberalism has more recently argued that liberals should not be neutral at an abstract level of ethics and endorses an objective list conception of well-being. Dworkin R., Sovereign Virtue, The Theory and Practice of Equality, Harvard University Press, London, 2002, p. 237‒284. 76 Hurka T., ‘Perfectionism’, Routledge Encyclopedia of Philosophy.

30 | Perfectionism: Some Basic Distinctions

In my view, if the above arguments above for the OL are correct then the step to EP is relatively simple, since most ethical theories see well-being as morally significant and as playing a role in guiding right action. The Perfectionist Principle which is defined below is the core principle of Ethical Perfectionism. The Perfectionist Principle: There is a significant reason to protect and promote the objective goods of all individuals. The claim that we have reasons to protect the objective good of individuals is accepted more widely than the claim that we have reasons to promote the objective good of individuals. In chapter 5, I will offer extensive argument for the transition from the claim that we have a reason to protect individual good, to the claim that we have a reason to promote individual good. But for present purposes, it is enough to point out the truism that concern for others is central to morality. Each individual has her own well-being to protect and promote. But morality takes an impartial standpoint, from which (a) each individual well-being matters ethically and (b) each individual well-being weighs equally. Given that one of the basic assumption of morality is that individual well-being matters equally it seems to follow that we should treat individual well-being the way we treat something of value: by protecting and helping it grow. Before concluding this chapter, I will offer some other intuitions to back up the Perfectionist Principle, intuitions that suggest that excellences such as creative achievement and understanding are ethically and not only prudentially significant. Many have a strong intuition that a world with more perfections is more valuable than a world with fewer. To see this, consider world A and world B, similar in every single aspect, except that in world B, some of the best artists of world A are absent. We assume here that they are not replaced by other equivalent artists. Shakespeare, Beethoven and Rembrandt exist in world A, but they do not exist in world B. There is a strong intuition that world A is superior

The Step from Prudential Perfectionism to Ethical Perfectionism | 31

to world B. Therefore, one could confidently say that a world with more perfection is more valuable than a world with less.77 However, someone might object that our judgement that world A is superior to world B is due to the fact that there would be aesthetic reasons (and not ethical ones) to choose the first. To this line of objection, one could reply only that the intuition in question is not only aesthetic but also ethical. The mere existence of a Shakespeare in world A makes an ethical difference, because of the ethical value in the achievement of that life. It is not only the beauty of his writings, that is, his creations that make world A superior to world B; it is the ethical value of a life engaged with artistic expression (and the ethical value of the lives of all the other individuals engaged with his work). If one could choose to create one of these two worlds, this choice does not seem morally indifferent. Another way of arguing for the difference in ethical value between the two worlds would be to deny the distinctness of the ethical as a class apart from the aesthetic. I am not going to develop this idea very deeply, because that is not the line I will take. But aesthetic criteria often get mixed up with ethical judgement. Much of our ethical vocabulary has aesthetic connotations: the vulgar, noble actions, ugly acts, etc. It is no coincidence if we use an aesthetic vocabulary to express ethical judgements. The concept of moral repulsion has often been phenomenologically described as an aesthetic experience. Take, for instance, Oscar Wilde’s novel, The Picture of Dorian Gray, in which the ethical corruption of Dorian Gray is literally reflected by the corruption of his looks in his portrait.78 EP could be defended on the basis of the claim that the ethical should not be understood as entirely distinct from the aesthetic. By sharing our concerns about the good life, EP can provide a partial answer to Bernard Williams’ influential criticism that mainstream ethical theories do not give enough consideration to the central projects that give meaning to our lives, and that giving systematic priority to the moral over the prudential is mistaken.79 EP cannot avoid this objection altogether, because there will some-

|| 77 Ross makes a similar thought experiment to test the value of understanding: ‘[Consider] two states of the universe equal in respect of virtue and of pleasure and of the allocation of pleasure to the virtuous, but such that the persons in the one had a far greater understanding of the nature and laws of the universe than those in the other. Can anyone doubt that the first would be a better state of the universe?’ W.D. Ross, The Right and the Good, Oxford University Press, Oxford, 1930, p. 139. 78 However, the opposite has also been argued, that is, that the ethical and the aesthetic are fundamentally opposed. See Kierkegaard S., Either/Or: Fragments of a Life, Princeton University Press, New Jersey, 1987. 79 Williams B., Ethics and the Limits of Philosophy, Routledge, London, 2006.

32 | Perfectionism: Some Basic Distinctions

times be tension between the central projects of a specific individual and other individuals’ central projects. However, whereas many ethical views leave little space for individuals’ pursuit of central projects, or at least do not see that pursuit as possessing ethical value, EP recognises the pursuit and promotion of such projects (so long as they revolve around genuine goods) as a central aim of ethical theory. By doing that, it already fares better than competing ethical theories when confronted with Williams’ objection.

1.6 The Step from Ethical Perfectionism to Political Perfectionism I have argued so far in favour of Prudential Perfectionism and Ethical Perfectionism. Something remains to be said about the step from Ethical Perfectionism to Political Perfectionism. If you believe that the Perfectionist Principle is correct, that is, that there is a reason to protect and promote intrinsically valuable goods, then it should be easy enough to convince you that such a reason applies to the state. To those who aren’t yet convinced that this is the case, one could point to the presence of other ethical principles which already apply to the reasoning behind existing state policies. Take a debate on the allocation of resources between say healthcare and Christmas decorations of the street. Within this debate, consequentialist considerations as to the effect the allocations of resources will have on individuals’ well-being and deontological considerations relating to the rights of individuals will be crucial in determining the level of resources allocated to each. This is to say that ethical principles are already part of political reasoning and there is nothing odd about using normative concepts in our political discourse. I have suggested so far that by appropriately qualifying Ethical Perfectionism, we could arrive at a more plausible form of Political Perfectionism. I have not yet given my own definition of Political Perfectionism and I intend to remedy to that now. Given that I take Ethical Perfectionism to ground Political Perfectionism, I will just modify the Perfectionist Principle so that it is appropriate for the state. The Political Perfectionist Principle will thus be defined as: Political Perfectionist Principle: There is a significant reason for the state to protect and promote intrinsically valuable goods. This Political Perfectionist Principle grounds straightforwardly what I earlier called the Prima Facie definition of Political Perfectionism.

The Step from Ethical Perfectionism to Political Perfectionism | 33

Prima Facie Political Perfectionism: The state has a significant reason to protect and promote intrinsically valuable goods on the basis of their intrinsic value. Recall that I took Political Perfectionism to require not only Prima Facie Political Perfectionism but also Modest Political Perfectionism. In other words, I will endorse the following definition of Political Perfectionism: Political Perfectionism: The state is permitted and justified to protect and promote the opportunities for citizens to engage with intrinsically valuable goods on the basis of their intrinsic value. Before concluding this chapter, it would be useful to compare my definition of Political Perfectionism with some existing definitions. My definition tries to occupy an intermediate ground between two definitions of Political Perfectionism. As you may recall from the introduction, one type of definition is very modest; it defines Political Perfectionism as the state being permitted to protect and promote some goods on the basis of claims about intrinsic value. The other kind of definition is more ambitious: it argues that the state ought to promote the goods of its citizens. The Modest Definition: The state is permitted to protect and promote intrinsically valuable goods on the basis of their intrinsic value. The Bold Definition: The state ought to protect and promote intrinsically valuable goods on the basis of their intrinsic value. This distinction is important to note because it highlights the fact that Political Perfectionism can be very modest in its ambitions. Many liberal perfectionists do not claim that the state should go about promoting any contentious conception of the good it wants to promote but merely that it is permissible for the state to act on the basis of claims of intrinsic value/moral reasons/metaphysical views. The most influential definitions have belonged to this modest type. The modest definition amounts to nothing more than a principled denial of the neutralist principle.80

|| 80 Recall that the neutralist principle claims that ‘ …political decisions must be so far as possible, independent of any particular conception of the good life, or of what gives value to life….’ Dworkin R., A Matter of Principle, Clarendon Press, Oxford, 1986, p. 191.

34 | Perfectionism: Some Basic Distinctions

Let us now look at some of the definitions on the modest side. Joseph Raz takes the view that perfectionism amounts to the absence of general impermissibility for the government to act on the basis of a moral reason: perfectionism is not to be equated with the view that governments should always pursue all moral considerations at all costs. It is the view that whether or not a particular moral objective should be pursued by legal means is a question to be judged on the merit of each case, or class of cases, and not by a general exclusionary rule, as the so-called ‘neutralists’ would have it.81

Raz insists that the endorsement of perfectionism does not mean that the state needs always to act for a valid moral reason; there might be practical or political reasons for that not to be the case: perfectionism is merely a term used to indicate that there is no fundamental principled inhibition on governments acting for any valid moral reason, though there are many strategic inhibitions on doing so in certain classes of cases.82

In other words, according to Raz, the endorsement of perfectionism is merely the denial of the validity of the neutrality thesis. Raz leaves open the possibility that political reasons might block perfectionist intervention. The state should not necessarily do what it is ethical for it to do. In other words, as Jerry Cohen has claimed: ‘the question of what is the true conception of ethics is different from the question of what the state should do.’83 The definition given by Jeremy Waldron also fits the modest definition of Political Perfectionism: ‘…perfectionism is simply the view that legislators and officials may consider what is good and valuable in life and what is ignoble and depraved when drafting the laws and setting the framework for social and personal relationships.’84 Very recently, Jonathan Quong has defined political perfectionism in a similar fashion. Quong defines Political Perfectionism in the following way: It is at least sometimes legitimate for a liberal state to promote or discourage particular activities, ideals or ways of life on grounds relating to their inherent or intrinsic value, or on the basis of other metaphysical claims.

|| 81 Raz J., ‘Facing Up: a Reply’ Southern California Law Review 62, 1989, p. 1231. 82 Raz J., ibid., p. 1230. 83 G.A. Cohen, On the Currency of Equality and other Philosophical Essays, Otsuka M. (ed.), Princeton University Press, p. 227. 84 Waldron J., ‘Autonomy and Perfectionism in Raz’ Morality of Freedom’, Southern California Law Review, vol. 62: 1097, 1988‒1989, p. 1102.

The Step from Ethical Perfectionism to Political Perfectionism | 35

This definition is again very modest, as it claims that the state could sometimes promote some activities on the basis of claims about intrinsic value. I reject this definition for two main reasons. First, Quong identifies the objects of promotion as ‘particular activities, ideals or ways of life’. The use of particular in Quong’s definition could suggest that perfectionism is necessarily parochial. But, as I will argue in the next chapter, the intrinsically and objectively valuable goods can and ought to be defined at an abstract level, allowing for a broad variety of cultural instances (or tokens) of these goods. Second, Quong’s definition implies that he takes claims of intrinsic value to be metaphysical claims! Claims about intrinsic value are substantive claims about value, but they do not necessarily imply any specific metaphysical view. I take this instance to be part of a more general confusion when it pertains to claims about metaphysics, morality or intrinsic value. Because neutralist liberals are suspicious of metaphysics, they have also become suspicious of claims about morality and claims about intrinsic value. In the end, they have come to take all of those claims to be on a par. This seems to me a mistake. My definition tries to make a positive claim by stating that there is a reason for the state to act on perfectionist grounds, while remaining more modest than the proponents of the Bold Definition by keeping the possibility open that this perfectionist reason gets defeated by other reasons or considerations. As a representative of the Bold Definition, we could take Steven Wall’s definition of Political Perfectionism. According to him, Political Perfectionism claims that ‘political authorities should take an active role in creating and maintaining social conditions that best enable their subjects to lead valuable and worthwhile lives.’85 This is a constructive and ambitious definition of perfectionism. This aspect of this definition stands out as most definitions tend to make more modest claims. Unfortunately, unlike my definition, this definition does not explicitly point to the intrinsic value of some goods in individuals’ lives. It is important to point to the intrinsic value of the goods, as I argued that it was a distinctive feature of Political Perfectionism (which isn’t shared by multiculturalist, communitarians or neoconservatives for instance). Beyond the terminological unclarity revealed in Quong’s definition above, there is a more important point to make against liberal neutralists: it is important to realize that not all metaphysical, moral claims or claims about intrinsic value are suspicious. We rely on metaphysical assumptions in our daily life. For instance, let us say that you have arranged to meet some friends at a certain

|| 85 Wall S., Liberalism, Perfectionism and Restraint, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 1998, p. 8.

36 | Perfectionism: Some Basic Distinctions

time and place. You organize your day so as to be at this time and place. One of the metaphysical assumptions that you are making is that your friends are real people. They exist outside your mind and would notice it if you were not to show up. Second, the same thing could be said about true moral claims and claims of intrinsic value. Some moral claims are difficult to reject, such as the claim that torturing people for fun is wrong. There is nothing obscure about this claim and there is nothing contentious about it either. If you understand what sentience means, and if you know what pain is, inflicting pain to another individual for fun is wrong. Similarly, some claims about intrinsic value, such as the claim that pleasure is good and pain bad are very intuitive claims. By giving up on appealing to these claims liberals give up on using claims that are accepted, in one form or another, by virtually everyone.

1.7 Conclusion In this chapter, I clarified the key notions of Prudential Perfectionism, Ethical Perfectionism and Political Perfectionism. I identified Prudential Perfectionism with an Objective List conception of well-being, and suggested that Ethical Perfectionism further claims that we have moral duties to protect and promote the goods of the Objective List view from an impartial standpoint. I argued that Political Perfectionism needed to be grounded on an account of Ethical Perfectionism for several reasons. First, I rejected political theories which claimed to be epistemically abstinent. Second, I claimed that Political Perfectionism needed Ethical Perfectionism to have concrete content. Third, I claimed that Ethical Perfectionism was more likely to give normative legitimacy to Political Perfectionism. In the rest of the chapter, I set out arguments in favour of Prudential Perfectionism. I rejected both desire-based and hedonic conceptions of the good life, and argued in favour of the adoption of an Objective List view, mainly on the grounds that it corresponds to many of our core intuitions about the prudentially good. I next discussed a specific feature of Prudential Perfectionism, which was the relationship it posited between intrinsically and objectively valuable goods on one hand, and well-being on the other hand. Finally, I suggested that once Prudential Perfectionism is accepted, it is easy to defend Ethical Perfectionism, and that once Ethical Perfectionism is endorsed, it is hard not to endorse Political Perfectionism.

2 Perfectionist Goods In the previous chapter, I attempted to clarify the relation between Prudential Perfectionism, Ethical Perfectionism and Political Perfectionism. I argued that perfectionists need to pay special attention to Ethical Perfectionism, as it not only grounds Political Perfectionism but also gives it its substantive content. Recall that, in the previous chapter, I defined Ethical Perfectionism as a view that claimed that it was morally right to protect and promote an engagement with the goods on the Objective List conception of well-being. In this chapter, I will focus on Prudential Perfectionism, and try to clarify what objective goods it should recognize. In the next chapter, I will turn to look into the structure of Ethical Perfectionism as an ethical theory. I will start by considering candidate lists of goods offered by various authors, and defend my own list of such intrinsically and objectively valuable goods. My list of goods includes both actions and states of affairs because I take both to be intrinsically valuable. I will then look at the distinction between these goods themselves and our opportunities to engage with them. From the perspective of Ethical Perfectionism, ethical evaluation of individual lives on the basis of whether or not they actually engage with the goods is paramount. However, for the purpose of Political Perfectionism, the appropriate focus should be on the protection and promotion of opportunities to engage with these goods, so as to secure the autonomy of individuals. The most important part of this chapter will critically examine attempts to provide what I call a unifying account of the good. I will focus here on George Sher’s attempt to offer such a unifying account of perfectionist goods. I will argue that no such unifying account can be given. I will then turn to consider Nussbaum’s attempt to ground political perfectionism in an overlapping consensus. I will suggest that, although it would be beneficial for Political Perfectionism to be based on a list of goods that command such an overlapping consensus, the relevant list of goods cannot be justified by such an overlapping consensus. Perfectionist goods are objectively valuable goods and their status as such cannot be grounded in the actual endorsement of individuals.

2.1 Basic Terminology Before we begin, let me start with some terminological remarks. I will sometime refer to objective goods as ‘excellences’ or ‘perfections’, but I will mostly describe them as ‘goods’, because this seems a more appropriate term. Such goods

38 | Perfectionist Goods

typically consist in the development of a talent, state of mind or character trait of an individual to a certain degree, but I will take them to also include achievements and states of mind.86 Some critics of perfectionism have defined excellences in a much narrower way. Rawls, for example, takes excellences to refer only to cultural achievements, and he therefore assumes that perfectionism is mostly concerned with such cultural achievements.87 But perfectionism can endorse a much wider list of goods than Rawls recognizes, once ‘excellence’ is understood to refer to physical and mental states as well as to achievements.

2.2 What Should we include in our List of Objective Goods? Several lists of goods have been suggested in the literature. I will now turn to critically examine them, and then offer a list of goods that I take to be the most plausible. I will classify these lists according to the ways I take them to be deficient.

2.2.1 Too Sparse Let us start with David Brink’s list, as it is among the most parsimonious. Brink claims that the list should include the reflective pursuit and realization of agents’ reasonable projects and certain personal and social relationships.88 This list’s advantage is that it wouldn’t be especially contentious, as few would reject the goods suggested by Brink. But I believe this list is too sparse (as well as too abstract and general) to offer much concrete guidance. Although the list

|| 86 I understand the term ‘achievement’ to refer to valuable outcomes resulting from intentional actions aiming at the realisation of a project. I mean outcomes here in the broad sense; not necessarily tangible but nevertheless observable actions/creations. For instance, climbing a mountain does not have a tangible outcome but is an achievement, something that has been accomplished and it can be considered as an outcome in this broad sense. 87 ‘If it is taken as the realization of human excellence in the various forms of culture, we have what may be called perfectionism. This notion is found in Aristotle and Nietzsche, among others.’ Rawls J., ‘Classical Utilitarianism’, in Scheffler S. (ed.), Consequentialism and its critics, Oxford University Press, Oxford, 1988, p. 16‒17. 88 Brink D.O., Perfectionism and the Common Good, Oxford University Press, Oxford, 2003.

What Should we include in our List of Objective Goods? | 39

of goods should be abstract enough to allow for a plurality of specific goods, if it is too abstract it would fail to give us any concrete sense of what counts as objectively valuable.89 Let us look at another list of goods that, I think, is too narrow to capture the variety of intrinsic goods that can be instantiated in a human life. Hurka’s list includes only physical perfection, theoretical rationality and practical rationality. This list is a bit less abstract, but it misses entirely the value of social relationships, as relationships would not fall clearly under either practical or theoretical rationality. Hurka’s list is thus definitely too sparse. Parfit offers the following list of goods: moral goodness, rational activity, the development of one’s abilities, having children and being a good parent, knowledge, and the awareness of true beauty.90 This list captures much of what seems to be intrinsically valuable in a life. However, parents-children relationships do not exhaust the range of possible valuable personal relationships. Parfit’s list may thus be amended to allow for the more general good of deep personal relationships, as well as the good of enjoyment.

2.2.2 Refer to goods that are not fundamental Let us thus move to examine the list of goods that is put forward by Raz. Raz suggests that our notion of a successful life is: of a life well spent, of a life of achievement, of handicaps overcome, talents widely used, of good judgment in the conduct of one’s affairs, of warm and trusting relations with family and friends, stormy and enthusiastic involve-

|| 89 Richard Arneson has made a similar criticism against Nussbaum’s list of goods. I don’t think this is a fair criticism of Nussbaum, given that, as we shall soon see, her list is much more specific than most. Arneson R.J., ‘Perfectionism and Politics’, Ethics, 2000, p. 49. 90 Parfit D., Reasons and Persons, Clarendon Press, Oxford, 1992, p. 499.

40 | Perfectionist Goods

ment with other people, many hours spent having fun in good company, and so on.91 This list seems to be on the right track as it gives a better representation of the variety of intrinsic goods in human life. However, there are some infelicitous elements. Let us here just mention one: this list does not really identify the fundamental objective goods that are intrinsically valuable, as it includes goods whose value derive from more fundamental goods. For instance, ‘many hours spent having fun in good company’ is a combination of pleasure and good company, and it is not clear which property is the good-maker. Given that Raz recommends an active involvement with goods, he might shy away from recognising pleasure as a good, but then one wonders why the time spent in good company ought to be fun for it to count as good. What I mean to point out here is the indeterminacy of the good-maker in the good identified as ‘many hours spent having fun in good company’. Is it the good company that makes the time spent in this way valuable? Or is it the experience of fun which explains the value of the activity? Moreover, any reference to the predicate ‘good’ in a list that is supposed to identify intrinsically valuable goods is question begging. Arneson proposes the following list of goods: great accomplishments, having relations of love and friendship, having experiences that are interesting and pleasant, fulfilling one’s important reasonable aims, or a least a subset among them, having a rudimentary understanding of the world one inhabits including its people, having ordinary bodily vigour and good health…92 This list is getting closer to what we are looking for. However, there are a few drawbacks. First, there is the same problem I identified above in Raz’ list: the reference to ‘experiences that are interesting and pleasant’ can be criticized in the same way. The phrase ‘experiences that are interesting and pleasant’ refers to two distinct goods, which begs the question as to which is the good-maker. Is it the fact that experiences are pleasant that make them eligible to the list of goods or the fact that they are interesting? Moreover, there is a reference to aims (this problem is shared by the Brink’s sparse list which refers to ‘projects’). Arneson qualifies aims as ‘important and reasonable’. This qualification is crucial because it presumably excludes aims

|| 91 Raz J., The Morality of Freedom, Oxford University Press, Oxford, 1988, p. 306. 92 Arneson R., ibid., p. 53.

What Should we include in our List of Objective Goods? | 41

that we would not think make a life better or more valuable. For instance, it would exclude the unreasonable aim of ‘counting blades of grass’ and the nonimportant teenage aim of becoming a celebrity. However, I have two objections to the inclusion of aims as one of the goods: First, I do not think aims should be one of the goods, because on an OL view, nothing is valuable merely because it is an aim. The problem with using ‘aims’ as goods, is that it amounts to saying that these goods are goods only if the individual wants them, which would be incompatible with their objectivity. Second, the importance of individual choice in determining what constitutes well-being will be better accounted for by a second-order endorsement constraint on the goods of the list. I think that we should rather claim that some instances of objective goods, relationships and pleasures are constitutive of well-being only if the individual wants to have these specific instances of goods in her life. I section 5 of this chapter, I will discuss in more detail what I take this second-order endorsement constraint to be. Roger Crisp has been similarly critical of Raz for taking ‘goals’ to be a good. He points out that giving normative importance to goals is in tension with an objective list of goods.93 My discussion of Arneson, I believe, also helps reply to Crisp’s worry. The tension Crisp identifies is that, on one hand, Raz argues that the well-being of an individual ought to be assessed independently from the desires of that individual. In other words, Raz is committed to an objective conception of a person’s good. On the other hand, Raz argues that it does not make sense to say that an agent’s well-being is negatively affected by his not becoming a violinist if he never wanted to become a violinist in the first place.94 Moreover, taking important reasonable aims to be goods might be problematic in another way. It might fail to capture the phenomenology of human life. Jeremy Waldron has claimed that ‘the idea of living a life from beginning to end according to a plan is both implausible and unattractive.’95 There are aims we endorse once we are getting involved in an activity and there are activities we enjoy ‘aimlessly’. Take Lucia, who wanted to become a violinist all her life. In a first scenario, Lucia becomes a violinist and endorses being a violinist. In this case, both the notion of aim and of endorsement seem to lead to the same result which is that it is crucial in establishing an individual’s well-being to consider what her aim (or project) is. However, if you take a second scenario, in which

|| 93 Crisp R., ‘Raz on Well-Being’, Oxford Journal of Legal Studies, vol. 17, n. 3, 1997, p. 504‒505. 94 Raz J., The Morality of Freedom, p. 292. 95 Waldron J., ‘Autonomy and Perfectionism in Raz’ Morality of Freedom’, Southern California Law Review, 1988‒1989, p. 1107.

42 | Perfectionist Goods

Lucia becomes a violinist but once she become a violinist she does not endorse her violinist career, we will have very different results if we believe that an agent’s well-being is determined by her aims or if we believe that an agent’s well-being is partially determined by whether or not she endorses whatever she is doing. If we take aims to matter, then on this view, Lucia has a good life. If we take the endorsement constraint, her well-being is seriously reduced by her not endorsing her violinist career. But it nevertheless would make sense to say that she would be worse off if she did not engage in any artistic achievement. We cannot have a conception of well-being which would expect from every single individual to engage with all the instances of the general good, but an objective conception of the good would require the existence of some instances of each (or almost each) general good for the individual to have a good life.

2.2.3 Contain too many goods Let us look at Martha Nussbaum’s list of goods, which is one of the most complete and plausible: 1. Being able to live to the end of a complete human life, as far as is possible; not dying prematurely, or before one’s life is so reduced as to be not worth living. 2. Being able to have good health; to be adequately nourished; to have adequate shelter; having opportunities for sexual satisfaction; being able to move from place to place. 3. Being able to avoid unnecessary and non-beneficial pain and to have pleasurable experiences. 4. Being able to use the five senses; being able to imagine, to think, and to reason. 5. Being able to have attachments to things and persons outside ourselves; to love those who love and care for us, to grieve at their absence, in general, to love, grieve, to feel longing and gratitude. 6. Being able to form a conception of the good and to engage in critical reflection about the planning of one’s life. 7. Being able to live for and with others, to recognize and show concern for other human beings, to engage in various forms of familial and social interaction. 8. Being able to live with concern for and in relation to animals, plants and the world of nature. 9. Being able to laugh, to play, to enjoy recreational activities.

What Should we include in our List of Objective Goods? | 43

10. Being able to live one’s own life and nobody else’s; being able to live one’s own life in one’s very own surroundings and contest. 96 Nussbaum gave this list in the context of defending Aristotelian Essentialism, a view that she abandons in later work. This list is a list of capabilities and it is the most successful among those we considered so far. One of the important insights that this list is calling our attention to is that it takes ‘avoiding unnecessary and non-beneficial pain’ as an intrinsic good. These goods weren’t figuring on other lists, because these goods are usually taken to be either of neutral value or of instrumental value to allow for engagement with intrinsically valuable goods. Giving them intrinsic value is not trivial. This is a very important insight provided by Nussbaum: it would be very counter-intuitive to claim that relieving pain is required just so that the individual can appreciate a beautiful sunset. Relieving pain is good in itself and the value of relieving pain does not need thus to be instrumental to anything else.97 I think however that Nussbaum’s list includes too many (capabilities for) goods. For instance, I do not think that the ability to have shelter is intrinsically valuable. I believe however that one could say that one needs to have shelter in order not to feel pain. And I would certainly agree that the absence of pain is intrinsically valuable. But I am also suspicious of taking health to be intrinsically valuable. I would think that health is instrumentally valuable to the extent that it allows us to avoid the experience of pain and to be able to function normally.

2.2.4 A Plausible List of Objective Goods I will now draw from the discussion so far to suggest a plausible list that, I believe, avoids some of the problems mentioned above. I take the following goods to constitute an appropriate list for Ethical Perfectionism: Empathy, rational activity, knowledge, understanding, craft, physical (bodily) skills, deep personal relationships, the awareness of beauty, pleasure and the

|| 96 Nussbaum M., Human Functioning and Social Justice, Political Theory, 1992, p. 222. 97 Another way of avoiding the claim that relieving pain is instrumentally valuable would be to use a non-exclusive perfectionism, which, as I will explain in the third chapter, allows for the use of non-perfectionist principles within a theory.

44 | Perfectionist Goods

absence of pain, autonomy, artistic and technological creativity, awareness of the human condition (or wisdom), awareness of nature. I add empathy because I believe that an aspect of psychological flourishing is missing in the previous lists. I take empathy to be a moral emotion, a good psychological feature, which connects us to other individuals. Knowledge, understanding and rational activity are all referring to different uses of the same cognitive capacities. Crafts and technological creativity I take to be instances in which human beings transform the external world. One could retort that human beings’ shaping of the world has been all but beneficent. This is true, but all intrinsic goods can be used for bad ends. The claim that these goods have intrinsic value does not prevent them from having instrumental disvalue. Awareness of the human condition and awareness of natural splendour I take to be features indicating a particular kind of understanding allowing human beings to transcend their own narrow interests to appreciate another perspective on life which takes up the bigger picture. Finally, with Nussbaum, I take autonomy to be intrinsically valuable.

2.3 Realizing Goods vs. Opportunities Nussbaum’s list raises an interesting issue. Contrary to what might appear from reading this list, Nussbaum intends to defend a list of capabilities, and not of goods – or, in her terminology, ‘functionings’.98 That has great significance, as this is really a list that should be understood to demand opportunities to achieve these functionings. If sufficient opportunities are present, individuals will be able to develop these capabilities.99 Capabilities ought to be favoured over functionings, according to Nussbaum, in order to show respect for the autonomy of

|| 98 Sen defines capabilities and functionings in the following way: ‘Functionings represent parts of the state of a person – in particular the various things that he or she manages to do or be in leading a life…. Capability of a person reflects the alternative combination of functionings the person can achieve and from which he or she can choose one collection.’ Sen A., Capabilities and Well-Being, in The Quality of Life, Sen A. and Nussbaum M. (eds.), p. 31. 99 Nussbaum thinks that, even in cases of disabilities, providing opportunities could make a big difference in allowing most disabled individuals to reach a sufficient level of capabilities. Nussbaum M., Frontiers of Justice: Disability, Nationality, Species Membership, Harvard University Press, Harvard, 2006.

Realizing Goods vs. Opportunities | 45

individuals.100 This being said, one could turn any of the list previously examined into a list of capabilities by replacing the goods by ‘opportunities to engage with the goods’. Arneson argues against privileging capabilities over functionings. He claims that privileging capabilities would lead us towards endorsing subsidies over a policy based on public persuasion (which according to him is more functioning-oriented.).101 However, I will argue that both policies are capabilityoriented. It seems that Arneson’s claim assumes that public persuasion focuses on functioning by providing reasons actually to exercise the capability instead of providing financial conditions that give individuals the opportunity to exercise the capability. But both reasons and financial help provide only opportunities. Even if someone is persuaded by a specific policy based on public persuasion that opera is a valuable activity, it does not follow from that fact alone that the individual will go to the next opera production. I do not think that rational persuasion has a definite impact on whether or not an individual will engage with a good; persuasion might not always lead to an engagement with the good. Persuasion can only convince someone of the value of an activity, but even if successful, this wouldn’t be enough to lead the individual to engage with the good: there are other factors that are at stake in the decision to actually engage with a good (such as the relative costs of the activity, the time available, the competitive appeal of other activities, weakness of will, etc.). The same applies to subsidies: neither policy can ensure functionings but both can considerably increase opportunities to engage with these goods (that is capabilities). However, this debate can be sidestepped once we are clear on whether we are discussing Ethical or Political Perfectionism. EP requires a list of goods, that is, of functionings. EP assesses individuals’ lives on the basis of how well they went. It would not make sense for EP to judge individuals’ lives on the basis of the opportunities they had. If Henry had many opportunities to have an interesting and fulfilling job, deep personal relationships and a broad education but failed to seize any of these opportunities, and, as a result, had a boring job, shallow and minimal interactions with others, no projects of his own and was ignorant, it would be odd to say that he had a good life. As an ethical theory, it is clear that EP is concerned with actual functionings. By contrast, as a political theory, I will argue that Political Perfectionism ought to restrict itself to the promotion of opportunities to engage with the goods. If PP were to promote

|| 100 Nussbaum M., ‘Aristotle, Politics and Human Capabilities: A Response to Antony, Arneson, Charlesworth and Mulgan’, Ethics, vol. 111, n. 1, 2000, p. 130. 101 Arneson R., ibid., p. 63.

46 | Perfectionist Goods

functionings, this would allow coercion of citizens to force them to engage with the goods. First, coercing individuals to engage with the goods would cause problems of legitimacy. At least in the context of a liberal democratic context, the scope for promoting functioning as such seems to be quite limited.102 Respecting the value of autonomy is far too important in our societies for a state who shows contempt for it to be legitimate. Second, it isn’t even clear that one could ever directly affect functionings through institutions. Even from an individual perspective, our ability to promote others’ engagement with the goods is limited. Ross claimed for this reason that we only have a weak set of duties to help others perfect themselves and that we ought mostly to pursue our own virtue: ‘If we feel a special responsibility for improving our own character rather than that of others, it is not because a special principle is involved, but because we are aware that the one is more under our control than the other.’103 A specific agent might be said to know a friend well enough to be in a better position than the state to promote her friends’ engagements with the goods. But even then, we are limited in our ability to help others to engage with the goods. With only superficial knowledge about each citizen, the state would be even less able to actually ensure the engagement with the goods. This is especially the case with respect to some goods where the right attitude towards the good is crucial for it to be valuable. If the agent does not engage with the goods willingly, her motivations are corrupted and the engagement is not genuine.104 Steven Wall, for instance, gives the example of romantic love: it ‘is an important element of a rewarding human life, but it is hard to see how political authorities could effectively promote it.’105 This is an interesting example.106 But the question is whether it extends to other goods. Let us con|| 102 Arneson R.J., ibid., p. 62. 103 Ross W.D., The Right and the Good, Clarendon Press, Oxford, 1967, p. 24. 104 Arneson R., ibid., p. 43. 105 Wall S., Liberalism, Perfectionism and Restraint, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 1998, p. 13. 106 It could also be interesting to put into question why we think that the state cannot promote romantic love. Part of the answer is, I believe, due to epistemic limitations as to how one would be able to promote it, as there is no reliable method that seems accurate in helping us find a romantic partner. But we could imagine in a future society that a technology would be available that could predict who would be the perfect match for another individual. But even in this case, one might have doubt about the success of using such a method: it is after all part of the meaning of romantic love that you have to encounter it through less predictable devices than that.

Agency and Good | 47

sider the case of compulsory voting in Australia.107 Does compulsory voting ensure the genuine functioning of political participation? If one complies with the law in a minimal way, by voting arbitrarily without any prior reflection or research on the political issues or political candidates, this wouldn’t amount to a genuine functioning of political participation. In other words, even in a case in which it seems relatively easy to coerce individuals to act in a certain way, coercion does not seem to be effective in ensuring functionings. Some goods require to be engaged with in the right way for them to be valuable. But could we nevertheless claim that, even if it is granted that it does not necessarily lead to genuine functioning, it could increase the probability that some individuals genuinely engage with the good of political participation. After all, from a political perspective, this would be already a huge achievement to shift the number of politically active citizens from say 40 % to 60 %. Moreover, one could coerce individuals into engaging with the good of pleasure for instance without it being self-defeating. Let us imagine that the state had a pleasure machine which would cause pleasurable experiences to whoever was hooked on the machine. Would it be justified in this case for the state to promote functionings by forcing every individual to spend enough time hooked up to the machine? But even in these cases in which coercion is not self-defeating for the good in question, and even if it might make a difference in the number of individuals who genuinely engage with the good, any coercion would go against my claim that the individual needs to engage willingly with the instantiation of the good in order for it to contribute to her well-being (I will discuss this endorsement constraint in section 5 below). I believe that the main reason for using a list of capabilities instead of functionings is thus to ensure the respect of autonomy.108 It would just be wrong for the state to force individuals to engage with the goods. This is why when it pertains to Political Perfectionism, one has to focus on opportunities for the goods instead of the goods themselves.

2.4 Agency and Good Many perfectionists have argued that excellences can be constituted only by active engagements with the goods on the list. Even though Raz’s list includes a series of states of affairs, he nevertheless claims, for instance, that excellences

|| 107 Nussbaum M., ibid., p. 130. 108 Arneson R., ibid., p. 61.

48 | Perfectionist Goods

are agency goods and that they require an active involvement of the individual.109 This would seem to identify goods as actions rather than states of affairs. However, most lists include both actions and states of affairs as goods. Parfit mentions both ‘having children’ and ‘being a good parent’, Raz includes both achievements and the wide exercise of one’s talents, and Nussbaum refers to ‘caring about nature and the animal world’ along with ‘having pleasurable experiences’. Even Nussbaum’s list which focuses on agential aspects include entirely passive states, such as pleasurable experiences. Indeed, even if some goods on the list are characterized as states of affairs, many of them also have an implicit agential dimension. For instance, if deep personal relationships are taken to be a prudential good, but nothing is mentioned about the character of the interaction within the relationship, much of the relationship’s value is not really explained. I will argue, however, that in the case of most goods, it is not only the activities (or active engagement with the goods) that are valued intrinsically but the state of affairs of having the goods themselves.110 Moreover, some goods are intrinsically valuable without requiring any active involvement: this is the case of pleasure or contentment. If pleasure is included in the list of objective goods, it would follow that goods do not always require the active involvement of the individual and can thus be passive states of affairs.111 Some of the lists we reviewed earlier can be interpreted as lists of prudential goods. This is however in tension with the claim of many of the philosophers we examined that these goods require the agent’s active involvement. Because these lists of goods are supposed to help us figure out what are the fundamental human goods, it is a serious deficiency if the kind of agency needed to enjoy

|| 109 Raz J., The Morality of Freedom, p. 306. 110 Some have also included virtues. I think it would be legitimate to include virtues in the list of Objective Goods on an Ethical Perfectionist view, but these might be less useful for Political Perfectionism. Joseph Chan distinguishes between agency goods and prudential goods. Agency goods are the virtues or dispositions, such as reason, courage, justice, temperance, integrity and sincerity. Prudential goods include aesthetic experience, human relationship, amusement and play, knowledge, etc Chan J., ‘Legitimacy, Unanimity and Perfectionism’, Philosophy and Public Affairs, vol. 29, n. 1, p. 11. 111 Crisp claims that contentment is one of the goods. Crisp R., ‘Raz on Well-Being’, Oxford Journal of Legal Studies, vol. 17, n. 3, 1997, p. 502. Griffin also includes enjoyment in his list of goods among accomplishments, agency, capabilities, understanding and deep personal relations. I wil not discuss Griffin’s list however, because he claims to endorse a desire-based conception of the good. It might be said that his desire-based conception of the good is as close as one can get from an OL view. Griffin J., Well-Being, Oxford University Press, Oxford, 2002.

Agency and Good | 49

these goods is not reflected in the list. This points to a general lack of clarity among contemporary perfectionists as to whether EP is concerned with (a) States of affairs or passive states of mind (such as pleasure) or (b) Active engagement with the goods. But it seems harder to categorise EP as focused exclusively on either (a) or (b), because the goods on a plausible objective list would, more often than not, necessarily involve engagement with valuable activities, relationships and objects. I claim that EP should be concerned with both (a) and (b). In order to know this, it will be useful to first conceptualise the distinction slightly differently. Is EP concerned with the resulting good, for example, knowledge itself, or the process by which one acquires knowledge? In order to illustrate this, I will use the ‘knowledge pill’ example. If an agent were given a pill that would make her instantaneously knowledgeable about world politics, would it be good for her, according to EP, to swallow the pill? I believe EP would recommend to the agent to swallow the pill because knowing about world politics would be a good result. However, the striving to learn is also valuable in itself not only because it brings about the positive result of knowledge. By swallowing the pill, the agent hasn’t engaged with the good of knowledge in the same way. So EP would recommend the swallowing of the pill, but it isn’t committed to the counterintuitive claim that it would be as good as the striving to learn about world politics without the help of the pill. This example demonstrate that EP should encourage both (a) and (b). It’s hard to deny that the outcome of having significant knowledge is itself valuable. If only the process of learning is valuable, this would have strange implications. Let us take another example. The same agent has learned about world politics for years, but then a confused perfectionist tells her: ‘Because only good actions count, you have already done the right actions and there is nothing valuable about having knowledge itself. I will give you a pill that would erase all this knowledge from your memory. This way you can learn it again in the next ten years.’ If only actions are valuable, there would be no reason for us to prevent the agent from taking the ‘erase knowledge’ pill. This again seems wrong. This seems to indicate that EP should take both actions and outcomes as intrinsically and objectively valuable.

50 | Perfectionist Goods

2.5 Bringing Back Perspective for a Perfectionist Renaissance There is an issue with respect to my overall argument so far. I have argued in favour of an OL conception of well-being which took autonomy to be one of the intrinsically valuable goods. But I have also argued that Political Perfectionism ought to promote only opportunities to engage with the goods, so that autonomy is preserved. However, the objection could still be raised that the account of EP that I have offered can nevertheless support a coercive form of Political Perfectionism. This is because although I did give some weight to autonomy in my list of goods, I have also said that no single good on the list is necessary for an individual to have a good life. Thus severe violations of autonomy could be compensated if the individual enjoys enough of the other goods. It might therefore be argued that, on the account I have given, whether or not state coercion is justified depends only on whether such coercive action would promote the overall balance of objective goods. This would be an unfortunate result. First, it would suggest that liberal perfectionism is not a stable view, and easily collapses into a non-liberal political perfectionist conception. Since most of us have strong prior commitments to liberal values, this might lead us to reject Political Perfectionism. Second, it would be counterintuitive to claim that the state coercion of individuals to engage with the goods would be favourable to the coerced individual’s well-being. So a conception of well-being that has this implication seems problematic or incomplete. I therefore need now to revise the OL conception of well-being I have sketched earlier to block this implication.112 But one could address this problem as part of a wider issue for all perfectionist views, namely the problem of how to account for the agent’s own perspective. An OL conception of well-being seems to be less equipped to deal with this issue than its competitors, the desire-based and hedonist conceptions of well-being.

2.5.1 There is Something about Perspective In the previous chapter, I have given several arguments and intuitions in favour of supporting the OL conception of well-being. However, the OL conception still suffers from a serious drawback: the OL conception, as outlined earlier, might

|| 112 I will suggest in the next chapter that there are further ways to block this implication at the level of Political Perfectionism.

Bringing Back Perspective for a Perfectionist Renaissance | 51

appear blind to both the pleasantness of the experience and the presence of desire to engage with valuable goods.113 But the pleasantness of the experience of engaging with the goods and the desires we have for them affect whether our engagement with the goods contribute to our well-being. As Judith Jarvis Thompson eloquently writes: There is something right about the idea that what is good for a person is importantly connected with the satisfaction of his wants. If a man most wants to become a veterinarian, what could possibly make it fail to be good for him to do so? No doubt he’d make more money as a lawyer, but that hardly matters. If a woman most wants to spend her free time knitting scarves for her friends, what could possibly make it fail to be good for her to do so?114

But something can be done to bring perspective back to the OL view without compromising the distinctive objective character of EP. I will argue that this can be done by adopting a second-order endorsement criterion that would also allow bringing back some individual perspective into our perfectionist conception. My strategy to account for individual perspective proceeds at two different levels. First, some of the elements in my list of goods already account partly for the importance of individual perspective. For instance, I take pleasure to be intrinsically valuable. My view can thus account for the role we attribute to pleasant experiences in assessing well-being. I also take autonomy to be on the list. This should indicate that making one’s own decision is valuable and therefore to be encouraged, so that not just any kind of engagement with goods is valuable. Both pleasures and autonomy are intrinsic goods that already give some perspective back to the perfectionist view, given that these states contribute to the well-being of the individual. However, as I outlined in the introduction of this section, insofar as they are intrinsically valuable goods, this is not enough, as the absence of autonomy or pleasure could be compensated by the presence of other goods. Second, I adopt a second-order endorsement constraint on whether some engagement with an instance of the goods on the objective list genuinely contributes to a person’s well-being. Many proponents of OL conceptions of well-

|| 113 For a thorough discussion of the tension between objectivity and endorsement, see Raz J., p. 292. Crisp R., ‘Raz on Well-being’, Journal of Legal Studies, p. 504. 114 Thompson does qualify this line by specifying that the desires that can matter in this way ought to be ‘relatively stable, resting on correct information, and autonomously arrived at’. Judith Jarvis Thompson, Goodness and Advice, Princeton University Press, New Jersey, 2001, p. 52‒53.

52 | Perfectionist Goods

being have used such an endorsement constraint.115 On this endorsement constraint, no engagement with the good can be said to contribute to well-being if it is not actually endorsed by the individual. This allows us to block the possibility of using coercion to promote well-being.

2.5.2 Endorsement Distinctions Let me explain now what I mean by ‘endorsement’. I take endorsement to be a second-order appreciation, both intellectual and affective, of the goods the agent engages with. But in order to have a more specific account of endorsement, I would need to contrast it with other related notions, such as enjoyment and autonomy. First, endorsement differs from enjoyment. By endorsement, I do not mean necessarily that the person is enjoying the engagement with the specific activity. I might endorse the choice of doing a PhD without necessarily enjoying every stage of the process. Contrariwise, someone might enjoy every step of the process of writing up a PhD and not endorse writing a PhD. Endorsement is more akin to a second-order recognition of the activity one engages with as one which is valuable for oneself. It might be true empirically that if an individual endorses an activity, she is more likely to enjoy engaging with it at some point. But there is no such conceptual requirement. Second, endorsement is much less demanding than autonomy. Endorsement implies choosing to continue to engage with the good in question and appreciating its value. But autonomy might require much more procedurally and substantively. In order to be fully substantively autonomous, one would need frequently to put into question our choices. In order to be fully procedurally autonomous, one would have to make a reflective, fully informed and independent choice as to whether or not to engage with each of the goods. Endorsement might occur after the individual chose randomly (or in conditions of limited autonomy) to engage with some good. For instance, a woman might have been pressured by her parents to start learning ballet as a girl; it would be enough for endorsement if she later on chooses to continue dancing and appreciates it. If the choice of the activity or good is biased, this wil not be enough to || 115 Sumner W., Welfare, Happiness, and Ethics, Clarendon Press, Oxford, 1996. Nussbaum, M. and Sen A. (eds.) The Quality of Life, Clarendon Press, Oxford, 1993. Griffin J., Well-being, Clarendon Press, Oxford, 1986. Haybron D., The Pursuit of Unhappiness, Clarendon Press, Oxford, 2008. Kraut R., What is Good and Why, Harvard University Press, Cambridge (Ma), 2007. Raz J., ‘The Role of Well-being’, Philosophical Perspectives, 2004, p. 269‒94.

Bringing Back Perspective for a Perfectionist Renaissance | 53

prevent the possibility that this activity would be genuinely endorsed. Endorsement is a form of acquiescing to certain activities and is thus less demanding than full autonomy. Before moving to the next section, I need to explain briefly why I think that the endorsement constraint is necessary for an engagement with that good to be constitutive of well-being.

2.5.3 Well-being I have argued that it was important for our conception of well-being to account for the subjective elements that seems crucial for a plausible account of wellbeing. I also argued that second-order endorsement was what was needed to make sure that the engagement with the good in question will be genuinely constitutive of well-being.116 This is so, because such second-order endorsement is key to the narrative process. Well-being is a narrative process by which identification with the activities results. Without the endorsement constraint, well-being comes apart from what we take to be a good life. An agent could engage with the goods at a very high level, and have a very successful life, but if the endorsement constraint isn’t satisfied, he would nevertheless not enjoy a good life. One way of showing the important role of endorsing at the second-order the goods we engage with would take the example of a depressed individual. This depressed individual does not take any of the activities he usually enjoys to be pleasant any more. In my original conception of well-being, this would be accounted for by the lack of pleasure the depressed individual experiences. But the depressed individual does not suffer only because he cannot experience pleasure. If that were so, depression wouldn’t be as damaging as it is. There is an additional loss which accompanies depression: the agent might be able to keep on actually engaging with these goods but they have become suddenly meaningless to him. His engagement with these goods requires a second-order endorsement for them to be constitutive of well-being. That is because without this endorsement, he lacks access to a narrative that makes sense of an engagement with these different activities. The narrative is key here because the endorsement allows for such a narrative to be possible. If there is no such narra-

|| 116 Sher, Beyond Neutrality, p. 56‒60.

54 | Perfectionist Goods

tive, there is no possibility to integrate these different engagements with goods into a whole coherent reflection of one’s life.117

2.6 Does Perfectionism require a Unifying Account of the Good? I have looked at the content of the list of goods that we should endorse for EP. But there is a recurrent question that seems to undermine EP, namely the question of justification. How do we justify this list of goods? Is there a unifying account one could give of these goods? A unifying account would explain why we hold the goods on the list to be good in terms of a single foundational notion. Within Prudential Perfectionism, we can distinguish two distinct views.118 One of them simply asserts that there is a list of intrinsically and objectively valuable goods which can be identified with the help of our intuitions. This view I will call Objective List Perfectionism (OLP). This variant does not try to provide a unifying account for the goods on the objective list. A more ambitious view we can call Human Nature Perfectionism (HNP). On this view the goods of the objective list are not merely a brute list, but can be derived from some account of human nature. HNP is held by Tom Hurka (in his earlier Perfectionism), George Sher, Philippa Foot and Richard Kraut. On Brad Hooker’s view, what is distinctive of a perfectionist objective list theory is the fact that it relies on an account of human nature; he defines perfectionism as HNP. According to him, perfectionism differs from other kinds of objective list theories in claiming that we determine what gets on the list by considering essential, distinctive, or characteristic human capacities or activities.119 The idea is that your having or exercising capacity X constitutes a benefit to you if and only if X is an essential, distinctive, or characteristic human capacity or activity. Arneson similarly defines perfectionism as ‘the doctrine that the good or intrinsically desirable human life is one that develops to the maximum extent the properties that constitute human nature.’120 || 117 This relates to the distinction made by Taylor between weak and strong evaluator: Taylor Charles, ‘What is Human Agency?’, Philosophical Papers, vol. 2: Philosophy and the Human Sciences, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 1985, p. 16‒25. 118 This distinction corresponds to Hurka’s distinction between ‘broad’ (OLP) and ‘narrow’ (HNP) perfectionism. 119 Hooker B., ‘Is Moral Virtue a Benefit to the Agent?’, in Crisp R. and Slote M. (eds.). How Should One Live?, Oxford University Press, Oxford, 1998, p. 145. 120 Arneson R.J., ‘Flourishing versus Desire’, Social Philosophy and Policy, 16, 1, 1999, p. 11.

Does Perfectionism require a Unifying Account of the Good? | 55

Is this more demanding form of perfectionism defensible? To answer this question, we first need to clarify what is meant by a unifying account. A unifying account is an account that appeals to a single explanatory source of value to justify the value of the goods on the list. If one endorses a version of EP which is based on HNP, one needs to claim that (i) we can give a unifying account of the good on the list; (ii) this unifying account must refer to human nature or essence; and if we accept (ii) we would also be accepting a constraint on the kind of goods that can be put on the list. This restriction is one of the reasons I will argue against HNP, because some of the goods we think are intrinsically and objectively valuable might not be justified by the same notion as the other goods. No doubt the idea of a unifying account of the goods on the list is very attractive. Indeed, such an account would fulfil a double role. First, it would provide a justification to the value we attribute to the goods that would not rely on our intuitions. Second, it would serve as an epistemic device that would help us identify the relevant goods to put on the list. However, I will argue that existing attempts to give such an account have not been successful, and that a unifying account is not really needed. I will start by examining Sher’s attempt to provide a unifying account of the goods. Sher justifies the list of traits and activities that he endorses as valuable by linking them to certain fundamental human capacities. In order to identify these fundamental capacities, Sher suggests the combination of two criteria: the criterion of being near-unavoidable and the criterion of being near-universal.121 Sher claims that these two criteria are best suited to fulfil the two requirements that he considers necessary for any adequate teleological theory to satisfy. The first requirement is the distance requirement: ‘To provide a standard of assessment, a goal must be distinct from whatever is being assessed – including, significantly, the goal seeker’s own actual desires and choices.’122 This is a legitimate requirement, as it implies that the agent adopts a reflective attitude towards her own goals. The second requirement is the depth requirement, which stipulates that the goal must stand in an appropriate relation to the person in question.123 Sher points to impulses, whims or decisions made under the ‘spur of

|| 121 Sher G., Beyond Neutrality, Perfectionism and Politics, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 1997, p. 235 and following. 122 Sher G., ibid., p. 234. 123 To explain the depth requirement, Sher claims that ‘If person and goal are not appropriately related, then the goal’s achievement will have no bearing on how well the person lives.’ Sher G., ibid., p. 234.

56 | Perfectionist Goods

the moment’ as examples of decisions, which do not satisfy the depth requirement. The most appropriate interpretation of the depth requirement seems to be that the goals in question are endorsed by the individual in a stable and continuous way. Sher argues that the criteria of near-universality and nearunavoidability together could identify the actions and dispositions which ought to be taken as the goals of his perfectionist theory. These actions and dispositions are thus identified because of their relationship to fundamental human capacities, which are themselves identified by the combination of the criteria of near-universality and near-unavoidability. In order to provide normative reasons to pursue these near-universal and near-unavoidable goals, Sher formulates an argument that is reminiscent of the arguments of natural law theorists. He aims to show that these goals are ‘fixed features of our lives’: Because something about our constitution makes our pursuit of it inevitable, there is simply no point in asking whether it is worthy of pursuit or whether we ought to continue pursuing it. Thus, such a goal is indeed a suitable touchstone for the evaluation of all other goals, including all other near-universal ones, whose pursuit is not similarly fixed.124

This is a surprising argument for Sher to make. He claims that because these dispositions and activities are so entrenched in human practices – because they are facts about us we cannot do without, they provide us with a standpoint for evaluating other activities and dispositions. Sher also argues that if a feature is near-unavoidable and also near-universal, it belongs ‘more deeply’ to the individual. He claims that a goal that is merely near-unavoidable would not satisfy his requirement of depth. However, if almost no one in the world can avoid pursuing this goal then it becomes significant, because it does not rely on any ‘particular traits, genetic makeup, or personal history’ of the agent: Thus, whatever the person happens to be like, he still would have been unable to avoid pursuing the goal if he had been different in a wide variety of ways. And this does provide a plausible explanation of how such a goal can belong more deeply to its possessor(s) than any mere idiosyncratic compulsion…

The claim that features that are near-unavoidable belong more deeply to the individual because they are shared by almost all is mysterious. I remain unconvinced by the idea that the notion of belonging can do any work in explaining the importance a feature has for an individual. Even if we grant that the notion of belonging could apply to individuals’ dispositions and activities, I am not || 124 Sher G., Beyond Neutrality: Perfectionism and Politics, p. 237‒238.

Does Perfectionism require a Unifying Account of the Good? | 57

convinced by that argument. One way of showing how unconvincing this argument is consists in pointing to the fact that one could easily make the opposite claim, given the vague meaning that the term ‘belonging’ has in these cases. One could indeed argue that the more idiosyncratic a disposition is, the more it ‘belongs’ to the agent who displays it. If one takes the case of agent-relative values they could be said to ‘belong’ more deeply to the agents, because they are more particular.125 Sher could reply to that kind of objection by saying that agent-relative values are recognised by observers because they belong to a wider category. The agent-relative value of climbing the Everest is a token of the type ‘achievement’ which could arguably be on the list of objective goods. But that response would not be enough, as the term belonging seems too vague to make a decisive argument either way. On a more charitable interpretation of Sher’s argument, the property of deep belonging refers to a close correspondence between the goods and the motivational set of the individual.126 But I still would take issue with the assumption that the fact that a disposition is near universal must mean that is plays some central role in the motivational set of the individual. The argument made above using agent-relative values still applies: the motivational force behind the pursuit of a value would not depend on whether this value is agentrelative or agent-neutral. The distinction between the general and the particular does not tell us anything about the motivational depth of any pursuit.127 Sher starts the following passage by addressing that issue but then returns to merely asserting a, by now, familiar claim: As we saw, the mere fact that all the members of a society, or every society, happen to pursue a goal does not eliminate the question of whether that goal is worth pursuing.

|| 125 For a definition of agent-relative, See Nagel T., The View from Nowhere, Oxford University Press, Oxford, 1989, p. 152‒153. 126 See Naticchia C., ‘Book Review: Beyond Neutrality: Perfectionism and Politics by George Sher’, The Philosophical Review, vol. 108, n. 3, July 1999. 127 The only way in which one could argue from the claim that a goal is general to the claim that it has motivational force would be to invoke the notion of (physiological and psychological) needs. Needs are defined by being shared by all individuals and they tend to have a very strong motivational force. But there are two problems here. First, I do not think that Sher has in mind needs when he uses the word goals; identifying these goals as needs would deprive them of their intrinsic value. Second, the strong motivational force of needs is not due to them being universal but to them being needs, that is, a requirement of our organism or psychological health. Take the case of a disease such as diabetes. Individuals with diabetes have needs that are not shared by most other individuals, but their not being universal does not make them less urgent.

58 | Perfectionist Goods

Hence, near universality alone does not satisfy the distance requirement.128 So, on the current proposal, what places a near-universal goal beyond evaluation is just the additional fact that its pursuit is also near-unavoidable. But how, again, can this make the difference? The answer, pretty clearly, is that when a near-universal goal also is nearunavoidable – when it is a goal that virtually no one can avoid pursuing – then questions about whether any or all of those persons ought to pursue it, or whether it is worthy of their pursuit, simply do not arise. Unlike a goal that is supplied by a pervasive culture, and so is just as open to criticism as that culture itself, a goal that is both near-universal and near-inescapable is a fixed feature of our lives.129

Sher argues above that the criteria of near-universality and near-unavoidability together give normative reasons to pursue these goals. He reiterates the claim that if these criteria are met, the goals in question are ‘fixed features of our lives’. But Sher simply assumes that this would be sufficient to give us normative reasons. We can first doubt whether these criteria, applied as Sher suggests, would really show that certain goals are fixed features of human life in a strong sense. The mere fact that these goals are shared across cultures is not in itself sufficient grounds for thinking of these as fixed features of human life in all its possible forms. The different cultures represented on earth do not exhaust all possible worlds. Some other aspects of human nature may not have been revealed to us yet, because the appropriate environmental and social conditions have not been present. Had this claim made under vastly different social conditions, such as a state of permanent global war, the disposition to ‘kill every approaching individual’ could have been described as a fixed feature of our life. In other words, ‘actually universal’ does not mean ‘necessary’ or anything remotely close to necessary; some features of human life might be universal but also highly contingent and arbitrary. In other words, an empirical claim does not seem to be able to ground any normative conclusion. Even if we grant, for the sake of argument, that these near-universal and near-unavoidable features are fixed features of our lives, we still do not have reasons to pursue them as goals. Near-universality and nearunavoidability may indicate indeed that the features in question are elements crucial to human psychology or human physiology (and thus motivating), but they do not give us reasons to pursue them as goals. Take the example of the emotion of anger and the disposition to act irrationally and destructively under

|| 128 The distance requirement stipulates that a ‘goal must be distinct from whatever is being assessed-including, significantly, the goal seeker’s own actual desires and choices.’ Sher G., ibid., p. 234. 129 Sher G., ibid., p. 238.

Does Perfectionism require a Unifying Account of the Good? | 59

its sway. This is a near-universal and near-unavoidable feature, in other words, a ‘fixed feature’ of human psychology; yet, we do not think that we should promote the development of this disposition to act terribly while angry.130 Sher’s proposal does not give any reasons for valuing near-universal and nearunavoidable goals, apart from an implicit claim that these goals are part of human nature. Indeed, even if almost everyone on the planet could not help having certain desires, this does not mean we could not have reasons to strongly resist them. Some of these desires might be unavoidable, in the sense that being motivated by them is unavoidable but we would still be able to resist actually acting on the basis of these desires. Moreover, even if they were unavoidable in the stronger sense that we couldn’t avoid acting on the basis of these desires, we could still have reasons to regret them. Finally, for a convincing account of human nature, the identification of human beings’ essential features should not rely on an empirical claim about our contingent history and environment.131 The criteria of near-universality and near unavoidability thus fail to give us reasons to value some goal or activity. Indeed, it seems that the force of the identification of near-universal and near-unavoidable goals with the ‘fixed features of our lives’ derives from an implicit appeal to human nature and its supposed normative significance. But I argued that any appeal to human nature as such fails to establish normative significance. What is specifically human is not necessarily valuable. Cruelty and self-delusion are both specifically human, but they are not valuable. An essential human feature is not valuable as such. Sher seems to be aware that any account grounded on human nature would be plagued by this problem. When he discusses Tom Hurka’s perfectionist theory (which is also essentialist, but and which I discuss later on), for instance, he claims that ‘no theory that identifies the human with their [essential human properties] possession seems capable of telling us anything about what anyone should do.’132 However, Sher might not be sensitive enough to the possibility of the same criticism applied to his own theory. Let us look now at how Richard Kraut attempts to avoid that same objection. Kraut defends his own kind of perfectionism (‘developmentalism’) accord-

|| 130 Hurka makes the same criticism in a review of Sher’s Beyond Neutrality: Perfectionism and Politics. Hurka T., ‘Book Review: Beyond Neutrality: Perfectionism and Politics by George Sher’, Ethics, vol. 109, n. 1, 1998. 131 Hurka gives up later his HNP because of that problem. He argues that if human flourishing is based on rationality, then we have trouble explaining why we don’t include among the goods malevolent exercises of rationality. Hurka T., ‘On Normative Ethics’, in Normative Ethics: 5 Questions in Petersen T.S. and Ryberg J. (eds.), VIP Automatic Press, 2007, p. 7. 132 Sher G., ibid., p. 221.

60 | Perfectionist Goods

ing to which the ‘best explanation for the goodness of valuable activities refers to the way they involve the enjoyable use of our bodies, senses, emotions and intellect.’133 He further claims that our well-being ‘consists in the full flowering of these powers, just as the good of any living thing consists in its flourishing’.134 By ‘flourishing’ Kraut refers to the development of our physical and/or psychological powers.135 Kraut wants to pre-empt the objection that some features of human nature have negative value, and so he claims that we do not need to identify as good every property traceable to human nature: Developmentalism does not begin with an a priori commitment to the idea that whatever nature gives us must be good for us. …We say that nature gave us something good in all these cases, but in saying that, we are standing in judgment of nature, not bowing down to it as the arbiter or determinant of what is good.136

What Kraut is in effect recommending, then, is that we should ultimately rely on our ethical evaluations of the good. But, if this is the case, what would be the point of a unifying account of human nature? If we ultimately have to rely on our independent ethical evaluations of goods and activities, then it does not add much really to relate first these goods and activities to human nature. To sum up, the attempts made by George Sher and Richard Kraut to ground a Human Nature Perfectionism have failed. Human nature isn’t a helpful notion for our purposes. Is there another ground on which we could possibly build a more cohesive account of the goods on the list? Some might think that a more appropriate ground for Political Perfectionism would be cultural or political.

2.7 Could Perfectionism be based on Cultural Norms or on an Overlapping Consensus? We have so far looked at unifying accounts that are based on some conception of human nature. Someone might here suggest that for PP, it would be very convenient if we could ground our list of goods on another kind of justificatory account, an account based on cultural norms or political acceptance. Such an account would be convenient, because it would have a clear empirical basis and it would be widely accepted. There have indeed been some attempts to ground

|| 133 Kraut, What is Good and Why, p. 190. 134 Kraut, ibid., p. 190. 135 Kraut R., ibid., p. 133. 136 Kraut R., ibid., p. 146‒147.

Could Perfectionism be based on Cultural Norms or on an Overlapping Consensus? | 61

perfectionism on such a basis. Steven Wall calls this kind of view parochial perfectionism. Steven Wall distinguishes indeed between what he calls universal and parochial perfectionism. According to him, universal perfectionism is justified ‘because it promotes or contributes to the flourishing of all human beings … [it] is not contingent on the particular commitments of people or the particular communities in which they live’; whereas parochial perfectionism, on the contrary, is justified by reference to a ‘valuable but not rationally required, way of life.’137 The new communitarians – especially MacIntyre in After Virtue – argue both that we ought to promote a particular conception of the good, and that we should justify this conception of the good by reference to our own cultural norms.138 I could not disagree more with this view. This view would allow for the goods on the list to be contingent to our culture and history. But, given the definition of EP I gave in the first chapter, I cannot consider these views to be perfectionist. Sher similarly rejects such views, on the ground that he ‘cannot see why society or its history, conventions, or practices must supply, ratify or undergird whatever (other) perfectionist values there are.’139 I will further discuss the relation between social forms and perfectionist goods in the 4th chapter. My definition of EP would also prevent perfectionism from being grounded in an overlapping consensus. Recall that, in Rawls, an overlapping consensus refers to all the citizens supporting the same set of basic laws for different reasons. Citizens might thus have very different comprehensive conceptions of the good and each of these conceptions might have a very different story to justify the laws they support in common with other conceptions of the good. Prudential Perfectionism consists in the endorsement of a specific conception of wellbeing, namely an OL view. It would be absurd for an OL view, which insists that the goods we ought to promote are objectively and intrinsically valuable, to be ultimately justified by an overlapping consensus.140 Relying on an overlapping consensus would run contrary to the intuition that these goods are valuable objectively, not merely because there happens to be an overlapping consensus about them. On the contrary, if something could be said about the relation between the value of these goods and the overlapping consensus, the justification would go the other way. There might be an overlapping consensus about these || 137 Wall S., Liberalism, Perfectionism and Restraint, p. 20. 138 MacIntyre, After Virtue, London, Duckworth, 1985. 139 Sher G., Beyond Neutrality, p. 11. 140 This being said, it might be epistemically justified to believe that, if many different cultures/ traditions believe independently that x is true, then there is greater reason to believe that x is true than if this belief were based only on our own intuitions. But it isn’t still enough to be justified in the belief that x is true.

62 | Perfectionist Goods

goods, but that would be ultimately explained because these goods are independently valuable. I have argued so far that the overlapping consensus could not justify Prudential Perfectionism. I will examine the attempt by Martha Nussbaum to use the overlapping consensus to justify Prudential Perfectionism below. But before I turn to this, let me just consider the possibility that Prudential Perfectionism would command an overlapping consensus but would not be justified by it. Prudential Perfectionism would thus be supported by an overlapping consensus but be justified in terms of its objective value. Commanding an overlapping consensus in this way would provide legitimacy and stability to Prudential Perfectionism.141 This would be particularly valuable given that some objections against perfectionism are actually claiming that it would be unstable and lack legitimacy.142 Let us however look closer at an attempt to justify an OL list account of the good by the use of an overlapping consensus. Martha Nussbaum has made such an attempt and it is telling that she ultimately cannot help but appeal to the objectivity of these values, by trying to ground them in human nature. The failure of her attempt to justify her list of capabilities by relying only on an overlapping consensus indicates the extent to which we assume the goods in question to be objectively valuable. Nussbaum considers her position very close to Rawls’s Political Liberalism. Her list of capabilities relies on what she calls a ‘political’ concept of the human being.143 Nussbaum admits that she is offering some conception of the good, but she claims that it is only a partial conception of the good. Moreover, Nussbaum denies being a perfectionist because she takes her list of capabilities to be based on the overlapping consensus.144 She claims that she presents the central human capabilities as ‘free of any specific metaphysical grounding’ and that ‘the capabilities can be the object of an overlapping consensus among people who

|| 141 Stuart White has pointed to me the importance of distinguishing in this context between being justified by an overlapping consensus versus commanding an overlapping consensus. 142 Rawls for instance formulates such a pragmatic argument against perfectionism. See Rawls, Political Liberalism, p. 63. For a discussion of Rawls’ pragmatic argument, see Wall S., p. 50 and following. Sher G., Beyond Neutrality, p. 107. Larmore C., Patterns of Moral Complexity, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 1987, p. 91. 143 Nussbaum claims that she steers clear from any meta-ethical commitment. Nussbaum M., Women and Human Development, p. 5. 144 The claim by Nussbaum that her view is not perfectionist is in conformity with my definition of EP, according to which the goods are intrinsically and objectively valuable; their value does not derive from an overlapping consensus.

Could Perfectionism be based on Cultural Norms or on an Overlapping Consensus? | 63

otherwise have very different comprehensive conceptions of the good.’145 She further argues that among our most basic intuitions, we would find ‘at least provisionally nonnegotiable points in our judgements’. So far so good. But Nussbaum suggests further that we find such provisional fixed points in the ideas of practical reason and sociability. She adds that these provisional fixed point are ‘extremely important aspects of an existence that is truly human, permeating and organizing its many functions.’146 This reference to the ‘truly human’ and to practical reason and sociability strongly echo human nature accounts. It is even harder later on to distinguish Nussbaum’s political conception of a person from Philippa Foot’s account of human nature.147 In Natural Goodness, Philippa Foot argued for her own account of human nature. On Foot’s view, species-specific capacities and biological characteristics are conducive to an evaluation of what it is for a member of that species to be a good prototype of it. Similarly, Nussbaum argues that the two capabilities of practical reason and sociability are specific to human beings and ground different interests. She compares the distinctive requirements for the flourishing of human beings with what is required for the flourishing of an animal: If a turtle were given a life that did not develop powers of practical reason and sociability, we would have no sense of waste and tragedy; when Marx’s worker is forced to live a life that reduces his senses to a less than fully human level of functioning, this does give rise to grief and anger.148

In this comparison between a turtle and a human being, Nussbaum seems to reveal an inclination towards a unifying account of human nature articulated around the notions of sociability and practical reason. I will insist on the significance of that lapse into hinting at the objectivity of the goods on her list at the end of this section, as I believe it shows that the objective value of the goods on the list are based on very strong intuitions. I have built so far a case against the use of the overlapping consensus in justifying Prudential Perfectionism. However, the overlapping consensus could have a beneficial role for Prudential Perfectionism. For Prudential Perfectionism to command such an overlapping consensus would be beneficial, as it could bring support and stability to the perfectionist state. || 145 Nussbaum M., ‘Aristotle, Politics and Human Capabilities: A Response to Antony, Arneson, Charlesworth and Mulgan’, Ethics, vol. 111, n. 1, 2000, p. 124. 146 Nussbaum M., ‘Aristotle, Politics and Human Capabilities’, p. 120. 147 Foot P., Natural Goodness, Oxford University Press, Oxford, 2010. 148 Nussbaum M., ‘Aristotle, Politics and Human Capabilities’, p. 123.

64 | Perfectionist Goods

2.8 Is the Lack of Unifying Account Damaging for Political Perfectionism? My conclusion from the above reflections is that we might have to give up the search for a unifying account for the goods. As mentioned at the beginning of this section, there is no denying that there would certainly be advantages in having a unified account.149 First, it would be theoretically satisfying to find unity in this seemingly disparate list. Second, it could help us agree on what goods we should put on the list. If we have a unifying account based on, say, the rational aspect of human nature, it would be easier to identify the activities that develop this aspect of human beings. The unifying account would thus provide an epistemic device to identify which goods are intrinsically and objectively valuable. However, these advantages shouldn’t be exaggerated. First, even if we had a unifying account, there might still be disagreement on how to derive a list of particular goods from it. Second, such an account would mean that the list of goods is justified in reference to one deeper good or normative principle, but justification has to stop somewhere, and those who reject the values of the disparate goods on the objective list could also reject the intuitive appeal of this single value or property. In other words, if we had such an account, it would be based on a firmer prior intuition about what matters, but one could still ask what justifies this basic intuition. We do not need to be too desperate about the fact that no unifying account is likely to be found, as it is doubtful that we need such an account to be confident about the list of perfectionist goods we endorse. After all, we have firm intuitions about the value of deep personal relationships, achievement and knowledge, intuitions that survive critical reflection; these intuitions can stand on their own. Indeed, I believe that we can be much more confident that these goods are valuable, than if we were to rest their values on the obscure notion of human nature. We can just rely on this intuitive conviction without worrying too much about a deeper explanation. If we just have a list of goods that reflects common core beliefs and that survive critical reflection, then we are not much worse off theoretically than if we had a unified account. Finally, the plurality of goods that our core beliefs seem to commit us to seems too rich and diverse to be unified under any single value without leaving

|| 149 Scanlon seems to think that without a unifying account, it does not make sense to attempt to give an account of well-being. Scanlon T., What Do We Owe to Each Other?, Belknap Press, Harvard, 1998.

Is the Lack of Unifying Account Damaging for Political Perfectionism? | 65

out some important goods. If we take a rationality-based unifying account, for instance, it will be hard to account for the good of enjoyment or friendship, as the value of these goods cannot plausibly be derived from the value of rationality. That, I believe, gives the final blow to any attempt to provide a unifying account, as none would be able to account for a diversity of valuable goods. It is implausible that such a unifying account can be given, and my discussion of existing attempts to provide such an account confirms this suspicion. Furthermore, some authors have suggested the use of thought experiments instead of a unifying account to help us figure out what are the objective goods. G.E. Moore suggests such a thought experiment.150 G.E. Moore suggested we use the ‘isolation test’. The method of isolation consists in comparing a universe containing only one good with one that does not contain such a good. If one concludes that the first universe is better, the good is good in itself. If the intrinsic goods existed by themselves ‘in absolute isolation’, their existence would still be taken to be good. I described Hurka earlier as providing a Human Nature Perfectionism (Human Nature Perfectionism, recall, is a variant of perfectionism which is based on human nature). However, it is important to note that he himself has changed his view on the matter. Hurka moved away from what he calls the ‘foundational approach’, exemplified by HNP, and which he endorsed when writing Perfectionism, towards a more ‘structural approach’, exemplified by OLP.151 Recall that OLP refers to Objective List Perfectionism, according to which the different goods on the list are not justified by an unifying account but stand as independent intuitive truths. The ‘foundational approach’, according to Hurka, grounds moral claims either in moral claims located at a more fundamental level within morality or in non-moral claims from outside morality (in metaphysics of the self, evolutionary biology or semantics). A typical example of a ‘foundational approach’ would be HNP, as it tries to ground our intuitions about the value of diverse goods on a more foundational claim about human nature.152 The ‘structural approach’, by contrast, claims that we should just try to connect our basic intuitions with more abstract principles and make them cohere. The main difference from the foundational approach is that these other principles are not || 150 Raz is a bit more pessimistic about what goods would survive a thought experiment; he suggests imagining a world post-nuclear devastation. Raz J., ‘Facing Up’, Southern California Law Review, 62, 1989, 1226‒1227. 151 Hurka T., ‘On Normative Ethics’, in Normative Ethics: 5 Questions in Petersen T.S. and Ryberg J. (eds.), VIP Automatic Press, 2007. 152 Another example would be Rawls deriving from the original position the two principles of justice.

66 | Perfectionist Goods

thought to be more fundamental; they are simply our common sense beliefs and principles. The structural approach uses a type of analysis similar to a wide reflective equilibrium.153 OLP (which Hurka ultimately endorses) is an example of a structural approach; it contents itself with the intuitions we have that some goods are intrinsically and objectively valuable. Once we give up providing a unifying account for these goods, the only work left is of a structural kind; explaining the relationship between these intuitions and other ethical principles we hold. I have argued that Human Nature Perfectionism fails to give a normative account of the goods on the list and I therefore endorsed OLP. I also denied that one could ground EP or PP on a cultural or political conception of the good or on an overlapping consensus: these moves wouldn’t be compatible with the fundamental commitment to the objectivity of EP. I discussed Martha Nussbaum’s attempt to ground her list of capabilities on an overlapping consensus and showed that she couldn’t help but hint at the objectivity of these goods (and even at a possible human nature account to unify the list of goods). Nussbaum hinting at the objective value of goods should convince us that secluding objectivity away from the political realm isn’t an easy task. Anti-perfectionists have been very vocal in their assertion that claiming the objective value of goods is contentious. But, on closer inspection, claiming that the goods on the list have no objective value and that we need to rely on something else (culture or political agreement) is much more contentious. It is indeed very counterintuitive to accept the claim that we value the goods on the list because they are accepted by the majority or because they are part of our culture. A political promotion of some good would be unconvincing if it tried to do that on this basis and PP should thus be content to rest on OLP, as it gives a more persuasive account of the good than cultural relativists or, for that matter, Rawlsians. EP should thus be based on OLP, because, for now, this is the best account we have of the goods. Moreover, PP would be more convincing if it appeals to something intuitively plausible, such as the objective value of goods.

|| 153 An example of the structural approach could be found in Ross’ and Moore’s work. Ross W.D., The Right and the Good, Clarendon Press, Oxford, 1967. Moore G.E., Principa Ethica, Barnes and Noble, New York, 2006.

Conclusion | 67

2.9 Conclusion This chapter distinguished between perfectionist lists of goods and Rawls’s neutralist list of primary goods. Rawls’s primary goods aren’t intrinsically valuable; they are only instrumentally valuable, goods that could be useful for any individual whatsoever her (reasonable) conception of the good. Perfectionist goods, on the contrary, are taken to be intrinsically and objectively valuable – they belong to a specific conception of the good, namely an Objective List conception of well-being. I then examined several candidate lists of perfectionist goods that have been proposed by different authors, and considered their respective plausibility. I argued that our list of goods should at least include goods such as absence of pain, pleasure, deep personal relationships, autonomy, aesthetic appreciations, and understanding. I also argued against leaving space for a separate category of ‘achievement of aims’. Instead, I suggested that we add an endorsement constraint, where endorsement is understood as a second-order appreciation of the activity or good. However, I did not take endorsement to be a separate good, but rather to be a necessary condition for the engagement with instances of each kind of good to be constitutive of the agent’s well-being. It is a crucial notion as it allows individuals to select specific tokens of each of the valuable goods – relationships might be objectively valuable, but it would be odd to expect individuals to endorse every kind of relationship they would come across. I also argued that Ethical Perfectionism should take both states of affairs and actions to be ethically relevant. I then examined whether perfectionists ought to promote opportunities to engage with goods or the goods themselves. I claimed that Ethical Perfectionism should endorse a list of goods (or functionings) whereas Political Perfectionism should focus on a list of capabilities over functionings (viz. opportunities for goods over the goods themselves). Despite a strong tendency in the perfectionist literature to argue in favour of looking for an unifying account of the goods based on human nature, I argued against giving such an account. I considered in more detail George Sher’s attempt to give an unifying account. Moreover, I argued that the absence of an unifying account didn’t necessarily lead to giving up on perfectionism.

3 Ethical Perfectionism: Distinctions and Objections I have so far looked at some of the defining features of Ethical Perfectionism and considered several list of goods that it would be plausible for EP to endorse. I have also considered the question of whether perfectionists need to offer a unifying account of the list of goods, and in particular whether they must ground it in some conception of human nature. My answer was negative on both counts. Many traditional objections are due to overlooking the wide variety of forms EP can take. In this chapter, I aim to identify a variant of EP that would be apt to ground a plausible and attractive PP. For that purpose, I will consider a range of key distinctions that both clarify the possible forms EP can take, and will be helpful in countering objections to EP. These distinctions are important, because both defenders and critics of perfectionism understand ‘perfectionism’ to mean a range of different views, and because the literature often ignores some attractive variants of perfectionism. In particular, I will argue that the most plausible form of EP is non-exclusive, pluralist, broad and relative to the talents of the agent. Finally, I will describe consequentialist, deontological and virtue ethical forms of perfectionism. I will then rebut some of the objections that have been levelled against Ethical Perfectionism and Political Perfectionism. I claimed that endorsing a plausible version of EP can allow us to rebut many of the traditional objections to PP. One such objection would be to claim that EP gives too much weight to the well-being of the agent and not enough to the well-being of other individuals. I will respond to that by pointing out that this will depend on two factors of EP: its structure (whether it has a consequentialist or deontological structure) and its content (whether or not it includes moral virtue as one of the goods). Finally, I will claim that if EP were nevertheless to end up giving more weight to the agent’s good than other ethical theories, this could be seen as a strength instead of a weakness: this would allow EP to respond to the objection made by Williams that most ethical theories fail to give enough weight to the ground projects of individuals. Ground projects are those projects which give individuals a reason to live; they constitute the conditions for the individual’s having ‘any interest in being around in that world at all’.154 Another possible objection is that EP gives too much weight to the promotion of positive value but does not give enough weight to the prevention of nega-

|| 154 Williams B., Moral Luck, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 1999, p. 13‒14.

Ethical Perfectionism as a Family of Theories | 69

tive value. This objection could have devastating implications for PP: one might hold that if no normative priority is given to negative value, PP would not give strong protection to individual rights and basic interests. But I reject the suggestion that EP must necessarily give more weight to positive value than to negative value, or even that it is necessarily committed to the claim that both positive value and negative value have as much weight. Some of the arguments offered in defence of Virtue Ethics can also be used to show that EP can be committed to give priority to the prevention of negative value over the promotion of positive value. I will also argue that giving some weight to positive value is helpful in countering an objection levelled against other competing ethical theories by Michael Stocker. Stocker claims that most ethical theories fail to give an appropriate account of the real motives of individuals because they fail to refer to their personal commitments; he calls that failure the ‘schizophrenia’ of ethical theories. I will suggest that EP can largely avoid this objection. The third objection I will consider is at odds with the previous objections to the extent that it claims that, instead of failing to give due attention to some moral requirements (of concern for others’ interests and the protection of basic interests), EP is guilty of being too moralistic, in the sense that if the state were to rely on it, it would end up judging harshly individual lives. It is true that ethical theories assess lives as good or bad but the point of Political Perfectionism is to protect and promote good lives. EP is not meant to be used as a blueprint according to which the state would judge specific individuals as having good or bad lives, it is meant to be used as an indicator of what opportunities the state should attempt to provide for its citizens to have good lives. Moreover, one could assess lives as good or bad, without being committed to the claim that individuals are responsible for it. EP does not need to be committed to any claim about moral responsibility, so to the extent that it judges lives, it does not need to judge individuals as responsible for the goodness (or badness) of their lives.

3.1 Ethical Perfectionism as a Family of Theories Ethical perfectionism is a family of theories that can come in different forms, depending on the views we take on several key questions. The existing literature often associates perfectionism with particular answers to these questions, which might make it seem less attractive. So fully to assess the plausibility of perfectionism, we need to be clear on the full range of possible perfectionist theories. There is also a need to first disentangle EP from certain controversial claims it is often mistakenly associated with. I will therefore start this chapter

70 | Ethical Perfectionism: Distinctions and Objections

by outlining a series of key distinctions and defending the specific form of EP that I find most attractive.

3.1.1 Exclusive vs. Non-exclusive Perfectionism Perfectionist ethical theories can be said to be pluralist at the level of moral principles. I will call non-exclusive a perfectionist theory that encompasses further ethical principles besides the core perfectionist one. These other ethical principles could include familiar principles such as ‘minimise pain’ or ‘never treat anybody as a mere mean’ and so forth. (However, if EP includes prevention of negative value, as I argue in section 5 of this chapter, minimising pain would already be part of the perfectionist principle and there would be no need to add the principle of minimising pain.) But in order for a theory to count as perfectionist, it would still have to give a certain priority to the Perfectionist Principle. Recall that the Perfectionist principle claims that there is a significant reason to protect and promote intrinsically and objectively valuable goods. Notice however that some elements of perfectionism could also be integrated into a nonperfectionist moral theory. For example, a deontological theory could include a perfectionist agent-relative and self-regarding duty to perfect oneself. Kant’s own theory includes such an imperfect duty to perfect oneself.155 Non-exclusive moral theories that include a perfectionist element raise questions about the weight that should be given to the Perfectionist Principle over other moral considerations. In A Theory of Justice, for instance, Rawls worries that if we were to give any recognition to perfectionist considerations, we might end up giving more weight to perfectionist considerations over other ethical considerations.156 (If one were not to give priority to the Perfectionist Principle over all other principles, this would entail the rejection of EP, as EP is defined as giving a predominant role to the Perfectionist Principle in the specification of the right). By contrast, an exclusive perfectionist theory would recognise only the Perfectionist Principle. Although such a view is conceivable, it seems hard to reconcile with many of our most basic moral intuitions, such as the priority we often give to basic human interests over perfectionists concerns. Here an unapologetic perfectionist might object that one could conceive of an exclusive perfectionist theory which would recognise the need to fulfil basic interests in

|| 155 Guyer P., ‘Kantian Perfectionism’, in Jost L. and Wuerth J. (eds.), Perfecting Virtue: New Essays on Kantian Ethics and Virtue Ethics, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 2011. 156 Rawls J., A Theory of Justice, p. 286.

Ethical Perfectionism as a Family of Theories | 71

priority. This would be justified by pointing to the need to have these basic interests satisfied in order to engage with the goods. In this case, basic interests could be given priority, but they would be given priority so as to allow individuals to engage with the goods. I believe that this move would be mistaken because it would be the wrong grounds to give priority to the basic interests. This being said, even an exclusive political perfectionism could give priority to basic interests. First, if the absence of pain appears on the list of intrinsically valuable goods, as it does on the list I put forward, the necessity to protect and promote the absence of pain would require the protection of many basic interests. Second, I will argue in section 4 below that the Perfectionist Principle could even give priority to the prevention of negative value over the promotion of positive value. In other words, priority would be given to the prevention of pain and ignorance, which is best achieved by the protection of basic interests in health, shelter and education. However, an exclusive form of EP could still allow harm to some of these basic interests if greater goods were thereby produced. If we wanted to go further in ensuring that we give priority to the protection of basic needs or fundamental liberties over the promotion of excellences, we would need to endorse a non-exclusive perfectionism which will leave room for other principles besides the Perfectionist Principle. Endorsing a non-exclusive form of perfectionism matters to the plausibility of EP, given that many would reject an ethical theory that recommended the promotion of perfectionist goods over more basic goods. This is why, in what follows, I shall assume that the most plausible form of EP is non-exclusive. Although the distinction I have drawn between exclusive and non-exclusive EP is not often made, I believe that it is often assumed. George Sher for instance defends a form of PP that is committed to the protection of substantive civil rights and procedural civil rights and thus probably assume a non-exclusive EP. Similarly, Tom Hurka argues that a non-exclusive form of perfectionism would have the advantage of protecting individuals from pain, which, on his understanding of perfectionism, falls outside the compass of perfectionist value.

3.1.2 Pluralist vs. Monist Perfectionism The distinction between monist and pluralist perfectionism refers to the number of goods that are objectively and intrinsically valuable. A monist perfectionism considers one excellence as the only intrinsically valuable good, and all the other goods are only instrumentally good to the extent that they lead to the su-

72 | Ethical Perfectionism: Distinctions and Objections

preme good in question.157 In contrast, a pluralist perfectionism considers all the different substantive goods on the list as valuable intrinsically.158 For monist perfectionists, a crucial issue is to determine which good is intrinsically good. The usual contenders for that privileged position have been theoretical rationality and practical rationality.159 Pluralist perfectionists argue that many different goods are intrinsically and objectively valuable. Because there are different goods, excellent lives can be much more varied as some lives will excel in some goods but less in others whereas others will do the opposite. This pluralism about value is often taken to correspond to a pluralism about ideal lives including both the life of the athlete and the life of the mathematician.160 I will assume EP is also pluralist, because it seems implausible that there is a single master value to which all the goods on the list we have discussed could be reduced. Monism would commit us to the claim that, say, only rationality is valuable. However, rationality isn’t all there is; rationality could perhaps account for the good of knowledge, understanding, intellectual exchange and intellectually creative projects, but it fails to account for other goods, such as the development of deep relationships with others. This is why I will assume that EP is pluralist.

3.1.3 Broad vs. Narrow Perfectionism This distinction has been made using a different terminology by different authors.161 In Arneson’s terminology, the difference between broad and narrow

|| 157 In monist perfectionism, we don’t literally have an objective list view, but merely an objective conception of well-being, as there is ultimately only one good which is considered intrinsically and objectively valuable. 158 There have been plenty of attempts though to give an unifying account of these different goods. I discuss this in chapter 2, section 6. 159 In the literature on virtue ethics, there has been indeed a great conflict over whether theoretical or practical rationality is the highest excellence. Plato surely believed theoretical rationality was more valuable, but Aristotle remained ambivalent on that, although he may have had a slight inclination towards theoretical rationality. 160 Griffin J., Well-Being: Its Meaning, Measurement and Moral Importance, Clarendon Press, Oxford, 1989, p. 59. This seems to be a plausible but not necessary implication of pluralist perfectionism. A pluralist perfectionism could possibly argue that there is only one ideal life that has a determined specific amount of each good (and that any life which does not reach this exact balance between the goods fails to be good). 161 Hurka uses ‘narrow perfectionism’ to describe what I call Human Nature Perfectionism.

Ethical Perfectionism as a Family of Theories | 73

perfectionism refers to the kind of goods that are considered excellences.162 If the excellences described by a perfectionist theory are largely accessible to most people, then we have an instance of broad perfectionism. By contrast, narrow perfectionism qualifies as excellences or perfections goods that can be attained only by a few, such as artistic creations and scientific discoveries of a certain importance. Griffin makes a similar distinction and labels the elitist form of perfectionism, `the superman version’ of perfectionism.163 I will take the broad/narrow distinction to refer to this elitist versus ‘democratic’ version of perfectionism. Note however that this distinction needn’t reflect the scope of the perfectionist principle. Sometimes the distinction is formulated in a way that could suggest that it is a question of scope of application of the perfectionist principle. However, narrow perfectionism does not apply only to the select few, it applies to everyone. It’s just that only a few manage (and can manage) to reach the required level of excellence and thus only a few individual lives matter normatively on a narrow perfectionist view. This is a crucial distinction, because one of the most common objections that has been formulated against perfectionism, by Martha Nussbaum among others,164 the accusation of elitism, raises a serious problem for narrow perfectionism but has little force against broad perfectionism. It is also a crucial distinction because it has dramatic implications for the plausibility and implications of Political Perfectionism. Fortunately, perfectionism needs not be elitist as it could include on its list of perfections common goods (such as an average understanding of the world, the development of deep relationships, etc) which can be accessed by the vast majority. Perfectionism is only elitist if one assumes that ‘human good is a rare and fine achievement and that only a few people are capable of leading a life that achieve any human good.’165 On the broad version of perfectionism, everyday understanding would qualify as an excellence and thus virtually everyone could attain this excellence. However, on the narrow version of perfectionism, understanding could be taken to be an excellence only if it is of a certain level, like, say, the mathematical || 162 Wall S., Liberalism, Perfectionism and Restraint, p. 16. 163 Griffin J., ibid. 164 ‘I understand the idea that certain types of scientific ability are worthy of support because society needs them; but that they are ‘higher ‘and more intrinsically valuable than the activity of a farmer or a mother, or a sweeper of the streets, smacks to me of casteism and elitism, and I don’t buy it.’ Nussbaum M., ‘Aristotle, Politics and Human Capabilities’, p. 129. 165 Arneson R.J., ‘Perfectionism and Politics’, p. 38.

74 | Ethical Perfectionism: Distinctions and Objections

understanding of the Fibonacci sequence or Goldbach’s conjecture. In this case, the number of individuals who could be said to engage with the excellence of understanding would be considerably lower.166 Broad perfectionism is directed towards the many and can thus be reconciled with egalitarianism,167 while narrow perfectionism is elitist. Narrow perfectionism is elitist not out of necessity but as a consequence of its answers to two prior questions: (i) what count as perfections, and (ii) who can achieve these perfections. An elitist perfectionism raises the bar of the answer to (i), and as a consequence then answer to (ii) that only a few can achieve (i). A broad perfectionism would answer to (i) that average knowledge is a genuine good and would thus answer to (ii) that most can achieve that level of good. A convincing form of EP would most likely be broad, because this form of perfectionism best exemplifies the idea that morality must be concerned with the good of all individuals. A narrow perfectionism shows a disproportionate concern for the talented few, which is at odds with our intuition that the well-being of every individual matters ethically. One might object that a maximizing form of perfectionism would still rank differently goods according to their level of development. On this view thus, even if our minimum requirement for something to count as a good is quite low, so that average knowledge is already a genuine good, it can still be the case that the knowledge of a musical genius is worth much more and we would in some contexts have far stronger reasons to promote such knowledge. The answer to this objection might be that unless elitist knowledge is far more valuable than average knowledge, we would most of the time have reason to focus on average knowledge, since we could promote it in a far greater number (and far more easily) thus producing much more value than if we focus on a small elite. One might also wonder how this intuition fits with the kinds of examples I used above to demonstrate the appeal of perfectionism; these involved the great achievements of the likes of Shakespeare and Cezanne. I used these examples because they make the point more sharply, but I would hold the same view, if instead of one Shakespeare, one of the worlds in question would contain just one further individual engaged with the excellences by, say, reading great literature. There is, I believe a similarly strong claim to be made about the value of

|| 166 Someone might object that my rejection of elitism seems to imply that the goods ought to be defined relatively to the majority’s abilities and that this is in tension with our objectivist commitments. But the goods themselves are not defined in relation to the majority’s abilities; only the degrees of engagement with them can be. 167 For an objection to the claim that equality can be reconciled with perfectionism, see Lecce S., ‘Should Egalitarians Be Perfectionists?’, Politics, vol. 25, issue 3, 2005, p. 127.

Ethical Perfectionism as a Family of Theories | 75

the striving and enjoyment of averagely gifted individuals who engage with the excellences.

3.1.4 Satisficing vs. Maximising Perfectionism I now want to ask whether EP should be satisficing or maximising.168 Satisficing perfectionism requires each individual to develop his talents to an appropriate fixed level for their life to qualify as good enough.169 Once this level is reached, it does not matter how well over that threshold the agent actually does.170 A life is thus judged as having negative value if the agent does not reach this threshold (of different goods), and as having positive value if she does. The question of where to set this threshold is obviously crucial. Take the example of artistic achievement. A perfectionist theory that would endorse artistic achievement would have to identify what qualifies as artistic achievement. Does singing in the shower qualify as an artistic achievement or only singing in an amateur choir group? Maybe neither of these examples constitutes artistic achievement, but only performance of world leading opera singers. All these possible thresholds can be adopted, but (in conjunction with the narrow/broad distinction) the choice of threshold determines the level of elitism the perfectionism in question will have.171 Perfectionism could also take a maximizing form. Maximising perfectionism demands from each individual to maximize the development of her talent regardless of the actual level of achievement already reached by her. There is no point at which the agent ceases to have a reason to attempt a higher achievement.172 There is a theoretical point of maximisation, namely, the point at which

|| 168 This question is not a reply to question (i) of the previous section. The level at which something can count as an excellence is not necessarily identical with the level at which perfectionism will claim that the life in question is a good (or good enough) life. One can have a bottom threshold for talking about good at all and another threshold that would indicate that the life in question is good enough (at least for that particular good or excellence). 169 For discussion of this issue, see Byron M. (ed.), Satisficing and Maximising, Moral Theorists on Practical Reason, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 2004. 170 Hurka T., Perfectionism, p. 56. 171 All these thresholds (even the ‘world-leading opera singer’ one) could still belong to a satisficing perfectionism, as setting a very high level of excellence threshold is not incompatible with endorsing a satisficing perfectionism. 172 The maximising version of perfectionism corresponds more closely to the way perfectionism has been understood in psychology as referring to a pathological tendency to reach for

76 | Ethical Perfectionism: Distinctions and Objections

the individual has promoted her goods to the extent that she was maximally able to, but it is not really plausibly reached in practice. Consequently, maximising forms systematically incite individuals to pursue further goods and would always give a similar mildly negative assessment of the agent. This could thus be articulated as a first objection against maximising forms of perfectionism, maximising forms of perfectionism might be said to be unhelpful in making subtle judgments about how good a life is. This problem is not irremediable though; as on a maximising view, we could still rank lives according to how close they are to the maximisation of goods. Another objection to the maximizing version would be that it seems to corrupt the kind of attitude one should have towards the good. By endorsing a maximizing view, we might compromise the value of the perfection. Richard Kraut has convincingly claimed that ‘the things that are good for us are not items towards which the proper attitude is as much as possible.’173 A similar objection has been made by Michael Slote, who argues that having a maximizing attitude towards the goods could prevent them from being goods to us, because maximizing seems to entail being unsatisfied by the good we do obtain.174 The idea is that satisficing as an attitude might be constitutive of a personal good.175 This would be a valid objection to a maximising form of EP if EP were to be used as a decision-making procedure by individuals. However, the objection would lose its force if EP was used only theoretically to identify right-making and wrong-making actions and states of affairs.176 The maximisation of perfections need not guide our daily decision-making. If EP were to be applied at the decision-making level, further objections could be raised against it. It would be time-inefficient to try to maximise the development of excellences at all times, and it would not fit our common sense understanding of the motivation for pursuing the excellences. Both these objec|| perfection in different aspects of life. In the psychological use of the term, there is no point at which the individual feels contented by his achievements. 173 Kraut, What is Good and Why, p. 20 174 According to Harry Frankfurt, a satisfied person ‘is satisfied with the amount of satisfaction he already has.’ Frankfurt H., ‘Equality as a Moral Ideal’, p. 37. 175 Slote M., ‘Two Views on Satisficing’, in Byron M. (ed.), Satisficing and Maximising, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 2004, p. 14. 176 This is the answer given by rule utilitarians and indirect act utilitarians against the objection that act utilitarianism would be useless if used as a decision-making procedure. Singer P., ‘Is act-utilitarianism self-defeating?’ in Philosophical Review (1972), 81 pp 94‒104. Parfit D., Reasons and Persons, OUP, Oxford, 1984, chs 1‒5 and part 4. Crisp R., Mill on Utilitarianism, Routledge, 1997, chap. 5. Rawls J., ‘Two Concepts of Rules’ in Philosophical Review (1955), 64 p. 3‒32.

Ethical Perfectionism as a Family of Theories | 77

tions would only apply to a form of EP that would be used as decision-making by individuals. However, once we keep the decision-making procedure separate from the right-making criterion, the objections based on time-efficiency and motivations can be answered. Finally, maximising EP could be accused of being too demanding. However, unlike consequentialism which is accused of being too demanding because it maximises impersonal value, the objection considered here would be based on a concern that maximisation of our own prudential good would be too demanding. This might seem puzzling as some might wonder how a view that aims at maximising the agent’s prudential good could be too demanding. But the actual maximisation of the excellences might require from the individual the complete submission of her life to the goal of the maximisation of the excellences; her life would have to be planned in every detail and the transition between one activity to the other would be swift and involve no wasted time. A possible response to this objection would be to point to the fact that these activities ought to be endorsed by the individual and ought to be constitutive of the individuals’ well-being. Moreover, goods on the list include pleasure and relationships; the maximisation of goods would thus not necessarily lead to a workaholic lifestyle. Some version of the demandingness objection might still be vindicated though, as a maximising EP would still be asking for the maximum for each good as well as the perfect balance between these goods. However, even on this form, the too-demanding objection could be dismissed for the same reasons that one could invoke to defend utilitarianism. One could claim that it is not such a problem for an ethical theory to be too demanding. An ethical theory might be ideal in the sense of making demands on us that might be very rarely satisfied by actual individuals. It would still fulfil its role as an ethical theory as long as it points us towards what we should strive to achieve. An ethical theory which is too demanding could still give us good indications about what we should do, even if many of our actions would fall short of that ideal. Maximising perfectionism has nevertheless a certain appeal because it seems to capture the elusive character of happiness. Jonathan Lear argues that happiness functions as an ‘enigmatic signifier’ in our lives; it gives them meaning, even though it cannot be fully experienced by anyone over a long period: ‘Happiness is that which makes life desirable and lacking in nothing… A truly happy life is somehow beyond lack, that is, beyond desire.’177 By inciting desire, happiness gives motivation; by suggesting a complete self, happiness gives

|| 177 Lear J., Happiness, Death and the Remainder of Life, Harvard University Press, Harvard, 2001, p. 27.

78 | Ethical Perfectionism: Distinctions and Objections

meaning. At the same time however, it is in the nature of desire to never remain satisfied for long; by reaching its object, desire tends to ebb away. I think Lear’s point captures the subjective experience of our relationship to happiness. One might have developed the goods to a high extent and have good grounds to believe that one’s life is successful, yet still feel unsatisfied. And the maximizing view captures that subjective experience of the yet unattained ideal.178 I will suggest a way of avoiding the problems linked with maximisation by applying maximisation not to the goods within one life, but to the number of individuals who engage with the goods up to a certain threshold. Let us assume that maximising perfectionists endorse the goal of maximizing the perfections held by all individuals. This could be interpreted in two ways. One possible interpretation claims that what has to be maximised is the number of individuals achieving perfection. Let us specify x as an excellence. On this view, an act is good if and only if it maximises the number of individuals who achieve x. I will dub this perfectionism P-maximising for Person-maximising. Another possible interpretation would claim that it is the total number of existing perfections which ought to be maximised, independently of the number of agents engaged with them. I will call this interpretation E-maximising for excellencemaximising. Hurka is a consequentialist perfectionist of the first kind: he defends the aim of maximising the total number of individuals engaged in excellences. If one endorses P-maximising as the structure of our EP, the objections against maximisation discussed earlier (such as the claim that it would corrupt our attitude towards the good or be too demanding) would not hold. But this would imply that one still applies a satisficing view to the goods within one’s life, as we maximise the number of individuals who are engaging with the goods up to a certain threshold. Let us look now at some of the drawbacks of this view. One drawback (attached to the satisficing aspect of that view) is that the threshold set will be invariably arbitrary, because there is no definite point after which we could say ‘after that one further hour spent understanding a mathematical problem, my life has reached the threshold for a good life. If I hadn’t spent this hour, my life would not have been a happy one.’ The absurd implications of such a reflection || 178 This view of the subjective experience of individuals as striving to reach a fixed ideal they always had in mind is contested by Cavell’s reading of Emerson: ‘I do not read Emerson as saying that there is one unattained/attainable self we repetitively never arrive at, but rather that having a self is a process of moving to and from nexts.’ On this view, the maximizing perfectionist view might motivate an individual to move from one self to the next, but there is no fixed ideal of the self that is grasped well in advance and that stands as a continual aim. Cavell S., ‘Moral Perfectionism’, in The Cavell Reader, Stephen Mulhall, ed., p. 362.

Ethical Perfectionism as a Family of Theories | 79

show that satisficing is plagued with the problem of vagueness and this vagueness would lead to some arbitrariness in defining where the threshold should be set.179 Another problem that P-maximising over a certain threshold would have to confront is the distorted importance given to the well-being of those just below the threshold. Promotion indeed requires us to aim to increase the number of people above the threshold of the good life. This seems to mean that we should devote our efforts to making those just below the threshold cross over it. Many, however, would rather hold that those at the very bottom should be given priority. In other words, any satisficing view gives a normative importance to the threshold that does not correspond to our intuitions about what matters.180 In response, however, we should remember that a non-exclusive perfectionist theory would also have other ethical principles which could give priority to those at the very bottom. From within an exclusive perfectionist theory, this problem could also be resolved by the introduction of multiple thresholds and a prioritarian structure of normative importance to these different thresholds.181 Individuals who do not meet the lowest threshold would be given priority and then that priority would carry over to the second-lowest threshold and so on. Given that we intend to apply EP to the political realm, thresholds are especially useful for the political purposes of allocating resources so that they reach those who need it most first. The political realm requires definite ranking of individual lives, in order to distribute resources for the promotion of the good in these individual lives. We cannot fully avoid problems of vagueness that are attached to the use of threshold, but using thresholds is nevertheless very helpful as it gives us answers about who are those who have not yet reached a certain level of flourishing. Even though Nussbaum’s view isn’t perfectionist, she also favours a threshold view for the same political reasons. She claims that a threshold view is recommended, because it allows us to better fulfil the ‘social goal …of getting citizens above this capability threshold.’182 She rejects the idea that her view is a satisficing view because it entails that what happens after the threshold is reached does not matter normatively. But she explicitly says that, after the threshold is reached one should use another distributive principle.183 || 179 For the problem of vagueness, see Keefe R. and Smith P. (eds.), Vagueness: A Reader, MIT Press, Cambridge (Mass.), 1997. 180 Casal P., ‘Why Sufficiency is not Enough’, Ethics, 2007. 181 See Parfit D., ‘Equality and Priority’, Ratio, 1997, 202–221. 182 Nussbaum M., ‘Aristotle, Politics and Human Capabilities’, p. 124. 183 Nussbaum M., Women and Human Development: a Capabilities Approach, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 2000, p. 75.

80 | Ethical Perfectionism: Distinctions and Objections

I agree with her that a problematic implication of using a satisficing view is to claim that the individual has no further reason to engage with the goods once she has reached the threshold. I examined EP here in order to ground a convincing account of political morality. One might still thus believe that further ethical reasons apply to those beyond the threshold, but that, from the perspective of EP, there are only reasons to maximize the number of individuals who engage with the goods up to a certain threshold. This is not to say that the state would not have further reasons to promote an engagement with the goods beyond the threshold. These reasons would just not be given by the form of EP defended here. In order to get the best of both worlds, I recommended a form of Perfectionism which aims at the maximisation of the number of currently existing individuals who engages with the goods up to a certain threshold. In other words, PP should be P-maximising but also have a satisficing aspect, as we would need to use a threshold to determine when individuals are engaging enough with the goods.

3.1.5 Absolute vs. Relative Perfectionism Perfectionism can also take both absolute and relative forms.184 In my discussion above of maximising EP, I have assumed a form of EP that is relative to the talents of the individual. One could also try to conceive of an absolute form of maximising, but it is doubtful that such a view makes sense. An absolute maximising perfectionism would argue that we ought to attain the maximum development of the excellences ever reached so far. But that would require of everyone of us to develop our voices so that it rivals with Maria Callas’ voice or write poems as inspiring as T. S. Eliot (or whatsoever standard would be considered to be the absolute maximum development of a specific excellence). In most cases, an absolute maximising perfectionism would violate the principle that ‘ought implies can’. Because we could not ask from an individual to do more than she could possibly do, maximising perfectionism would most plausibly be relative to the agent’s talents. The claim that excellence is relative to particular agents can be interpreted in different ways. Some of these readings, however, are incompatible with a

|| 184 Tom Hurka and Steven Wall use a similar distinction but understand it differently than I do here. Hurka T., Perfectionism, p. 62. Wall S., Liberalism, Perfectionism and Restraint, p. 12‒13.

Consequentialist, Virtue Ethics and Deontological Perfectionism | 81

perfectionist view; for example, the excellences cannot be relative to the agent’s desires or conception of the good because of EP’s commitment to OL conception of good. On a satisficing view, relative perfectionism is best understood to claim that the threshold required to have a good life will be relative to the talents of each individual.185 The main contention behind the absolute/relative divide is whether the threshold for excellence should be relative to each individual’s abilities or, on the contrary, should be the same for all individuals. Relative perfectionism claims that each agent’s ability to engage with a good should be assessed according to the specific talents the agent happens to have. Thus what counts as a perfection for agent x would not count as a perfection for agent y, who is much more talented than x. Satisficing perfectionism qualifies a life as good if a definite threshold of excellences has been reached and relativity allows for this threshold to be adjusted according to talents. In relative satisficing forms of perfectionism, each individual’s engagement with the goods has to be judged according to his talents. By indexing thresholds to talents, relative perfectionism shows some concern to questions of responsibility in assessing the level of excellence an agent engages with. This is the reason why I would support only a relative perfectionism. Absolute satisficing forms of perfectionism are not to be recommended because they would set up the threshold at the same level for everyone, which would not be fair.

3.2 Consequentialist, Virtue Ethics and Deontological Perfectionism I have argued that EP is an ethical theory grounded in Prudential Perfectionism. It is an ethical theory because it claims that the promotion of people’s wellbeing, understood in objective terms, plays a foundational role in determining (at least partly) what it is right to do. I also pointed out that although a non-

|| 185 One could wonder here why I limit myself to talents. After all, if I look at people’s lives around me, I will judge the goodness of their lives not only in relation to their talents, but most probably also in relation to their circumstances (their resources and social opportunities). If PP were to index individuals’ engagement with the goods to their initial circumstances, this would have the rather conservative implication that we would index individuals’ well-being in relation to how much they started up with. But this would be very unfair. Our intuition is that PP should promote everyone’s well-being without such qualification. Unlike circumstances, talents cannot be affected or changed by any policy, so it is fair to index people’s well-being to that.

82 | Ethical Perfectionism: Distinctions and Objections

exclusive version of EP would give a certain priority to the Perfectionist Principle, it could also admit other ethical principles, such as deontological constraints on harm to others. Moreover, I have argued that my argument for EP could also be used quite effectively for the introduction of the Perfectionist Principle. Recall that, on my view, EP includes an account of goods (Prudential Perfectionism) and an account of right action (Ethical Perfectionism). In this section, I will outline different structures that EP could take. There are existing examples in the perfectionist literature of both consequentialist and deontological perfectionisms. First, Hurka gives us an example of maximising time-neutral and agent-neutral consequentialist perfectionism. He claims that ‘our ultimate moral goal, is the greatest development of human nature by all humans everywhere.’ 186 Consequentialist perfectionism is thus a moral theory according to which the excellences of all have to be maximised. Second, In The Right and the Good, Ross gives us an example of deontological perfectionism. Ross claims that there is a prima facie duty to bring things that are intrinsically good into existence, such as virtue, knowledge and pleasure. Ross identifies a set of duties stemming from our ability to improve our own condition ‘in respect of virtue or intelligence.’187 This distinction between consequentialist and deontological perfectionisms has been generally ignored nevertheless. This is why it is important to point out how these different forms differ. I will focus now on teasing out consequentialist, deontological and virtue ethics versions of the Perfectionist Principle. The reason I focus on the Perfectionist Principle is that even if one rejects EP, it is harder to deny the validity of some form of the Perfectionist Principle. In other words, one could reject the view that we should give foundational priority to the Perfectionist Principle, while still holding that a form of the Perfectionist Principle is true and ought to be included in another ethical view. This is why I focus on clarifying different forms that a Perfectionist Principle could take; this way I allow the Perfectionist Principle to be used either within EP or within a nonperfectionist ethical theory. For the sake of clarity, it will be useful to contrast specifically deontological, consequentialist and virtue ethics188 versions of the Perfectionist Principle: || 186 I take consequentialist theories’ main thesis to be that the rightness of acts depends only on facts about what would make things go best. See Parfit D., On What Matters, Oxford University Press, Oxford, 2011. 187 Ross W.D., The Right and the Good, Clarendon Press, Oxford, 1967, p. 20‒22. 188 I have also briefly mentioned attitude (or disposition) as an appropriate unit of ethical evaluation. I do not discuss this here for simplicity’s sake, but it is likely that the attitude of the

Consequentialist, Virtue Ethics and Deontological Perfectionism | 83

Deontological. There is a reason to (i) engage with objective goods and (ii) refrain from obstructing the engagement of others with these goods; Consequentialist. There is a reason to promote everyone’s engagement with objective goods; Virtue-Ethical. There is a reason to develop the right disposition towards objective goods. These could all be perfectionist principles. However, we are interested in EP as an ethical theory that can ground Political Perfectionism. And there are important differences between defending EP as a correct ethical theory for individual morality and defending it as correct as a political morality.189 To begin with, there are changes of perspective involved in the move from the perspective of the agent to the perspective of the state. The liberal state ought to be committed to seeing each life as equally valuable. Our political morality needs to show a commitment to the equal treatment of every citizen. Every right attributed to citizens should thus remain indifferent to individual specificities; the political morality ought to be agent-neutral (between the citizens of the same state). I earlier suggested a particular Perfectionist Principle: There is a reason for the state to protect and promote the objective good of all individuals. As we can see, this version of the principle contains both deontological and consequentialist elements. The deontological element commits PP to the protec-

|| agent towards the good would also matter from a perfectionist perspective, whatsoever its structure. The focus on attitude and dispositions has been a distinctive feature of virtue ethics. See Hursthouse R., On Virtue Ethics, Oxford University Press, Oxford, 1999, chap. 5. If we were to have a Virtue Ethics perfectionism, I will take it to be concerned with the development of the right disposition towards goods and actions, which in our case, would be the development of a perfectionist attitude. 189 I would like to emphasize that this is not incompatible with the claim that there is a true ethical conception whose ultimate normative principles are fact-independent. See Cohen G.A., Rescuing Justice and Equality, Harvard University Press, Harvard, 2008, p. 229. I accept the claim that fundamental normative principles are fact-independent, but the normative rules we need to apply in specific contexts might have to be adapted to reflect these fundamental principles accurately in these specific contexts.

84 | Ethical Perfectionism: Distinctions and Objections

tion of basic rights.190 From the standpoint of political morality, some consequentialist elements are required because we are considering the relationship between the state and its citizens. The state needs to treat all its citizens equally and ought thus to try to maximise the number of citizens engaging with the goods (at least up to a certain threshold). If we merely focus on the deontological version of EP, it is constituted by two different kinds of reason. These two reasons are the following: (1) One has pro tanto reason to engage with perfectionist actions and goods; (2) One has pro tanto reason to refrain from preventing others to engage with perfectionist actions and goods. The example of a deontological Perfectionist Principle will be now used to render explicit what I want to say about the transition between EP and PP. Even if we believed that a deontological EP is the true ethical conception, it could not be simply applied as such as a political morality. For instance, let us look at the two reasons suggested above as the two main reasons of a deontological EP, (a) the reason to engage with perfectionist acts and goods, and (b) the reason to refrain from preventing others from doing so. This is a problematic basis for Political Perfectionism, as a reason personally to engage with objective goods is not one that the state itself can follow. This is just a trivial point: a state cannot engage with goods on behalf of individuals. (I will discuss below inherent limits to indirect state promotion of these agent-relative duties.) When one applies this to, say, deontological ethics, which is characterized by agent-relativity, this would demand that one reformulates the principles so as to cater for this change of perspective.191 However, this can be done while retaining some agentcentred prerogatives. This is why, if PP were based on a deontological EP, the policies that would stem from the concern for the respect of (a) and (b) would differ quite substantially from the reasons themselves. In order to encourage (a), the state could aim to provide the institutional conditions that would allow individuals to pursue (a) more effectively. In order to fulfil (b), the state would need to recognise rights that would protect individuals from being harmed or obstructed in their

|| 190 George Sher has pointed to the necessity of including a deontological element to avoid the objection that perfectionism would permit the violation of individual basic rights. Sher G., Beyond Neutrality, p. 15. 191 Darwall S., ‘Introduction’, in Darwall S. (ed.), Deontology, Blackwell, Oxford, 2003.

Is Perfectionism too Self-indulgent? | 85

basic freedoms by other individuals (along with refraining from obstructing the basic freedoms of individuals itself). In order to promote (a) and (b) at the level of a political morality, the state would thus have to protect the basic liberties of individuals and promote conditions conducive to the individual engagement with perfectionist actions and goods. In order to respect the value of autonomy, the state ought to focus on providing opportunities to engage with the goods. Political Perfectionism would thus be restricted to provide the conditions necessary for individuals to engage with the goods, and to promote an environment that fosters the desire to engage with them. The conditions necessary to develop and encourage engagement with the goods would nevertheless be quite demanding. Providing the necessary conditions would involve, for instance, securing the basic needs of everyone as well as ensuring that citizens have the means and time to enjoy different activities beyond work. An appropriate environment for the development of perfections would require sufficient education for all, as well as the fostering of a culture that values these goods. To sum up, the form of EP (and PP) I would recommend has both consequentialist and deontological features.

3.3 Is Perfectionism too Self-indulgent? An objection that could be raised against EP, and also against PP is that they fail to give enough priority to moral commands, by blurring the line between what is owed to others and what is for the benefit of the agent’s own well-being. In doing so, EP might run the risk of being too self-indulgent as an ethical theory and might ground policies that overlook serious harm to others. The objection considered here would thus claim that Ethical Perfectionism blurs the line between what is owed to others and what is in the agent’s own interests because the objectors would claim that perfectionism claims that what is morally right for you to do is also what is good for you. Put differently, perfectionism might seem at first sight to be a self-other asymmetric moral theory. A self-other asymmetric theory treats the agent’s good asymmetrically to the good of other individuals. A theory is self-other asymmetric when it allows the agent to give priority to her own good over the good of other individuals (or when it gives on the contrary more weight to the good of other individuals’ over the good of the agent).192 It would then differ from self-

|| 192 For the distinction between self-other symmetry/asymmetry, see Slote M., From Morality to Virtue, Oxford University Press, Oxford, 1992.

86 | Ethical Perfectionism: Distinctions and Objections

other symmetric theories, such as consequentialist theories, according to which the right action for you to do is the promotion of the good for all. A theory is selfother symmetric when it gives equal weight to the interests of the agent as it gives to other individuals. But by now, it should be obvious that this is mistaken: the fact that EP focuses on the objective good of agents does not yet tell us that it gives any priority to the agent’s own good. It could do so, but could also be completely impartial when it takes a consequentialist form in which we should give equal weight to everybody’s goods. The OL view on which EP is based does not specify whose welfare (the agent, her loved ones or everyone?) is to be promoted. Self-other asymmetry is thus not a necessary feature of perfectionism. I have so far argued that the structure of EP would have a great impact on how much concern is given to other people. A consequentialist EP would give as much weight to everyone’s well-being, whereas a deontological or virtue ethics EP would characteristically give the agent’s own well-being priority. I say characteristically and not necessarily, because more contemporary versions of consequentialism, for instance, have dropped total self-other symmetry. Samuel Scheffler, for instance, has argued that we should allow some self-centred prerogatives within consequentialism.193 So, the typical descriptions of consequentialism as self-other symetric and deontological ethics and virtue ethics as selfother asymetric would only be valid if we take standard unadulterated forms of consequentialism, deontology and virtue ethics. In other words, even consequentialism, in its more attractive recent forms, isn’t necessarily completely impartial and self-other symetric. So the accusation that EP would be necessarily asymmetric cannot be held. But, besides structure, there is another aspect of EP that would have an impact on how much concern is given to everyone: the content of goods endorsed by EP.194 EP could recommend a balance between self-regarding versus otherregarding duties, so that even a self-other asymmetric EP could make some room for others’ well-being. Kantian and Virtue Perfectionism could include other-regarding duties in their list of goods, which could compensate for their being (typically) self-other asymmetric theories (they systematically give more || 193 Scheffler S., The Rejection of Consequentialism, Oxford University Press, Oxford, 1982, p. 80‒114. 194 This point is similar to the two different dimensions on which theories of justice differentiate themselves: distributive principle and what has been called the ‘currency’ of justice. The determination of both these dimensions will have an impact on the substance of the theory of justice endorsed. Similarly here, both the structure of the EP endorsed and the goods will have an impact on the ultimate shape of the perfectionist theory adopted.

Is Perfectionism too Self-indulgent? | 87

weight to the agent’s good). One way of building other-regarding duties into a perfectionist theory would be to include moral virtue among the list of goods. But, if EP were to take moral virtue to be a good, it would be confronted with two objections. First, in virtue ethics, taking moral virtue to be constitutive of eudaimonia has led to accusations that it is egoistic. The same criticism could be made against EP, if it includes moral virtue as one of the goods. This criticism states that, if the agent is concerned for others’ good as a means to having a better life herself, the agent is using others’ good in an instrumental way.195 Kraut reiterates this criticism against Julia Annas’ view and contends that ancient ethics is in one sense egoistic as the motivation for benefiting others is based on the ultimate benefit to the agent’s well-being.196 Julia Annas has argued that, contrary to appearance, ancient moral philosophy is not egoistic because eudaimonia involves a significant degree of concern for the good of others.197 The second objection points to the implausibility of the claim that moral virtue is a prudential good. Brad Hooker designed a thought experiment to demonstrate this implausibility: the ‘sympathy test’.198 Take two individuals with the same amount of friendships, achievements and pleasures. They differ only on one aspect: morality. One of them, A, is morally virtuous while the other one, B, is morally vicious. If one takes moral virtue to be a prudential good, one would think that A has more prudential goods than B. Hooker, however, argues that we tend to feel sympathy towards the person who has fewer prudential goods than another. However, in the example briefly sketched above, we would not feel sorrier for the vicious B than for the morally upright A. Hooker concludes that our lack of sympathy towards vicious B shows that we do not consider moral goodness to be a prudential good. One might try to question this conclusion, as there are alternative explanations available to explain our lack of sympathy towards vicious B. Maybe our lack of sympathy towards vicious B is due to the assumption that he could behave differently and that he is responsible for his vicious behaviour. Let us as-

|| 195 Annas seems to be aware of that as she claims that one would suffer from ‘a kind of schizophrenia’ if one were to get pleasure from benefiting one’s friend while at the same time remaining aware that one would do that for one’s own happiness. Annas J., The Morality of Happiness, Oxford University Press, Oxford, 1995, p. 241. 196 Kraut R., ‘Book Review: The morality of happiness by Julia Annas’, Philosophy and Phenomenological Research, 1995, p. 924. 197 Annas J., The Morality of Happiness, p. 128. 198 Hooker B., ‘Does Moral Virtue Constitute a Benefit to the Agent?’, in Crisp R. (ed.), How Should One Live?, Oxford University Press, Oxford, 1998, p. 141 and following.

88 | Ethical Perfectionism: Distinctions and Objections

sume, for instance, that vicious B is not responsible for his vicious behaviour. He has been abused as a child in such a way and his subsequent adult life has been so deprived that the responsibility for his vicious behaviour could not be plausibly attributed to him. It seems that we could feel sympathy towards him, on the basis that he is unable to be morally virtuous. But this modifies the example too significantly: it assumes that B has been suffering beyond a threshold (for which we could feel sorry) and that B is trying to be morally virtuous. If B has had as much suffering as A (which is, after all, what the example states) and if B isn’t even trying to be morally virtuous, it is likely that we would not feel sorry for him. Moreover, Hooker claims that we would feel sympathy for the individual if he misses any other prudential good whether or not he is responsible for the absence of the good in question. We would feel sorry for a person who lost any aptitude to feel pleasure, even if she were responsible for this loss (by say taking unnecessary risks). When it pertains to an abusive individual, however, he might not be responsible for the factors that led him to become who he is, we might still not feel sorry for him. A last attempt to challenge Hooker’s sympathy test would be to try to isolate another explanation for our lack of sympathy: namely the harm to others. It is hard to feel sympathy towards someone who is an aggressor, not a victim. And it is even harder to distinguish in our emotional response between what we feel towards this person qua aggressor, and what we feel towards this person, qua person. If we imagine B as an internally vicious person, in that he does not harm anyone by his vice, he just has bad dispositions and motives. Would we feel sorry for him? In some sense, I think we could. Let us take a person who is greedy, but does not harm to anyone. We could say ‘I feel sorry for him’, in order to express that the person is ‘missing out’ on something by being morally deficient in this excess of greed. This explanation suggests that we could take moral virtue to be a prudential good and reject Hooker’s intuitions in the sympathy test.199 However, I want to remain neutral as to the question of whether moral virtue should be included in our list of goods. In any case, a plausible form of perfectionism would need to leave at least some room for self-regarding duties. A form of perfectionism that would only include other-regarding duties would be self-defeating, since no individual would be likely to possess any excellence, if

|| 199 Moral virtue could be a prudential good, because many prudential goods derive from it: the pleasure of a guilt-free conscience, a feeling that we conform to what is expected from our community and thus a sense of being in harmony with the community, etc.

Is Perfectionism too Self-indulgent? | 89

each individual was concerned only with others’ engagement with excellences.200 This space for self-regarding duties would need to be given even in an EP which wouldn’t include moral virtue as one of its goods. It is worth emphasizing that EP is somewhat unique in being a conception of morality which gives a foundational role to the aim of promoting one’s own and others’ perfections, where that would presumably centrally include helping them pursue their deep projects, and in this way perfectionism gives unique space to people’s deepest concerns (as long as these projects engage with objective goods), a point I developed earlier in this section and that I will develop further in section 5.201 Perfectionism is indeed opposed to a picture of morality as inherently antagonistic to individual’s well-being. This is in line with Raz’s argument that well-being and morality are not conflicting concepts. This would be even more true on a perfectionist view that includes moral virtue as an objective good.202 Although perfectionists recognise the possibility of occasional conflict between well-being and morality, this conflict is seen as contingent. In a similar vein, perfectionism could help us reject an understanding of moral and prudential reasons as radically distinct. This fits with some of the literature on the ‘primacy of reasons’ which holds roughly that the normative comes before the evaluative.203 In other words, the good is always ultimately justified by a reason rather than by an evaluative notion. The consequence of holding that the normative is prior to the evaluative is that we ought to move away from talk about evaluative notions to use only reasons. Griffin, for example, argues in favour of such a move to talk about reasons. Griffin indeed claims that ‘deliberation of a sufficiently global scope is not conducted in terms of prudence, self-interest or flourishing on the one side and morality on the other… [but] in terms of strength

|| 200 This is a version of an objection that has often been made against consequentialism. For a rejection of this see Singer P., ‘Is Act-Utilitarianism Self-Defeating?’, Philosophical Review, 1972. Moreover, the concern to promote others’ excellences would be limited in its efficiency in practice, given that the excellences require the active participation of the agent herself. 201 Kraut takes this good-centeredness of perfectionism to be one of its attractions. Kraut R., What is Good and Why, p. 21. 202 Raz J., The Morality of Freedom, p. 318. 203 Scanlon commits himself to such thesis in What We Owe to Each Other. For objections to this view, see Williams B., Ethics and the Limits of Philosophy, 1985, chapter 8. For a discussion of the thesis of the priority of the normative over the evaluative, see Wallace R. J., ‘Reasons, Values and Agent-Relativity’, Dialectica, vol. 64, n. 4, (2010), p. 503‒528.

90 | Ethical Perfectionism: Distinctions and Objections

of practical reasons.’204 This would be in line with the perfectionist project which sees prudential and moral reasons as coming from the same source.

3.4 Praise and Blame Another common fear that grounds an objection against PP is that EP is, on the contrary, too moralistic. I will take this accusation of moralism here to amount to the fear that EP would be passing harsh moral judgements on individuals. This would be the case if EP was mostly concerned with praising and blaming. This objection to EP stems from the image of the perfectionist possibly lecturing on what each individual should or shouldn’t do in order to have a good life. The perfectionist, on this view, is associated with a preacher of sort, the kind that would reproach you for having stopped to play the flute when you were 11. A related objection has been formulated recently by Jonathan Quong in his book Liberalism Without Perfection205. Quong argues that perfectionism necessarily entails the violation of the commitment to treat citizens as free and equal. He argues that this is so because, in order to distinguish itself from Rawlsian liberalism, perfectionists ought to demand that more funds need to be allocated to the protection and promotion of goods after each citizen has received her fair share. However, I think that Political Perfectionists would probably differ from non-perfectionists in their identification of what shares are fair (as I will discuss in chapter 6 of this book). Moreover, I will argue in this section that there is no necessary moral judgement implied by Political Perfectionism, because it does not need to judge specific individuals or to take individuals to be ultimately responsible. In other words, I will deny here that praising and blaming is a crucial feature of perfectionism. Let’s take praise as our example. I take praise to be the combination of a belief that a person x has done a right action with a desire that x did commit the action along with the commendation of x for that action.206 Both praise and blame rely on the assumption that there is a strong link between the agent and her actions. Praising someone is making a positive evalua-

|| 204 Griffin J., Well-Being: Its Meaning, Measurement and Moral Importance, Clarendon Press, Oxford, 1989, p. 161. 205 Quong J., Liberalism without Perfection, Oxford University Press, Oxford, 2011. 206 This definition is based on George Sher definition of blame as the combination of a belief that a person x has done some bad action with a desire that x did not commit this action. George Sher, In Praise of Blame, Oxford University Press, Oxford, 2006, p. 112.

Praise and Blame | 91

tion of an agent on the basis of what she did. In order for EP to praise individuals, it needs to accept that (a) Individuals can be morally responsible for their actions. (b) Individuals (not their actions or lives) ought to be ethically evaluated. However, there is nothing that suggests that EP needs to endorse either (a) or (b). To begin with, perfectionism as I defined it here focuses on actions not on agents, that is, it is less concerned with the evaluation of agents than with the evaluations of actions and goods, so it can reject (b).207 A perfectionist ethical theory is fundamentally committed to attributing intrinsic value to some actions and goods.208 The objects of praise are only acts, and acts for which we are responsible in a deep sense. To that, it might be replied that one could praise actions as much as one could praise agents. This would be accurate. However, perfectionism does not only praise actions; given that valuable goods can include states of mind, the positive evaluation could be extended to her states of mind. But the mere fact that perfectionism tells us to promote not only good acts, but also good states of mind, indicates that perfectionism is not motivated by the aim of emitting judgements of praise and blame. First, if it were so motivated, states of mind would be problematic, as they cannot be accessed and thus cannot be the ground for praise or blame on the part of the preacher-state. Second, one of the goods on the Objective List is pleasure. No moralistic conception would be that concerned with us feeling good! And no preacher-state would be trying to increase our opportunities for pleasure. Furthermore, (a) indicates that praising and blaming rely on the assumption of a strong link between the agent and her action. This raises the old problem of moral responsibility. First, the perfectionist might deny any responsibility to the agent for metaphysical reasons. A perfectionist who endorses hard determinism would entirely dismiss the appropriateness of praise and blame because she would reject the claim that agents can be taken to be (really) responsible. In reply, it could be said that excellence and achievement can also merit praise (even if not moral praise), or some similar positive attitude. It’s true that perfectionism gives great weight to things that merit such appreciative attitudes but understood in that way, this claim does not imply much. Praising

|| 207 See Haksar V., Equality, Liberty and Perfectionism, p. 1‒2. 208 George Sher has also denied that by saying that some ways of life are better than others perfectionists are committed to the claim that persons are better than others. Sher G., ibid., p. 5.

92 | Ethical Perfectionism: Distinctions and Objections

and blaming on this view would only refer to the reactive attitudes that individuals cannot help but have with respect to each other. 209 Second, even if one believes in moral responsibility, there might be no way of knowing if the agent is fully responsible for her action. In this case, there would be no evaluation of the agent for epistemic reasons. EP thus escapes the charge of being moralistic because praise and blame are not central to it. This removes a possible worry about PP. Citizens would not feel that the ethical conception endorsed is moralistic, to the extent that it is concerned with what actually matters to citizens. It would not consider the good of citizens as outside the scope of morality, rather it would take the good of citizens as the basis of its actions. It wouldn’t enjoin people to do specific actions but EP would shape the state conception of what opportunities it needs to provide to its citizens.

3.5 Perfectionism and Positive Value In section 3 of this chapter, I argued that EP didn’t have to be self-other asymmetric, as consequentialist EP, for instance, could be self-other symmetric. I argued that the degree to which EP would be other-regarding would also depend on whether or not it included moral goodness. But the original objection could be reformulated as follows. What if EP could still be unable to cater for the basic needs of individuals by putting so much emphasis on positive value – that is the development of goods and perfections – while remaining silent about negative value, such as pain, ignorance, insecurity, etc.210 In other words, if EP is so focused on the promotion of the goods, it might overlook the importance of preventing individuals from suffering harm and right violations. Even if EP gave the same weight to the goods of each individual, it might still give undue importance to positive ethical value (e.g. great artistic achievement or moral virtue) instead of negative ethical value (e.g. suffering and need.). If true, this is likely to also raise a problem for Political Perfectionism, given that many hold that a plausible political theory ought to give stringent protection to individuals’ basic interests and needs. Indeed, a forceful objection would claim that perfectionism overlooks the normative priority that ought to be given to the satisfaction of basic interests in order to cater for the development of perfectionist goods.

|| 209 Strawson P.F., Freedom and Resentment and other Essays, Methuen, London, 1974. 210 On my list, the absence of pain figures as a positive good but it is only one positive good among others.

Perfectionism and Positive Value | 93

I discuss this point further below, but let me start by clarifying the sense in which EP might be said to give priority to positive ethical value, and the relationship between positive value and negative ethical value. Given that I took both states of affairs and actions to be possible goods, I will assume that positive ethical value consists in either positive well-being or good actions. I will thus assume that the contrast between positive ethical value and negative ethical value could refer either to (A) The promotion of positive well-being versus the prevention of harm; or (B) The promotion of morally good/right acts versus the avoidance of morally bad/wrong acts. For simplicity, I will assume positive ethical value (PV) and negative ethical value (NV) to refer to both (A) and (B). PV could thus refer to positive well-being as well as to morally good (right) acts, while NV could refer both to the prevention of harm and the avoidance of morally bad acts.211 Let us now look at the possible relations between the prevention of what has negative value (NV) and the promotion of what has positive value (PV). There are five possible views: (i) The prevention of NV has priority over the promotion of PV. (ii) The prevention of NV and the promotion of PV have equal status. (iii) The promotion of PV has priority over the prevention of NV. (iv) Only PV matters. (v) Only NV matters. I will argue that the most plausible version of EP should endorse (i), contrary to the mistaken assumption made by several authors that perfectionism is committed to (iii). Some have even claimed that according to EP the prevention of morally wrong acts has no inherent significance, which would go further than (iii)

|| 211 According to EP, NV could refer to a varied list of elements: pain, ignorance, lack of aesthetic appreciation, social isolation, etc.

94 | Ethical Perfectionism: Distinctions and Objections

to endorse the extreme (iv). On this view the prevention of NV matters only to the extent that it is instrumental for the promotion of PV. Hurka, for instance, makes the striking claim that ‘the reason it is wrong to kill or maim others is that this will prevent them from achieving full human development’.212 Martha Nussbaum (who isn’t herself a perfectionist) seems to make a similar assumption.213 An ethical theory that endorsed (iv) would, I think, be seriously incomplete. But this rests on a confusion. However, even a consequentialist form of EP would give equal weight to PV and NV and this would amount to endorsing (ii).214 Consequentialist EP is similar in this respect to utilitarianism. At first sight utilitarianism can also seem to focus exclusively on positive value. But when we examine it more closely, we realise it only really endorses (ii). Utilitarianism gives equal weight to both pain (NV) and pleasure (PV). What matters to Utilitarians is the overall balance of pleasure over pain. Traditional forms of Perfectionism (consequentialist EP) are similar in that way to utilitarianism: it is best understood as giving equal status to the prevention of NV and the promotion of PV. According to both utilitarianism and consequentialist EP, the prevention of suffering (or more broadly NV) does not constitute a separate category to which we give priority. This can have counter-intuitive implications: if one action x would result in many more individuals engaging with the goods, but one individual suffering an extreme and long-lasting pain, the action would be permissible. This is the familiar rightbased objection to utilitarianism. This should make us reject (ii) and lead us to endorse (i). In order to do so, one could use arguments that have been invoked to reply to a parallel criticism against virtue ethics. Virtue Ethics has also been largely silent on NV. Rosalind Hursthouse has suggested, however, that virtue ethics should recognize prohibitions, which are based on vices.215 Prohibitions are crucial in giving an appropriate weight to the prevention of NV. Michael Slote similarly argues that deontic concepts are necessary for any ethical conception, but he further argues that deontic concepts can be derived from aretaic ones and that therefore virtue ethics can easily recognize side-constraints to what can be permissibly done.216 Some have even suggested that, from a virtue ethics perspective, giving weight || 212 Hurka T., Perfectionism, p. 63. 213 Nussbaum M., ‘Aristotle, Politics and Human Capabilities’, p. 122. 214 Although, as I will argue later on, the most plausible form of EP would include deontological elements (such as prohibitions grounded on the independent disvalue attributed to wrong actions). 215 Hursthouse R., On Virtue Ethics, Oxford University Press, Oxford, 1999. 216 Slote M., From Morality to Virtue, Oxford University Press, Oxford, 1992.

Perfectionism and Positive Value | 95

to the promotion of PV (in this case the virtues) would entail giving greater weight to the prevention of NV (in this case, vices). MacIntyre has argued along these lines, claiming that virtue ethics can distinguish, in this way, between doing positive wrong and merely failing to do good.217 I have argued so far that we shouldn’t exaggerate the role attributed by perfectionists to positive value and that the most plausible form of Perfectionism should endorse giving priority to the prevention of negative value, that is, (i). This being said, it is not altogether bad that EP still gives some role to the promotion of positive value. Giving some role to positive value helps EP address the concerns of both Elizabeth Anscombe and Bernard Williams. Anscombe was critical of the legalistic structure of consequentialist and deontological theories (which virtue ethics and perfectionism avoid).218 Williams complained that the ‘morality system’ (especially in its Kantian form) is too focused on blame, resentment and punishment.219 EP is less vulnerable to these criticisms. It is also more informative on how to live the good life than most ethical theories, which often merely tell us what is owed to others. EP does not see morality just as a system of negative constraints that regulate relations between people, allowing each to pursue their own subjective ends, but is also concerned with the positive content of people’s lives. In other words, EP can help individuals through the difficult business of living their own lives.220 Finally, because EP is concerned with positive value, and because it reflects some of our intuitions about value, it can better respond to another objection made against ethical theories. Michael Stocker has argued that most ethical theories fail to motivate agents in their daily life. Stocker calls this problem the ‘schizophrenia’ of ethical theories: I have been concerned with what sort of motives people can have if they are to be able to realize the great goods of love, friendship, affection, fellow feeling and community. And I have argued that, if we take as motives, embody in our motives, those various things, which recent ethical theories hold to be ultimately good or right, we will of necessity, be unable to have those motives. Love, friendship, affection, fellow feeling and community like many other states and activities, essentially contain certain motives and essentially

|| 217 MacIntyre A., After Virtue, Duckworth, London, 1985. 218 Anscombe G.E.M., ‘Modern Moral Philosophy’, Philosophy, vol. 33, n. 124, 1958. 219 Williams B., Ethics and the Limits of Philosophy. 220 Hurka voices this complaint against other ethical theories: ‘morality concerns only acts that affect other people….It …says nothing about what we or they should choose for ourselves.’ Hurka T., Perfectionism, p. 5.

96 | Ethical Perfectionism: Distinctions and Objections

preclude certain others, among those precluded we find motives comprising the justifications, the goals and the goods of those ethical theories most prominent today.221

Michael Stocker eloquently expresses the need to take better account of the concepts that actually figure in our daily decision-making process. These concepts are bound to the projects that constitute our lives – our relationships, our community, our loved ones all give us reasons that cannot be accounted for by most ethical theories. Because EP gives a crucial role to the central projects of individuals (as long as these projects engage with objective goods) and to the importance of their loved ones, it is more likely to ground a political theory that is stable and attractive.

3.6 Conclusion I have been advocating a form of EP that is quite complex and which integrates elements from various more familiar ethical theories. But that is not surprising. Simple ethical theories tend to be less plausible than theories that are more nuanced and qualified. Think of a strict Kantian who would not proffer a lie even if it were to rescue a life222 or a strict consequentialist who would gladly electrocute someone to allow for the diffusion of an important football match.223 My aim in this chapter was to counter different objections to Political Perfectionism by identifying the kind of EP on which a plausible Political Perfectionism could be grounded. To this end, I started by making some distinctions so as to find a more plausible Ethical Perfectionism. I discussed some of the differences between consequentialist and deontological Ethical Perfectionism. I also pointed out that some changes might be needed in the transition from Ethical Perfectionism as an ethical theory to Ethical Perfectionism as a political morality. For this transition to take place, I argued that we would need to introduce some consequentialist elements to whatever Ethical Perfectionism we chose to adopt. These consequentialist elements would allow the political morality in question to be agent-neutral and self-other symmetric, two features that a political morality committed to the value of moral equality ought to have. I

|| 221 Stocker M., ‘The Schizophrenia of Modern Ethical Theories’, in Crisp R. and Slote M. (eds.), Virtue Ethics, Oxford University Press, Oxford, 1997, p. 73. 222 Kant I., On a Supposed Right to Lie because of Philanthropic Concerns, in Groundings for the Metaphysics of Morals (translated by James W. Ellington), Hackett Publishing Company, Indianapolis, 1993, p. 61 and followings. 223 Scanlon T.M., What We Owe to Each Other, p. 235.

Conclusion | 97

claimed that an Ethical Perfectionism that would provide a good ground for Political Perfectionism would need to be non-exclusive, pluralist, broad and relative to the talents of the agent. I argued that Political Perfectionism ought to maximise the number of individuals who reach a certain threshold of engagement with the goods. I also endorsed a perfectionist principle that would include both deontological and consequentialist elements. Once a plausible form of Ethical Perfectionism was so defined, I looked at several objections that could be made against it. The two first objections I considered were based on the idea that EP blurs the line between the good and the right. I considered first the objection that EP is too indulgent towards agents by not giving enough weight to the interests of others. I also claimed that EP didn’t need to be self-other asymmetric; whether it is depends on its structure and on the goods that it endorses. The second objection is also based on the premise that it is a mistake to blur the distinction between the right and the good. The worry here however isn’t that the resulting ethical conception would not give enough importance to morality (as defined by what is owed to others) but that EP might end up moralising individuals and by doing that would be treating them as if they had an inferior moral status. I claimed that Ethical Perfectionism wasn’t driven by the aim to ‘moralise’ individuals (by praising and blaming them). In fact, I argued that Ethical Perfectionism didn’t need to be at all concerned with the judgement of individuals themselves. I also argued that, even if one remained unconvinced by Ethical Perfectionism (which gives priority to the Perfectionist Principle over other principles), it would be hard not to recognise the legitimacy of including at least one form of the Perfectionist Principle in non-perfectionist ethical theories. The third objection was that EP is implausible because it fails to give appropriate normative weight to the protection of basic interests and rights, due to its focus on positive value. Contrary to what is often assumed, I argued that Ethical Perfectionism need not give a disproportionate weight only to positive value and that on its most plausible interpretation, it ought to give more weight to the prevention of negative value. Ethical Perfectionism, nevertheless has more to say about positive value than most other ethical theories. This is again a strength, as it makes EP better suited than most ethical theories to guide us through the difficult task of leading a good life.

4 The Reasons that Goodness Gives ‘[T]o claim that something is valuable (or that it is ‘of value’) is to claim that others also have reason to value it, as you do.’ Scanlon, What We Owe to Each Other, p. 95.

In the three previous chapters, I have tried to clarify the notion of Ethical Perfectionism. I started by defining Prudential Perfectionism and Ethical Perfectionism. I defined Prudential Perfectionism as endorsing both the claims that there is a list of objective goods that are constitutive of well-being and that we should strive for them for our own good. I took Ethical Perfectionism to make the further claim that this constitutes a moral requirement. I drew several basic distinctions within Ethical Perfectionism and argued that, in order to ground Political Perfectionism, Ethical Perfectionism would need to be non-exclusive, pluralist, broad and relative to the talents of the agent. More specifically, I argued that our list of perfectionist goods should at least include goods such as pleasure, the absence of pain, deep personal relationships, aesthetic appreciations, and understanding. These claims about value, I argued, are supported by strong intuitions. These intuitions led us to endorse Ethical Perfectionism. But these intuitions, I will now argue, can take us further; to the endorsement of Political Perfectionism. This chapter and the next one will thus be devoted to positing, examining and criticising positive arguments in favour of Political Perfectionism. In chapter 1 (section 10), I drew a distinction between Bold, Modest and Prima Facie Political Perfectionism. Recall the definitions are the following: The Modest Definition: The state is permitted to protect and promote intrinsically valuable goods on the basis of their intrinsic value. The Bold Definition: The state ought to protect and promote intrinsically valuable goods on the basis of their intrinsic value. The Prima Facie Definition: The state has significant reason to protect and promote intrinsically valuable goods on the basis of their intrinsic value. I then defined Political Perfectionism as the view that Political Perfectionism: The state is permitted to and justified in protecting and promoting intrinsically valuable goods on the basis of their intrinsic value.

The Reasons that Goodness Gives | 99

If you are a Political Perfectionist, of the modest kind, your argument can be limited to showing that the state is permitted to protect and promote intrinsically valuable goods on the basis of their intrinsic value. If you are a Political Perfectionist of the bold kind, you need to argue in favour of the much bolder claim that the state ought to protect and promote the goods on the basis of their intrinsic value. As discussed in the introduction, a full case in favour of bold Political Perfectionism would require not only an argument showing that the liberal state ought to reject neutrality (as I do in chapter 5) but also an adequate response to the objections commonly raised against Political Perfectionism (I only partly respond to this second challenge by qualifying Political Perfectionism in a way that restricts the number of objections that can be plausibly raised against it). I will not try to defend Bold Perfectionism because I think that whether perfectionism is justified needs to be considered on a case by case basis and that there are conceivable circumstances in which perfectionist interventions would not be advisable. My aim is to argue in favour of Political Perfectionism in the sense outlined above, which requires arguing both for Prima Facie Political Perfectionism and Modest Political Perfectionism. This is exactly what I intend to do in this chapter. After having revised an argument made by Raz to the effect that the liberal state has significant reason to protect and promote intrinsically valuable goods (the Prima Facie Definition), I will turn to another argument in order to show that the state is permitted to do so (Modest definition). This chapter will examine and revise some of Raz’s arguments for Political Perfectionism. The Service and Well-Being Argument (section 1 to 5) argues for the Prima Facie version of Political Perfectionism while the Service and Practical Reason Argument (section 6 to 9) argues for the Modest version. I will start by examining a crude version of the first argument, so as to tease out the main lines of its more complex version. Then, in section 3, I will reconstruct an argument for Political Perfectionism on the basis of different claims that are made by Raz in The Morality of Freedom and other writings. This argument, which I will call the Service and Well-Being Argument relies on several background assumptions made by Raz which I will critically examine. In section 4 and 5, I will look at some objections that have been made against different premises of the argument, defend the argument against these objections and revise some of the premises so that they can still support its conclusion. In section 6, I will turn to look at an argument made explicitly by Raz, which I label the Service and Practical Reason argument. Despite the fact that they can stand independently from each other, I will show how both the Service and Well-Being Argument and the Service and Practical Reason Argument are ultimately linked. I will fill in the gaps of this argument by pointing to some of

100 | The Reasons that Goodness Gives

Raz’s background assumptions. In section 7, I will raise an objection to the argument as it stands and revise the argument so as to add a specification about the kind of reasons that can be used. For this purpose, I will give a different account of the relationship between agent-neutral and agent-relative reasons. In section 8, I will consider some meta-ethical objections to the argument and qualify the argument appropriately. Finally, I will conclude the chapter by offering a revised version of Raz’s argument for Political Perfectionism.

4.1 Prima Facie Arguments224 I will label prima facie arguments positive arguments in favour of Political Perfectionism which might be defeated by other considerations. These arguments are thus only prima facie because they are not conclusive or definitive arguments in favour of Political Perfectionism. For them to be definitive, further possible objections would need to be resisted. Most of the perfectionist arguments start by addressing common objections to Political Perfectionism – as if there is a general presumption against PP, which must first be overturned. This situation might be adequately explained by the fact that neutrality appears now as the natural default position of a liberal state, a default position that perfectionists must first resist. The liberal commitment to neutrality has established itself so deeply that the prima facie pull of perfectionism has been obscured. But this assumption of the value of neutrality exactly reverses the way things are at the level of justification, where the presumption is in favour of PP. It is therefore important to demonstrate this presumption at the level of justification, by articulating positive arguments for a PP principle. These prima facie arguments capture something very ‘natural’ about perfectionism, so much so that many authors have described them as ‘natural’ arguments.225 In this chapter, I will examine several versions of a prima facie argument based on a specific conception of legitimacy, the Service Conception developed by Joseph Raz. For now, let us start by a crude version of this prima facie argument.

|| 224 For a good explanation of the distinction between prima facie and pro tanto reasons, see Hurley S.L., Natural Reason: Personality and Polity, Oxford University Press, Oxford, 1992, p. 133. 225 Chan J., ‘Legitimacy, Unanimity and Perfectionism’, Philosophy and Public Affairs, vol. 29. Raz J., ‘Facing Up’. Waldron J., ‘Autonomy and Perfectionism in Raz’ Morality of Freedom’, Southern California Law Review, 1988‒1989, p. 1137.

Well-Being and the Function of the State: The Crude Argument | 101

4.2 Well-Being and the Function of the State: The Crude Argument A somewhat crude prima facie argument has been suggested by Joseph Chan as one possible argument for Perfectionism (although he does not endorse it himself): People care about the quality of their lives and have an interest in leading a good life. If the state’s existence is to help citizens pursue their interests, it seems natural that the state should assist citizens by promoting valuable conceptions of the good life, just as it should assist the lives of citizens by promoting the economy, offering education and health services, and protecting their rights and justice.226

This argument merely states that leading a good life is one of citizens’ interests. Chan points to one important condition: ‘If the state’s function is to help citizens pursue their interests…’. This condition is important, as Chan’s argument depends on a certain conception of state legitimacy. If the state’s function is to help citizens pursue their interests, then it follows that the state ought to be helping citizens to lead a good life. Let us state this argument more explicitly. Each step could be formulated in the following way: 1. 2. 3.

Citizens care about the goodness of their lives (or how well their lives go). Leading a good life is one of citizens’ interests. The function of the state is to help citizens successfully pursue their interests.

Therefore 4. The state ought to help citizens pursue a good life. In other words, if individuals have alongside their ‘neutral’ interests, an interest in pursuing their conceptions of the good, there is a prima facie reason for the state to assist them in the pursuit of these interests. This argument might sound trivial, but it is not as trivial as it might first appear, given that the third premise isn’t accepted by everyone and some ambiguities surround the use of the word interest.

|| 226 Chan J., ibid., p. 5‒6.

102 | The Reasons that Goodness Gives

To speak of interests is ambiguous, as it could be understood in a subjective or objective sense. If we take a subjective view of interests, the state’s promotion of individuals’ subjective interests would be equivalent to the state’s promotion of individual well-being on the desire-based account of well-being. On an Objective List (‘OL’) conception of well-being, individuals’ interests would refer to the items on the OL list. The advantage of referring to interests is that this avoids commitment to any particular conception of well-being. This allows perfectionists to appeal to proponents of both the OL and desire-based accounts of wellbeing. I will argue however that this is a mistake, as the argument for perfectionism fails to make sense if we adopt a subjective understanding of interests. The first premise – the claim that citizens care about the goodness of their lives – has a problematic role in the argument. Chan claims that ‘[p]eople care about the quality of their lives and have an interest in leading a good life’ which seems to suggest that both of these claims are necessary for the argument. If interests were understood in a subjective sense, I believe that only one of these claims would be necessary to the extent that if citizens care about leading a good life, this amounts to saying that they have a (subjective) interest in leading a good life. The fact that Chan uses both claim 1 and claim 2 suggests that there is a limit to the kind of interests that can be included; and by doing this he shows an inclination towards an objective conception of interest. Moreover, in Chan’s quote, he refers to ‘valuable’ conceptions of the good, which seem to imply an objective set of criteria that would evaluate which interests are valuable. But then, one might wonder why it matters at all that they care about how well their lives go. There are two different plausible interpretations for the presence of this claim in the argument. One would be that it performs an epistemic function. According to this interpretation, the fact that individuals care about how well their lives go shows (is evidence) that well-being is valuable and that the state should protect it. This statement would then be similar to John Stuart Mill’s statement that the fact that people desired happiness was a proof that it was desirable in his famous ‘proof’ of utilitarianism.227 However, as many have noted, the fact that people desire happiness cannot prove that it is valuable and that people ought to desire it.228 In both cases, it isn’t a valid move. Desirability

|| 227 Mill J.S., Utilitarianism, Cahn S. (ed.), Classics of Political and Moral Philosophy, Oxford University Press, New York, 2002, chs. 3, 4. 228 Crisp R., Routledge Philosophy Guidebook to Mill on Utilitarianism, Routledge, London, 1997, chap. 4.

Well-Being and the Function of the State: The Crude Argument | 103

is a normative concept.229 Using the fact that happiness is desired to establish that it is desirable in the normative sense constitutes a move from an ‘is’ to an ‘ought’. Similarly, using the fact that individuals care about how well their lives go to show that it is valuable that their lives go well commits the same mistake. The other more plausible interpretation of the claim is that it represents a commitment to the condition of endorsement. From an Objective List conception of well-being, the fact that individuals care about their conception of the good is not relevant to the attribution of value to that conception. However, many Objective List proponents have claimed that endorsement is still a necessary condition for the activity or good in question to benefit the individual at all. On that interpretation, the proper way to understand the first premise would thus be as a gesture towards an endorsement constraint (I discussed such endorsement constraint in chapter 2 section 5). To sum up, the problem with this version of the argument is that the notion of interest is misleading. On a subjective reading of interests, they could include other-regarding or offensive preferences. That would make the argument absurd, as it would be implausible to suggest that the state’s function is to promote whatever desires arise in the mind of any individual (although this view would be more plausible if an ideal version of the desire-satisfaction approach was used.). I also believe that Chan’s argument as it stands implies an objective understanding of interest. But if we refer to objective interests, we are effectively dealing with an objective conception of well-being. In this case, I would suggest using the word ‘objective well-being’ as it is less ambiguous than interests. The argument ought thus to be amended to make that clear: 1. 2. 3.

Citizens’ objective well-being is constituted by engagement with objective goods a, b, c… The state’s function is to ultimately promote citizens’ objective wellbeing The state ought to promote engagement with the objective a, b, c…

The key premise is thus (2), the claim that the state’s raison d’être is to promote citizens’ well-being.230 This claim relies on an instrumentalist conception of

|| 229 As Velleman writes: ‘desirable ....denote the status of being appropriate to desire....’ Velleman D., ‘A Theory of Value’, Ethics 118, 2008, p. 410. 230 I could point out right away that it is enough for the argument if this is only one of the state’s functions. It does not need to be the central one. See section 10 below.

104 | The Reasons that Goodness Gives

authority. Instrumentalist conceptions of authority take beneficial consequences to individuals to be crucial in establishing an institution’s authority. Such an instrumentalist view is held by John Finnis, for instance, who holds that the purpose of the law is coordination for the common good.231 Raz’s Service Conception of Authority is related to such views.232 As I will discuss the Service conception of authority in section 6 of this chapter, I wil not discuss it further at present. The argument does not assert that there is decisive reason to accept PP, but only that, if the state treats differently ‘neutral’ interests from interests originating in a conception of the good, some justification needs to be given for that differential treatment. Some might claim that there is nothing new in claiming this, insofar as justifications are given by neutralists for this differential treatment.233 This is true. However, we have become so familiar with these justifications that we no longer feel the powerful initial pull of the prima facie argument in the opposite direction. My aim here is to draw attention to this powerful prima facie justification for PP. Before we move on to consider another version of this argument, I’d like to point out that this argument isn’t equivalent to the claim that promoting individuals’ interests is a desirable thing. The argument, as stated above, assumes that the state has the function of promoting individuals’ interests, so it relies mostly on an assumption of what it is for a state to be legitimate. Surprisingly, Chan treats these two different claims as equivalent: Another way to put this point is that since states can have a powerful impact on our lives, would it not be sensible to choose a state that would promote the conditions enabling people to lead a worthwhile life. Isn’t a state that promotes worthwhile conceptions more desirable than one that fails to do so?234

Unlike Chan, I do not think that this is just another way of putting the previous point. This last quote merely claims that the promotion of individuals’ interests is a desirable feature in a state. It merely evokes the appeal of using the capacities of the state to improve individuals’ well-being. It is thus a weaker argument

|| 231 Finnis J., Natural Law and Natural Rights, Clarendon Press, Oxford, 1979, p. 334‒336. 232 Raz J., The Morality of Freedom. J Raz, ‘The Problem of Authority: Revisiting the Service Conception’, Minnesota Law Review, 2006, p. 1003–1044. Sherman J., ‘Unresolved Problems in the Service Conception of Authority’, Oxford Journal of Legal Studies, 2010, p. 419‒440. 233 An instance of such justification is to claim that violations of neutrality are incompatible with treating others with respect. See Waldron J., ‘Autonomy and Perfectionism’, p. 1137. 234 Chan J., ibid., p. 6

The Service and Well-Being Argument | 105

than the previous one which was making a claim about the promotion of individuals’ interests being itself necessary for the legitimacy of the state.

4.3 The Service and Well-Being Argument Joseph Raz has been one of the major defenders of Political Perfectionism in recent years. One of his arguments for Political Perfectionism, which I label the Service and Well-Being Argument, is merely implicit in his writings. In what follows, I will turn to examine the underlying structure of this argument. The Service and Well-being Argument is not unrelated to the one suggested by Chan, as it is based on a similar conception of legitimacy. Raz is committed to the general claim that all value is ultimately connected to individual well-being. Good government is then presented as one instance of this more general claim that anything valuable has to promote individual well-being. I will attempt here a reconstruction of his argument: (1) ‘[T]he goodness or badness of anything derives ultimately from its contribution, actual or possible, to human life and its quality.’235 (2) The goodness or badness of government derives ultimately from its contribution, actual or possible, to human life and its quality (a specification of 1). (3) In order for the state to be good, it ought positively to contribute (actually or potentially) to individual well-being (follows from 2). (4) Individual well-being is constituted by the successful pursuit of valuable comprehensive goals.236 (5) Valuable comprehensive goals are possible only via ‘existing social forms, i.e. forms of behaviour which are in fact widely practiced in [their] society.’237 Therefore, (6) In order for the state to be good, the state ought to promote valuable social forms so as to promote individual’s well-being (follows from 3, 4 and 5). || 235 Raz J., The Morality of Freedom, p. 194. 236 As Raz writes: ‘I have argued that well-being consists in a whole-hearted and successful pursuit of valuable relationships and goals.’ Raz J., ‘The Role of Well-Being’, Philosophical Perspectives, 18, 2004, p. 269. 237 Raz J., The Morality of Freedom, p. 308.

106 | The Reasons that Goodness Gives

The three first premises describe and apply Raz’s Humanist Principle (which I will discuss in a moment) to the political realm. The fourth premise defines individual well-being. The fifth premise points to the necessity of a cultural and social background for goals to be meaningful. This claim is usually called the Social Forms Thesis. The conclusion of the argument is that the state ought to promote valuable social forms. This conclusion can seems to correspond to the bold definition of Political Perfectionism but I will later suggest that it actually amounts only to the endorsement of Prima Facie Perfectionism. I will briefly examine each of these premises. I will then consider more closely proposition 1, 2 and 5. First, the first two premises articulate and apply the ‘The Humanistic Principle’ to the state. The Humanistic principle states that ‘the goodness or badness of anything ultimately derives from its contribution, actual or possible, to human life and its quality’.238 It is important to emphasize that an activity, relationship, or state of affairs needs only to have the potential to contribute to individual well-being in order to be valuable. This is quite important, as an activity that fails to actually benefit individuals, will still have value, if it has the potential to contribute to individual well-being.239 The Humanistic Principle has been interpreted by David McCabe as naturally implying at the political level that ‘political institutions and policies must be defended ultimately by the contribution they make to the well-being of persons who live under them’.240 This seems a reasonable enough interpretation of Raz’s view, if it weren’t for the omission of the idea of potential contribution. The notion of potential contribution implies that political institutions and policies could in principle be valuable even if they do not contribute effectively to human well-being – for example in instances where individuals choose not to take advantage of the opportunities made available to them. It is thus important to correct David McCabe’s interpretation, as it could rule out creating opportunities that individuals might not take, and arguably even allow the government to coerce individuals for the sake of their well-being. The fourth claim specifies Raz’s conception of well-being: individual wellbeing is constituted by the achievement of personal projects (i.e. projects that the individual has chosen). In Raz’s opinion, a person’s well-being is thus critically connected to her goals: ‘success and failure in the pursuit of our goals is in || 238 Raz J., The Morality of Freedom, p. 194 239 Macklem T. and Gardner J., ‘Value Interest, and Well-Being’, Utilitas, 18, 4, 2006, p. 370‒371. 240 McCabe D., ‘Joseph Raz and the Contextual Argument for Liberal Perfectionism’, Ethics, 2001, p. 496.

The Service and Well-Being Argument | 107

itself the major determinant of our well-being.’241 Raz’s use of goals fulfils the same function as my second-order endorsement constraint (see section 5 of chapter 2) – it allows us to take into account the individual perspective. Raz himself claims that his account of well-being includes a subjectivist component.242 Nevertheless, Raz also includes an objective criterion; he repeatedly adds the epithet ‘valuable’ to these goals and relationships, implying that they need to be independently valuable.243 The fifth claim posits the Social Forms Thesis. The Social Forms Thesis holds that individuals can form and engage with comprehensive goals only through exposure to existing social forms – forms of behaviour which are in fact widely practiced in their society.244 The Social Forms Thesis has been held in one version or the other across the whole political spectrum by communitarians, liberals and conservatives alike.245 I will discuss the Social Forms Thesis in further detail below. The conclusion of the argument is that the state ought to promote such social forms. This conclusion can seem to amount to Political Perfectionism in its bold definition. Recall that the bold definition stated that ‘the state ought to protect and promote intrinsically valuable goods on the basis of their intrinsic value’. Both the crucial elements of the bold definition are present in the conclusion of this argument. First, the conclusion claims that the state ought to promote social forms (of the goods). Second, given Raz’s qualification that the social forms in question ought to be valuable, it does so on the basis of the intrinsic value of these goods. However, given that the state ought to promote valuable social forms in order for it to be good, the conclusion is merely saying that, if one wants the state to be good, it ought to do so. This does not amount to the bold definition; the bold definition makes a much more general and definite claim about what the state ought to do. The Service and Well-Being Argument thus best understood to support Prima Facie Perfectionism. Recall that I defined Prima Facie Perfectionism as the following: There is at least a significant reason for the state to protect and promote intrinsically valuable goods. In this case the reason in question is that it allows the state to be legitimate. Moreover, Prima || 241 Raz J., The Morality of Freedom, p. 297. 242 Raz J., Ethics in the Public Domain, Clarendon Paperback, Oxford, 2001, p. 6 243 Raz J., ‘The Role of Well-Being’, Philosophical Perspectives, Ethics, 2004, p. 269. 244 Raz J., Ethics in the Public Domain, p. 177. 245 Kymlicka W., Liberalism, Community and Culture, Oxford, Oxford University Press, 1989, p. 74‒99. Taylor C., Philosophical Papers, vol. 2: Philosophy and the Human Sciences, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 1985.

108 | The Reasons that Goodness Gives

Facie Perfectionism implies that, in order to be legitimate, the state ought sometimes to protect and promote intrinsically valuable goods on the basis of their intrinsic value. In other words, it is enough for the state to be legitimate if it does so in some instances. Bold Perfectionism implies that it always ought to do so. I will now look at some possible objections to the first premise (the Humanistic Principle) and premise 5 (the Social Forms Thesis).

4.4 Is the Humanistic Principle necessary for the Service and Well-Being Argument? Let us start with the Humanistic Principle. One might deny the claim that individual well-being has such fundamental value. I take something to be of fundamental value if all other value ultimately derives from it. In political philosophy, a plausible contender for having fundamental value is justice. Rawls has famously claimed that justice is the first virtue of institutions and this is seems incompatible with the claims above according to which anything that has value derives from the potential or actual contribution to individual well-being, as this amounts to claim that individual well-being has fundamental value.246 If justice is the first virtue of institutions, a just society would be more valuable than an unjust society, independently from the different contributions (actual or possible) these societies would make to individual well-being.247 However, while articulating the levelling down objection, Derek Parfit has famously claimed that a situation cannot be worse (or better) if there is no one for whom it is worse (or better).248 Larry Temkin has argued that this amounts to endorsing a view according to which ‘outcomes should be assessed solely in terms of the way the sentient beings in those outcomes are affected for better or

|| 246 Rawls J., A Theory of Justice, Oxford University Press, Oxford, 1999, p. 3. 247 It might be said that in general, thanks to redistribution and the fact that individuals derive less benefits from added resources because of marginal utility, justice is often correlated with benefits to the well-being of individuals in the society. In this case, both fundamental values would converge towards the same policies. However, if we take a fairly affluent society which guarantees a certain threshold of well-being to all individuals, the remaining inequalities in the distribution of good might have no significant impact on individual well-being. Yet if we take justice to be a fundamental virtue of states, these inequalities might still affect the way we judge the state in question. 248 Parfit D., ‘Equality and Priority’, Ratio, vol. 10, no. 3, December 1997, pp. 202‒221.

Is the Humanistic Principle necessary for the Service and Well-Being Argument? | 109

worse’.249 But if this is the case, this seems to imply that justice does not have a fundamental role, as justice would be valuable only to the extent that it has a positive impact on human well-being. This disagreement is a fundamental one, but it isn’t really relevant for our argument. If we want the argument to remain as close as possible to Raz’s view, the argument should stand as it is. However, only the second premise is needed for the argument. Even if one rejects the claim that anything valuable derives from individual well-being, one could still endorse the claim that the legitimacy of a state derives partly from the potential and actual contribution the state makes to individual well-being. This claim is difficult to reject as it could be reasonably integrated into diverse conceptions of legitimacy. One could thus revise this premise: The goodness of government derives at least partly from its contribution, actual or potential, to human life and its quality. On this revised claim, the potential or actual contribution to human life and its quality is a necessary but not sufficient condition for a state to be good/legitimate.250 In other words, as long as the extent to which the state benefits individual well-being is taken to have a role in assessing the value of the state, then the revised argument can stand. One could surely have a plausible view that a good state is judged with respect to both justice and well-being. In this case, we could change the argument into the following: (1) The goodness or badness of government derives at least partly from its contribution, actual or possible, to human life and its quality. (2) In order for the state to be good, it ought positively to contribute (actually or potentially) to individual well-being. (3) Individual well-being is constituted by the successful pursuit of valuable comprehensive goals. (4) Valuable comprehensive goals are possible only via existing social forms.

|| 249 Temkin L., ‘Equality, Priority and the Levelling-Down Objection’, in Clayton M. and Williams A. (eds.), The Ideal of Equality, Macmillan and St. Martin’s Press, 2000, p. 132 250 Good and legitimate are used here interchangeably, because we are talking about an instrumentalist conception of legitimacy.

110 | The Reasons that Goodness Gives

Therefore, (5) In order for the state to be good, the state ought to promote valuable social forms so as to promote individual’s well-being.

4.5 An Objection to the Social Forms Thesis One could next question the validity of the Social Forms Thesis. The Social Forms thesis can be interpreted in three different ways: as a semantic claim, as an epistemic claim, or as a meta-ethical claim. First, on the semantic interpretation, the very existence of some comprehensive goals depends on social practices and institutions. The goals that individuals have – the goals whose achievement is a necessary condition for well-being – can only be defined and grasped via a cultural framework that makes sense of them. One cannot form the project of becoming a doctor, if the activity of healing the sick, the techniques by which one could do that, and an educational system that could train and guarantee that some individuals are qualified for that purpose, are not already established and recognised within one’s society. Second, on the epistemic interpretation, the Social Forms thesis is a thesis about the psychological and cultural processes by which one gets to know and engage with a valuable activity.251 Without an actual social practice, it is difficult to know how to achieve certain goals. One needs to know a whole set of uncodifiable responses and patterns of behaviour which would not be accessible without the practice itself.252 On this interpretation, being exposed to a social practice and experiencing it teaches us something we wouldn’t be able to learn otherwise. The existence of cultural and social institutions provides insights into aspects of the goals that would otherwise not be available to us. Finally, the meta-ethical interpretation would consist in a denial of strong objectivity and an endorsement of what Kramer has called ‘weak objectivity’.253 On such a ‘weak-objective’ interpretation of the Social Forms Thesis, the value (or goodness) of a social practice is constituted by the attitude of the majority of the group members of a specific community. But this interpretation would not fit with Raz’s claim that the goods need to be valuable, where by that he is im-

|| 251 This interpretation has been explicitly endorsed by Raz. 252 McCabe D., ‘Joseph Raz and the Contextual Argument’, Ethics, 2001, p. 498. 253 Kramer M.H., Objectivity and the Rule of Law, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 2007, p. 4

An Objection to the Social Forms Thesis | 111

plicitly referring to objective constraints on the goals to be pursued.254 The objection that can be raised against the meta-ethical interpretation of the Social Forms thesis is thus that, it is incompatible with even the minimal commitment that Raz expresses with respect to the objectivity of values. We can thus reject the meta-ethical interpretation of the Social Forms Thesis. Now someone might object that if the meta-ethical interpretation of the Social Forms thesis is rejected, one would need to defend the existence of objective values, especially given the diversity of cultural and social practices. The key to making such a case is to consider particular social and cultural practices as different tokens of the same universally valuable objective goods. This is to say that a specific social or cultural practice or institution is a specific instantiation of a more general valuable good.255 Let’s take, for instance, the institution of marriage. There are different forms of what is taken to be involved in marital unions across cultures. But there is a common more abstract good that underpins these diverse social and cultural practices: the value of deep long-lasting relationships. This is not to say of course, that marriage is the only possible token of the more general good of deep long-lasting relationships. Another one is friendship but there could be other possible instantiations that aren’t yet part of our practices. Particular valuable practices can thus be different instantiations of the same abstract universal goods. Consider next another objection. Don’t we need to add the claim that the state is necessary to uphold such social forms which would otherwise perish? Both Joseph Chan and Jeremy Waldron have argued that this is a necessary or crucial step in the argument in favour of Political Perfectionism.256 However, contra Chan and Waldron, I argue here that the necessity of state interventions for the survival of the social forms is not necessary for the Service and WellBeing Argument. There are two different questions raised here. First, one could ask the question of whether the state is at all necessary to the survival of some social forms. Second, one could wonder whether the state is in a better position than individuals to promote social goods. Recall that the Service and Well-Being Argument assumes a conception of legitimacy according to which, contributing to || 254 Raz J., Ethics in the Public Domain, Clarendon Paperback, Oxford, 2001, p. 4‒5. See also Raz J., The Value of Practice, p. 210‒213. 255 McCabe defends the same explanation of the relationship between abstract universal goods and specific tokens. McCabe D., ‘Joseph Raz and the Contextual Argument for Liberal Perfectionism’, p. 505. 256 Chan J., ‘Legitimacy, Unanimity and Perfectionism’, p. 34. Waldron J., ‘Autonomy and Perfectionism in Raz’ Morality of Freedom’, Southern California Law Review, 1988‒1989, p. 1138.

112 | The Reasons that Goodness Gives

individual well-being is a necessary condition for the state to be legitimate. Given such an assumption, the first question is irrelevant. On the Service and Well-Being argument it is the duty of the state to promote individual well-being via the promotion of social forms. Even if the social forms were to be sustained without the help of the state, it would still be the state’s duty to promote the social forms. The second question would similarly be irrelevant, to the extent that, even if the state were in a worse position than individuals to promote the social forms, it would not change the fact that this remains its duty. This being said, if it could be held that the state is in a better position than individuals to sustain the social forms, because it is more impartial or has better means to do so, it might be of relevance in determining the extent of state intervention. A last objection hasn’t been considered so far. What if one were to reject not the status of well-being in Raz’s view, but his definition of it? After all, there are many competing views on well-being and one could reject Raz’s conception. In order to respond to that objection, I will need to introduce another argument which eschews references to well-being (although it refers to goodness, which, for Raz is equivalent to well-being). This argument will also not refer to the Social Forms Thesis. Raz commits himself explicitly only to the next perfectionist argument I will consider based on practical reason.

4.6 The Service and Practical Reason Argument: The Explicit Version The argument I examined above is only implicit in Raz’s writings. The explicit argument that Raz uses is based on practical reason.257 The structure of the explicit argument given by Raz in ‘Facing Up’ is the following:258 (1) ‘That an act is good is a reason to do it, that a state of affairs is good is a reason to bring it about.’259 (2) ‘[T]he reasons which should guide governments are the reasons which should guide their subjects….’260

|| 257 I take a reason to be simply ‘a consideration in favour of something’. See Scanlon T.M., What We Owe to Each Other, p. 17. 258 Raz J., ‘Facing Up: a Reply’, Southern California Law Review, 1989, p. 1230‒1232. 259 Raz J., ibid., p. 1230.

The Service and Practical Reason Argument: The Explicit Version | 113

(3) ‘[I]t follows from these two propositions that governments should act on perfectionist reasons…’261 This argument claims that the state is supposed to follow reasons stemming from goodness. The first premise connects goodness with practical reason. The second premise states Raz’s Dependence Thesis. The conclusion states that the government ought to use ‘perfectionist reasons’. What Raz has in mind by perfectionist reasons are non-neutral reasons (reasons that belong to a conception of the good). The argument is only briefly sketched in ‘Facing Up’ and the argument implicitly relies on Raz’s Service Conception of Authority, an assumption that is exposed in The Morality of Freedom but not in ‘Facing Up’. The first premise claims that goodness is reason-giving. This is meant by Raz as a conceptual claim.262 To say that something is good means that it gives us a reason to want it, do it, and make it happen. One might then wonder what kind of reasons are we talking about? Are we dealing with prudential reasons or moral reasons? (I take prudential reasons refer to instances of goodness, which ‘benefit’ the agent and moral reasons refer to reasons which will not ‘benefit’ the agent.) Raz denies that he is talking exclusively about prudential reasons. He indeed argues that if something is good for someone other than the agent, it still gives her a reason to bring it about, namely the fact that it is good. The outcome of such a view is that moral reasons stem from the same source as prudential reasons. Both arise from the valuable and the good.263 However, one could point out that this claim could be interpreted in two slightly different ways. On one reading of it, it is a conceptual claim that gives an analysis of goodness: ‘x is good’ is the equivalent of ‘having reasons to do/pursue x’. If one claims that x is good, one points to the existence of reasons in favour of x. However, on another reading, the goodness of x itself gives us reasons to do/pursue x. On the second reading, the claim implies a rejection of a buck-passing account of value. A buck-passing account of value holds that it is not the fact that x is good, or valuable, that provides reasons, but other proper-

|| 260 Raz J., p. 1231. 261 Raz J., p. 1231. 262 Raz writes: ‘that there is some good in the action is the reason for it’. Raz J., ‘On the Guise of the Good’, in Tennenbaum S., Desire, Practical Reason and the Good, Oxford University Press, Oxford, 2010. 263 This view is shared by those many who are convinced by the thesis of the priority of the normative over the evaluative. Scanlon, What We Owe to Each Other. Wallace R.J., ‘Reasons, Values and Agent-Relativity’, Dialectica, 2010, p. 503‒528.

114 | The Reasons that Goodness Gives

ties that characterise x and which explain why x is taken to be good.264 Raz’s argument is compatible with both ways of understanding the relation between value and reasons.265 The claim endorsed by the first premise isn’t revolutionary. From the perspective of practical reason, if an individual is rational and if an action is good, the presence of a reason supporting it must at least dispose the individual in favour of this action. However, this does not amount to a claim that he ought to do the action in question; there might be other, stronger reasons counting against it.266 The overall balance of reasons must be in favour of the action in question in order to have this binding significance. Let us nevertheless consider premise 2: (2) The Dependence Thesis: Legitimate laws ought to reflect reasons that apply to individuals anyway. The second premise of the argument qualifies the kind of reasons that an authority can appeal to for it to be legitimate in its directives. The reasons invoked to ground legitimate authoritative directives should be ‘dependent’, that is, they should depend on reasons already applying to the subjects of the authority. In other words, individuals should already have reasons (autonomously from the reasons generated by the directives) to comply with the directives given by the authority, and these directives should be formulated because of these preexisting reasons. Or as Raz puts it: ‘all authoritative directives should be based on reasons which already independently apply to the subjects of the directives and are relevant to their action in the circumstances covered by the directive.’267 Thus on Raz’s account, authority is legitimate only if it is grounded in reasons which apply anyway to its subjects.268 || 264 ’…being good, or valuable, is not a property that itself provides a reason to respond to a thing in certain ways. Rather, to be good or valuable is to have other properties that constitute such reasons.’ Scanlon T.M., What We Owe to Each Other, p. 97. 265 If a buck-passing account of value were endorsed though, this would lead to a reductionist reading of intrinsic value, Wallace R.J., Reasons, Values and Agent-Relativity, Dialectica, vol. 64, no. 4 (2010), p. 503. 266 Broome writes that ‘If you do not do what you have reason to do, you might not have failed in any way; you might have performed exactly as you should have. You might have had a better reason not to do this thing and correctly followed the better reason.’ Broome J., ‘Are Intentions Reasons’, in Morris C.W. and Ripstein A. (eds.), Practical Rationality and Preferences: Essays for David Gauthier, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 2001, p. 107. 267 Raz J., The Morality of Freedom, p. 47. 268 Raz J., ibid., p. 47.

The Service and Practical Reason Argument: The Explicit Version | 115

The Dependence thesis is another way of claiming that the law should guide its subjects well; that the law ought to provide good normative guidance. Raz isn’t alone in holding this view, as Gardner points out: For Finnis and Dworkin alike, law aims to guide its subjects properly, soundly, upstandingly, well. Law aims to be justified in the guidance that it gives to those whom it aims to guide, such that what they do, when they are guided by the law and make no mistakes about the law, will itself be justified.269

This summons well enough the role of the Dependence thesis in Raz’s Service Conception. Let us take the example of criminal laws. A law prohibiting killing (excluding legitimate defence and just war cases) is legitimate on the Dependence Thesis, because there are independent moral reasons for individuals not to kill others. The legitimacy of a prohibition on killings is based on these other moral reasons that would apply to individuals anyway, even in the absence of authority. It is important to emphasize that the Dependence Thesis does not claim that actual authorities issue directives only in light of such dependent reasons. The Dependence Thesis is a normative claim, that is, a claim about what properties directives should have in order to be legitimate. Moreover, on Raz’s account, authoritative determinations are binding, even when they do not correctly reflect the reasons on which they depend. This is due to the fact that the reasons that ground authoritative directives are pre-emptive; they replace the relevant dependent reasons (if the conditions of the Normal Justification Thesis270 and the Dependence Thesis are generally satisfied.). In other words, the authoritative directives give reasons to individuals to comply with them that should replace the reasons that ground their existence.271 Let us examine why this is so. It is only because authoritative directives reflect dependent reasons which bind individuals anyway that they are entitled to replace people’s own judgement on the merits of the case.272 But if it is because reasons are dependent that they are pre-emptive, how do we make sense of the claim that even in instances in which the dependence thesis isn’t respected the authoritative directive remains binding. I want to suggest that this is explained by the ‘Normal Justifica|| 269 Gardner J., ‘Law’s Aim in Law’s Empire’, in Hershovitz S. (ed.), Exploring Law’s Empire – The Jurisprudence of Ronald Dworkin, Oxford University Press, Oxford, 2008, p. 210. 270 The Normal Justification Thesis is explained below. 271 Raz J., ibid., p. 46. 272 Raz J., ibid., p. 59.

116 | The Reasons that Goodness Gives

tion Thesis’. This thesis is mostly developed by Raz in The Morality of Freedom. The Normal Justification Thesis claims that: the normal way to establish that a person has authority over another person involves showing that the alleged subject is likely better to comply with reasons which apply to him (other than the alleged authoritative directives) if he accepts the directives of the alleged authority as authoritatively binding and tries to follow them, rather than by trying to follow the reasons which apply to him directly.273

In other words, an authority is recognised as such if the reasons that ground its directives are dependent reasons and if the authority in question is competent in recognising these reasons better than the individual would on her own. Given that this is a claim about general competence, the thesis does not claim that the authority always needs to track the reasons better than individuals to be legitimate: it only needs to do so generally. This is why the directives can replace the reasons on which they depend as long as they are formulated by an authority that satisfies the conditions identified by the Normal Justification Thesis. If the general competence of the authority is established, the individuals would do better to rely on the directives rather than to themselves deliberate on the original reasons that justify the directives. The Normal Justification Thesis thus adds a claim about the competence of authorities to better track reasons.274 Without this competence, the authority would not be justified.275 On Raz’s view, all these different theses are linked: authoritative directives replace the original reason only if the Dependence Thesis and the Normal Justi-

|| 273 Raz J., ibid., p. 53. 274 Beyond the superior epistemic skills of the authority, it is possible that Raz also believes that the authority has a superior pragmatic capacity to ensure the compliance of individuals with those reasons. Raz claims that the ‘alleged subject is likely better to comply with reasons’. The legitimate state might thus have an advantage not only in identifying the reasons in question but also in ensuring compliance. There is thus a practical aspect to the Normal Justification Thesis: The authority could increase the likelihood that the individual will comply with the reasons that apply to her. 275 Raz writes: ‘An authority is justified, …if it is more likely than its subjects to act correctly for the right reasons.’ Raz J., ibid., p. 61.

The Service and Practical Reason Argument: The Explicit Version | 117

fication Thesis are satisfied.276 All together these theses constitute Raz’ Service Conception of Authority.277 If we explicitly add the Normal Justification Thesis, this amended version of the argument gives us a stronger and more plausible account of Raz’s Service and Practical Reason argument for Political Perfectionism: (1) Goodness as reason-giving: ‘That an act is good is a reason to do it, that a state of affairs is good is a reason to bring it about.’278 (2) The Dependence Thesis: Legitimate laws ought to depend on reasons that apply to individuals anyway. (3) Reasons given by the goodness of specific acts and specific states of affairs apply to individuals autonomously. (4) The Normal Justification Thesis: The state has authority if it generally better tracks those reasons that apply to individuals anyway. Therefore (5) A state that has authority ought to formulate laws that reflect dependent reasons, whether these reasons belong to a conception of the good or not. I have added premises 3 and 4 to the explicit argument given by Raz in ‘Facing Up’. Premise 3 explicitly links the Dependence Thesis with the reasons provided by goodness: reasons provided by goodness qualify as apt to ground authoritative directives. Premise 4 affirms the Normal Justification Thesis. Finally, the conclusion of this argument is slightly different from the conclusion that Raz invokes in ‘Facing Up’. In that article, Raz claims that it follows that ‘governments should act on perfectionist reasons…’.279 However, my reconstruction of the argument endorses a more modest conclusion, which is that ‘the state ought to formulate laws that reflect dependent reasons, whether these reasons belong to a conception of the good or not.’ This conclusion claims that the state ought not to restrict its reasons to only neutral ones. Recall that, on the modest defini-

|| 276 The Service Conception consists of three theses. The three theses are the Dependence Thesis (DT), the Normal Justification Thesis (NJT) and the Pre-emption Thesis (PT). Sherman J., ‘Unresolved Problems in the Service Conception of Authority’, Oxford Journal of Legal Studies, 2010, p. 421. 277 For a brief description of the Service Conception of Authority, see Raz J., ‘The Problem of Authority: Revisiting the Service Conception’, Minnesota Law Review, 2006, p. 1014. 278 Raz J., ‘Facing Up: a Reply’, p. 1230. 279 Raz J., ibid., p. 1231.

118 | The Reasons that Goodness Gives

tion of Political Perfectionism, the state is permitted to protect and promote intrinsically valuable goods on the basis of their intrinsic value. The conclusion of the argument explicitly allows the state to use reasons that are not neutral, and to that extent, it amounts to a form of Modest Political Perfectionism. So far, it seems that the Service and Practical Reason argument has a major advantage over the Service and Well-Being argument. The main advantage consists in the fact that it is not committed to a specific conception of well-being or even to the value of well-being as such. By being so uncommitted, it can have more adherents. However, I would like to point out that, from Raz’s perspective, the Service and Well-Being Argument and the Service and Practical Reason Argument are ultimately connected. Recall that, on Raz’s view, anything valuable is ultimately connected to individual well-being. Only goods and relationships which could ultimately contribute to human well-being give reasons in their favour. And the argument based on practical reason states that the property of goodness entails the presence of reasons favouring the activities, states of affairs and relationships which display it. In other words, the goodness of anything (including government) derives from its potential and actual contribution to human wellbeing and gives reasons in favour of it. From Raz’s perspective, both arguments can be connected. However, this is not to say that they depend on each other to work: as we have seen, they work perfectly well independently.

4.7 An Objection to the Service and Practical Reason Argument: Agent-neutral vs Agent-relative Reasons 4.7.1 The Objection The Dependence Thesis claims that laws are legitimate only if they reflect dependent reasons. However, one might object that some reasons should not figure as grounds for laws; for instance, one could claim this about agent-relative reasons – reasons that are possessed only by specific individuals.280 Given that agent-relative reasons by definition do not apply to everyone, this seems to || 280 Parfit describes agent-neutral reasons as reasons that apply to everyone. Agent-relative reasons, however, are reasons that apply to the individual (they might also apply to others, but they might not). Parfit D., Reasons and Persons, Clarendon Press, Oxford, 1992, p. 143. Scanlon also writes: ‘the impersonal value of things that matter to an individual need not correspond to their personal value to him.’ Scanlon T., ‘Preference and Urgency’, The Journal of Philosophy, 1975, p. 659.

An Objection to the Service and Practical Reason Argument | 119

create a problem for the Service and Practical Reason argument in favour of Political Perfectionism. However, I will argue here that agent-relative reasons are always accompanied by a weak agent-neutral reason (or reasons).281 These weak agent-neutral reasons might be too weak to ground any policies but their existence is enough to rescue the Service and Practical Reason argument. Let us start by looking at the definition of agent-relative reasons provided by Nagel. Nagel describes agent-relative reasons as those reasons that stem from ‘individual aims, projects and concerns’ chosen by the individual,282 while agentneutral reasons give everyone a reason to act. In order to illustrate this, Nagel contrasts the interest someone has in having the pain of a bad headache relieved with the interest a mountain climber has in climbing Everest. On Nagel’s view, we all have agent-neutral reasons to help alleviate the bad headache, because anyone would want to relieve the pain of a headache, independently from any other choice they made in their lives. However, in the case of the climber, his interest in climbing Everest does not provide us directly with reasons to help him; it only generates agent-relative reasons which apply specifically to him. This is so because he desires to climb Everest only because he chose to become a mountain-climber. However, Nagel also suggests that agent-neutral value is attached to some interests, such as liberty, general opportunities, the basic resources of life, pleasure and the absence of pain.283 Holding both these views creates an inconsistency. If Nagel is committed to the claim that there is agent-neutral value in pleasure, then it follows that the satisfaction of the project that has been chosen by an individual has at least some agent-neutral value. The pursuit and achievement of the project in question would indeed bring about some preference-satisfaction, which is impersonally valuable to the extent that it causes pleasure in the agent who has her interest fulfilled. But Nagel specifically denies that preference-satisfaction gives any agent-neutral reasons.284 This is inconsistent, as no justification is given for making such a distinction between physical and psychological pleasure.285

|| 281 Note that I don’t address here agent-relative reasons that are said to derive from deontological rules, but only agent-relative reasons that stem from projects endorsed by individuals. 282 Nagel T., The View from Nowhere, Oxford University Press, Oxford, 1989, p. 168. 283 Nagel T., ibid., p. 171‒172. 284 Nagel T., ibid., p. 227. 285 One possible way to make sense of Nagel’s distinction between preference satisfaction and pleasure would be to invoke responsibility for choice. On Nagel’s account, choice is determinant in identifying agent-relative values. Consistency could thus be rescued if only pleasure

120 | The Reasons that Goodness Gives

However, Nagel seems to partly recognize that there must be some agentneutral reasons mixed in with the agent-relative reasons. He indeed claims that ‘the achievement of a typical personal project or ambition has no value except from the perspective of its subject – at least none in any way comparable to the value reasonably placed on it by the person whose ambition it is’.286 This claim is confusing as it seems to dismiss the importance of the difference between having no agent-neutral value whatsoever and having very little agent-neutral value.287 However, on the distinction Nagel himself traces, there is considerable difference between the two, as an activity that has agent-neutral value could give agent-neutral reasons to others, however weak these are, whereas an activity that has no such agent-neutral value could not. Moreover, Nagel claims that these activities, relationships or states of affairs ‘acquire value only because of the interest we develop in them and the place this gives them in our lives, rather than evoking interest because of their value.’288 He states explicitly that agent-relative reasons derive from activities whose value stems only from the interest we develop in them. This seems to me misleading. An activity that has no agent-neutral value at all could not give anyone agent-relative reasons. An objectively worthless project cannot give me any reasons to engage with it. I do not think that the project of counting blades of grass for its own sake gives anyone a reason, be it agent-relative or agentneutral. The project must be an instantiation of one of the goods and as such, it gives both agent-neutral and agent-relative reasons. In the case of the climber wanting to achieve the ascension of Everest, the successful ascension is constitutive of his well-being, not only because it satisfies one of his preferences and is thus bringing pleasure, but also because it is an instantiation of a more general good of physical achievement. Any instantiation of a good gives agentneutral reasons. For sure, there is a big difference between how important the success of a personal project (say achieving a difficult yoga pose) is for me and how important it is for a stranger, but this can be accounted for by the claim

|| and pain derived from unchosen activities were said to give agent-neutral reasons. But this would be quite confusing in practice, as it might be hard to establish of any specific headache is the result of an (non-chosen) disposition to headaches or the result of a (chosen) stressful lifestyle. 286 Nagel T., ibid., p. 169. 287 And the same hesitation is repeated when Nagel hints at the possible existence of some agent-neutral reasons for all of us to care about the climber’s project: ‘…other people have very little reason, if any, to care whether I climb the mountain or not.’ Nagel T., ibid., p. 167. 288 Nagel T., ibid., p. 168.

An Objection to the Service and Practical Reason Argument | 121

that my specific project gives strong agent-relative reasons to me but only weak agent-neutral reasons to others. To sum up, I have argued that agent-relative and agent-neutral reasons necessarily come together, every time a good is instantiated in a project endorsed by an individual. Agent-neutral reasons are important to the extent that they can be used to ground duties, such as the duty not to interfere with your engagement with your project or the duty to promote your engagement with it. For instance, in the case of the climber, on my view, there are agent-neutral reasons stemming from the goal of climbing Everest that apply both to the climber and to other people. These agent-neutral reasons derive from the value of two goods on the list I suggested in chapter 2; physical achievement and pleasure. Of course, these agent-neutral reasons do not exhaust the kind of reasons that apply to the climber. He has further agent-relative reasons to actually go through with the climb (and these reasons derive from his specific commitment to this specific form of physical achievement). Similarly, a mother has agent-relative reasons to pick up her kids after school which do not apply to the rest of us. However, some more general agentneutral reasons apply to us which account for the value of the parents’ fulfilment of their duties towards their children. Such agent-neutral reasons require us to respect the duties that parents have towards their children, refrain from obstructing them and even, if they fail to fulfil their duties, take over these duties by handing in the children to an institution if necessary.

4.7.2 Agent-relative Reasons in our Lives Given that I claimed that agent-neutral reasons always accompany agentrelative reasons, I need to explain how this claim can be reconciled with the apparent dominance of agent-relative reasons in our lives. I will argue that this apparent dominance is mostly due to the practical limits of our lives which restrict the number of instantiations of goods one can engage with. To begin with, the apparent dominance of agent-relative reasons is partly explained by value pluralism. Value pluralism is the claim that there is such a plurality of conflicting goods that constitute well-being combined with the claim that these goods are irreducible to a single good.289 This means that a human life will have different realizations of each good (and might entirely lack in the realisation of one

|| 289 Wall S., ‘Neutralism for Perfectionists: The Case of Restricted State Neutrality’, Ethics, 120, 2010, p. 235.

122 | The Reasons that Goodness Gives

good). However, plural and incommensurable goods and values need not directly conflict with each other. Take the example of friendship and knowledge. It is not necessary for them to conflict. However, different goods could still compete for our attention in a more practical way, due to the fact that our lifespan and ability to develop skills, talents and virtues is limited. There is thus a more mundane reason for us to limit our undertakings even in the absence of conflicting goods: time and resource constraints. The reasons which stem specifically from our commitment to projects might then be properly labelled agent-relative, but they are agentrelative, partly because of the practical limitations of our human lives (and they are still accompanied by weaker agent-neutral reasons). Even if there was no pluralism of values, time constraints would have the same restricting effect within a single valuable good. As Macklem and Gardner point out: The importance of personal goals comes from the necessary constraints of a single life as a vehicle for pursuing value. Life is a progress of finite duration, necessarily conducted in a particular spatio-temporal location. We have only one life to live, and we are bound to live it at a particular time, and in particular places. That being the case, we can only pursue and realize as much value as we have time and space to pursue and realize.290

Many activities could instantiate the good of understanding. One could read poetry, write a novel or become a chess master. Each of these instances of intellectual activity is good. We might have a reason to do each of these activities, but we do not have a reason to do all of them. Not having an infinite amount of time constrains human beings to focus on some specific valuable activities and give up on other valuable activities. I believe that this is the main explanation why our lives seem so subjected to agent-relative reasons. Let us now modify the Service and Practical Reason argument in light of these reflections on agent-neutral and agent-relative reasons. Given that laws apply to every citizen in the state, they cannot be grounded on agent-relative reasons. It follows that only agent-neutral reasons can ground authoritative directives. This should be seen as a further specification of the Dependence Thesis. This is why we need to add another premise: 5.

Given the general scope of laws (viz. that they apply to everyone within the community), they ought to reflect only agent-neutral reasons.

|| 290 Macklem T. and Gardner J., ‘Value Interest, and Well-Being’, Utilitas, 18, 4, 2006, p. 374‒375.

The Revised Service and Practical Reason Argument | 123

Here someone might object that this move seems to undermine the basic motivation behind the Service and Practical Reason argument. After all, the point of the Service and Practical Reason was to support perfectionism. However, excluding agent-relative reasons seem to also exclude reasons that stem from the individual’s specific conception of the good, as these are typically reasons that apply to the individual because of her personal choices. In response to that, remember that Political Perfectionism isn’t committed to the claim that every individual’s conception of the good should be promoted, but only the Objective List conception of well-being. This was exactly the point of tying Political Perfectionism with an Objective List view of well-being. Moreover, I have just argued that an activity can provide agent-relative reasons only if it is impersonally valuable, so every activity that can provide agentrelative reasons will also provide agent-neutral reasons. Even though agentrelative reasons cannot ground authoritative directives, the agent-neutral reasons that always, on my view, accompany them can ground authoritative directives. The only relevant point would be to gather enough such agent-neutral reasons for them to ground authoritative directives legitimately.

4.8 The Revised Service and Practical Reason Argument I wish to set out the strongest version of the Service and Practical Reason argument for modest Political Perfectionism that we get when we take into account the distinction between agent-neutral and agent-relative reasons. But the resulting argument nevertheless retains many aspects of Raz’s arguments in favour of Political Perfectionism, namely the Service Conception of authority, and his emphasis on the demands of practical reason: (1) Goodness as reason-giving: ‘That an act is good is a reason to do it, that a state of affairs is good is a reason to bring it about.’291 (2) Legitimate laws ought to reflect reasons that apply to individuals anyway (dependence thesis). (3) Reasons given by the goodness of specific acts and specific states of affairs apply to individuals anyway. (4) The state has authority if it tracks in general better those agent-neutral reasons that apply to individuals anyway, that is, those reasons that conform to the dependence thesis. (normal justification thesis).

|| 291 Raz J., ‘Facing Up’, p. 1230.

124 | The Reasons that Goodness Gives

(5) Given the general scope of laws (they apply to everyone within the community), they ought to reflect only agent-neutral reasons. (6) A state that has authority ought to formulate laws that reflect agentneutral dependent reasons The first premise affirms the reason-giving character of goodness. The second premise corresponds to Raz’s Dependence Thesis. It specifies a different constraint on the kind of reasons that can be used to ground an authoritative directive: they need to apply to individuals independently. The third premise holds that objective goods can give reasons to every individual, unlike subjective goods, or interests. The fourth premise argues that a certain competence of the state in tracking dependent reasons needs to be established. The penultimate premise identifies one kind of constraints on the reasons that can justify an authoritative directive; only agent-neutral reasons ought to be taken into account. The normative conclusion then results quite naturally from the endorsement of an Objective List view of well-being, and Raz’s Normal Justification Thesis. The conclusion amounts to the endorsement of Modest Political Perfectionism because it merely allows for the use of non-neutral reasons in formulating policies.

4.9 A Meta-ethical Objection One might still find the argument sketched above unsatisfying. As the objection to the meta-ethical interpretation of the Social Forms Thesis should have made clear, not every meta-ethical view is compatible with the Service and Practical Reason argument. In particular, it is incompatible with many subjectivist metaethical views. If we do not accept the existence of intrinsically and objectively valuable goods, it will be hard to make sense of the Service and Practical Reason argument. After all, the argument claims that goodness gives reasons to agents and that these reasons should be relied upon by the state for its laws to be legitimate. However, if one holds a subjectivist view of goodness, this would be incoherent. If every individual conception of goodness gave rise to reasons that should ground laws, this would almost certainly lead us to a set of incoherent laws. Some kind of objectivity must be assumed for this argument to go through. Surprisingly, given his denunciation of Rawls’s epistemic abstinence, Raz prefers to remain uncommitted meta-ethically. In his definition of well-being, for instance, he uses the word ‘goals’ because, as he explicitly says, it allows him to preserve an ambivalence on whether he endorses a desire-based view or

An Objection to the Service Conception of Authority | 125

an objective view of well-being.292 Raz seems to hold a view that is just about objective enough to supply an external evaluative standard that would leave space for the Service and Practical Reason Argument, but where this standard is nevertheless relative to a given culture. Raz does not hold that liberal values are objective and universal. His treatment of the value of autonomy is a perfect illustration of this. Raz sometimes appears to suggest that autonomy has universal value, yet his main argument in The Morality of Freedom defends only a contextual value for autonomy, arguing that its value derives from its appreciation in our own culture.293 I believe that this is a mistake, given that the Service and Practical Reason argument would be incoherent if one does not endorse an Objective List view of well-being.

4.10 An Objection to the Service Conception of Authority However, the major objection that could be raised against both the Service and Well-Being and the Service and Practical Reason arguments is not fully addressed here and would require further work. Both arguments rely on a Service conception of authority and as such, they might not be convincing to those who do not endorse Raz’s Service Conception of Authority. Moreover, the Service Conception of Authority has been recently heavily criticised: both Allan Buchanan and Scott Hershovitz have argued convincingly that the Service conception of authority cannot on its own give a valid account of authority.294 They argue, persuasively to my mind, that a substantive account of legitimacy needs to be complemented with a procedural account. Such a procedural account would require democratic procedures to be followed. If democratic procedures are followed and the state in question benefits the well-being of its citizens (by among other conditions, respecting their human rights), then the state would be legitimate. But these criticisms of the Service Conception allow us to respond that, although it might be true that an instrumentalist conception of authority (such as the Service Conception of Authority) cannot fare well on their own, neither can procedural accounts. A valid account of legitimacy needs both procedural and substantial conditions to be satisfied (and this is acknowledged by Buchanan

|| 292 Raz J., The Morality of Freedom, p. 291. 293 McCabe D., ‘Joseph Raz and the Contextual Argument’, Ethics, 2001, p. 494. 294 Buchanan A., ‘Political Legitimacy and Democracy’, Ethics, 2002. Hershovitz S., ‘Legitimacy, Democracy and Razian Authority’, Legal Theory, 2003.

126 | The Reasons that Goodness Gives

and Hershovitz). The substantial condition would most plausibly be of an instrumental kind. If this is so, the Service and Well-Being argument and the Service and Practical Reason argument can both remain valid, even though the conditions they describe as being sufficient for state legitimacy might only be necessary but not sufficient. This in no way invalidates either argument. To sum up, it is not implausible to claim that all conceptions of legitimacy ought to take a version of an instrumental conception of legitimacy as a necessary but not sufficient condition for a state to be legitimate. In other words, other conceptions of legitimacy might also treat as important the claim that the state ought to promote its citizens’ interests. They might only qualify this claim by insisting that the promotion of interests ought to be achieved in a certain way, that is, by showing equal concern for the interests of everyone. This does not seem to be incompatible with the account I have drawn here.

4.11 Conclusion I started this chapter by pointing out the need for a positive argument in favour of Political Perfectionism. Too many arguments for Political Perfectionism start by trying to rebut the objections against it, instead of putting forward a strong positive case for Political Perfectionism. In this chapter, I examine two arguments in favour of Political Perfectionism: the Service and Well-Being Argument, which supports the Prima Facie Political Perfectionism, and the Service and Practical Reason Argument, which supports Modest Political Perfectionism. Given that I endorse a definition of Political Perfectionism which requires both Modest Perfectionism and Prima Facie Perfectionism, both these arguments taken together constitute an argument in favour of Political Perfectionism. I started by looking at one positive argument suggested (though not endorsed by)by Chan, which I called the Crude Argument. The simplicity of the Crude Argument is helpful, but it is slightly too crude to be persuasive. I then turned to examine the Service and Well-Being Argument. I reconstructed The Service and Well-Being argument on the basis of various claims by Raz. One of the drawbacks of the Service and Well-Being Argument is that it not only requires a specific conception of authority, the Service Conception, but it also requires the endorsement of a specific conception of well-being. I next turned to the Service and Practical Reason Argument which is explicitly articulated by Raz. I completed some of the gaps of the argument by explicitly stating some of its background commitments. I further claimed that, given the general scope of laws, one needed to qualify reasons not on the basis of whether or not they pertained to the good or the right, but on the basis of whether they were agent-

Conclusion | 127

relative or agent-neutral. I believe that the distinction between agent-neutral and agent-relative reasons confuses many, but once understood properly, it gives us a crucial insight into the kind of reasons that stem from authoritative directives. I criticised the view endorsed by Nagel that there could be agentrelative reasons unaccompanied by agent-neutral reasons. Finally, I argued that it was a mistake for Raz not to be committed to a meta-ethical view and that such a commitment was necessary for his arguments to stand scrutiny. The problem with the Service and Practical Reason argument is that it still requires a commitment to a specific conception of authority, the Service Conception. I gestured at the end of this chapter to a way of avoiding this objection. I argued that it was plausible that a valid conception of legitimacy would include as a necessary condition some substantial instrumentalist condition. As stated at the beginning, both arguments are positive arguments in favour of Political Perfectionism, but cannot be definitive arguments to the extent that there may still be further objections that could be raised against their conclusions, and which I did not consider here. For that reason, I will need to consider another argument. In the following chapter, I will consider an argument which claims that it would be inconsistent, given the existing commitments of the liberal state, to reject Political Perfectionism.

5 The Consistency Argument 5.1 Introduction The argument I will consider in this chapter claims that the current commitment of the liberal state to the protection of individual rights, is inconsistent with refraining from promoting the interests protected by these rights. By arguing that the liberal state is guilty of inconsistency, this argument has several advantages over the previous arguments. First, it is less abstract: the arguments we considered so far operated at a pre-political level which ignored the concrete commitments of the liberal state. Second, the Consistency Argument can address a wider audience, as it does not rely on a specific conception of authority. Finally, by rejecting the consistency of the liberal state position, the Consistency Argument allows us to shift the burden of proof towards the neutralist liberal. The Consistency Argument claims that it is inconsistent for the liberal state to protect liberal rights, without being prima facie committed to the promotion of interests. Recall that, in chapter 1, I claimed that in order to argue for Political Perfectionism (i.e. the claim that the state is permitted and justified to protect and promote the opportunities for citizens to engage with intrinsically valuable goods) it was a pre-requisite to argue both in favour of Modest and Prima Facie Political Perfectionism. The Consistency Argument provides thus truly an argument in favour of Political Perfectionism, that is, it constitutes both a rejection of the claim that the state ought to be neutral and an affirmation of the claim that it is justified in protecting and promoting some goods on the basis of their intrinsic value. I will start by looking at two existing arguments formulated by Vinit Haksar and Charles Taylor. Both claim that the actual commitment of the liberal state to the protection of individual rights has perfectionist implications. However, their arguments will be rejected as they are both committed to the claim that the attribution of rights stem out of some essential features displayed by the rightholders. As I argued in chapter 2 (section 6), any attempt to ground rights on essential properties of human beings is unlikely to succeed. Then, I will discuss some of the implications that holding or rejecting this essentialist picture could have on whether animals have rights. I will then formulate a positive argument inspired by their arguments in favour of Political Perfectionism. This argument, the Consistency Argument, will argue that certain commitments of the liberal state entail some perfectionist commitments. Even if they do not necessarily formulate this exactly in these terms, neutralist liberals are committed to hold the view that, if one holds x to

Introduction | 129

be valuable, the protection of x is required, but not its promotion. They are committed to such a view, when they claim for instance that it is warranted to protect the right to education, but that there is no duty to promote various educational projects targeting adults more widely. Or, when they claim that, although there is a right to free speech, the state is justified in stopping there and is not committed to ensure that individuals have the skills to speak in a public forum, and the time and resources to do so. The general neutralist liberal view is thus that there is a duty to protect interest X by establishing right Y, but that there is no such duty to promote interest X. The basic implicit argument they must hold is that if X is valuable, one ought to protect X but one does not have a prima facie duty to promote it. However, I will argue that if X is valuable, one has a duty both to protect and to promote X. One of the premises of the Consistency Argument, premise 2, argues that the protection of rights commits the state to the recognition of the value of certain rights. Given that this is a contentious premise, I will briefly defend the Interest Theory of rights which grounds premise 2. For that purpose, I will discuss both the Interest Theory of rights and the Choice Theory of rights. I take these accounts to attempt to respond to the question of what is the proper normative justification for rights. Others have suggested that the debate is about something else, namely either about what is meant by rights semantically, or about what is the fundamental value a political theory should be committed to. I will argue in favour of the Interest Theory of rights because it is presupposed in the second premise of the Consistency Argument. My defence is limited, but I do not think that this is too much of a problem for two reasons. First, the Interest Theory of rights is a dominant view. So, if those that are already committed to an Interest Theory of rights are persuaded by the Consistency Argument, they will have to accept some perfectionist commitments. This is no small result, given the prevalence of the Interest Theory of rights. Second, others have given convincing defences of the Interest Theory of rights. Finally, I suggest that, even those who remain faithful to the Choice Theory of rights might not be lost to the perfectionist cause; I sketch an alternative version of the Consistency Argument which could appeal to them. I then proceed to discuss the fourth premise of the Consistency Argument, which claims roughly that if x is valuable, then one has reason both to protect and promote x. I believe that it is a crucial premise and it needs to be defended because neutralist liberals would reject it. Neutralist liberals assume that the state has a duty to protect the interests of its citizens but no such duty to promote their interests. However, I will argue that if one takes x to be valuable, one has a duty to both protect and promote x. This being said, I wil not deny that there might be no conclusive duty to promote x in some cases. For instance, in

130 | The Consistency Argument

conditions of scarcity, one might want to give priority to the protection of some interests before allocating resources to the promotion of interests. But these cases are not explained on the basis that, if x is valuable, one has only the duty to protect x but no such duty to promote x. These cases are explained because despite having a prima facie duty to protect and promote x, some circumstances make it the case that one cannot promote x. Finally, I will dispel some of the confusing associations between, on one hand, protection of interests and deontological ethics, and, on the other hand, promotion of interests and consequentialism. The Consistency Argument has one main aim: to show that given the liberal commitment to the protection of liberal rights, there is no way for neutralist liberals to avoid some perfectionist commitments. More specifically, there is no justification for the neutralist liberal commitment to the protection of interests stopping short of a commitment to the promotion of interests. I argue that in many possible interpretations of the distinction between protection and promotion, there is no justification for the difference in normative weight attributed to protection and promotion. Once the most problematic premises of the Consistency Argument have been defended, the Consistency Argument can be re-affirmed with conviction.

5.2 Charles Taylor’s Argument In his essay ‘Atomism’, Taylor attacks the priority attributed by liberals to individual rights, as opposed to collective rights.295 In doing so, he articulates what he believes to be the justification for our attribution of rights exclusively to human beings; only human beings have capacities that can ‘command our respect’. Once we acknowledge that certain capacities command our respect, it would be inconsistent not to commit ourselves to promote and foster these capacities as well as to protect them. In other words, if it is the case that certain capacities entitle us to have rights, then these capacities have further normative implications: we ought to develop them in ourselves and in others. But let us look at the first step of Taylor’s argument. Taylor claims that the capacities in question not only define who can be the right-holders, but also what rights they have.296 Taylor claims that an individual has a natural right to

|| 295 Taylor C., Philosophical Papers, vol. 2: Philosophy and the Human Sciences, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 1985, p. 187‒210. 296 Taylor C., ibid., p. 193.

Charles Taylor’s Argument | 131

x, if doing or enjoying x is essentially part of (or necessary for) the manifestation of an essential property, E. He claims that A’s essential property or set of essential properties E is the ground for commanding our respect and that these properties E define the kind of rights A has. In our case, E refers to the essentially human capacities. More specifically, according to Taylor, A has a natural right to x, if doing or enjoying x is essentially part of manifesting E (e.g. if E is being a rational life-form, then A’s have a natural right to life and also to the unimpeded development of rationality), or if x is a causally necessary condition of manifesting E (e.g. the ownership of property, which has been widely believed to be a necessary safeguard of life or freedom, or a living wage).

In other words, Taylor claims that rights are justified by human beings’ essential properties and these essential properties define what natural rights there are. This accounts for the first step of Taylor’s perfectionist argument. Taylor’s argument consists in identifying certain capabilities as the grounds for rights and then proceeding to claim that if we protect these capabilities by adopting rights, we also ought to promote them. Although Taylor explains in some details what capabilities are valuable, the second part of the argument, the claim that, once we are committed to protect these capabilities we are also committed to promote them, isn’t really discussed. I will discuss the move from protecting interests to promoting interests in section 6 of this chapter. There are two problems with the first step of Taylor’s argument as presented above. First, there is a well-known objection to his account of human rights. There are human beings who still have rights despite lacking the capacities that Taylor identifies as grounding these rights: babies, comatose individuals and those with severe cognitive disability. Taylor does not overlook this issue; he addresses it by claiming that those examples only prove that once we are granted the status of ‘being a creature defined by its potential for these capacities’, we cannot lose this moral status. For sure, Taylor’s response is cleverly formulated; even though individuals might lose the potential for these capacities as is the case in some of the examples mentioned above (i.e. in the case of severe cognitive disability or comatose individuals), according to him they do not cease to be a creature defined by this potential, as long as they remain members of the group of human beings. Ultimately, however, this argument will not succeed either. If human beings are really defined by these capacities, then the individuals who lose the potential in question cease to belong to the group of creatures defined by their potential for these capacities. By defining human beings as a group of individuals having this potential, individuals would first need to display this potential in order to qualify as a member of that group. Only those with the potential to develop the capacities can possess the relevant

132 | The Consistency Argument

rights. An individual whose brain damage is severe enough to pre-empt any development of these capacities would lose her rights.297 The second problem with Taylor’s first step lies in the notion of essential properties. In chapter 6, I discuss in detail problems with any account based on the notion of essential properties. To avoid repetition, I will just briefly restate here that the main problem with attempting to ground a notion of the good for human beings on essential properties is that essential properties are normatively defined. We tend to identify as ‘essential properties’ only those properties that we consider valuable. This is why we do not take cruelty to be an essential property of human beings. However, the notion of essential property is supposed to do the reverse: guide us towards what is valuable starting from an empirical examination of human beings as a species. The whole approach of trying to identify essential properties is therefore misguided from the start, as there is no such shortcut from the distinctive biological and psychological features we display to the normative. This is why I am led to reject this part of Taylor’s argument.298 However, I believe that it is possible to formulate a similar argument that avoids the problematic notions of human nature and essential properties altogether. On my view, rights are attributed because they protect fundamental interests of human beings. The characteristics of human beings matter to the identification of interests fundamental for them, but these characteristics need not be presented as essential. Thus, unlike Taylor, I avoid using expressions such as ‘essential properties’ or ‘human distinctive features’ in my argument for Political Perfectionism. Surely, to the extent that some animals display these features, they must allow for animals to hold certain rights. It might be true that these features are exclusively displayed by human beings, but I do not need to commit myself to this claim. The important point is that these features can be displayed by human beings, and that having the potential to display these features entails having a set of interests connected to them. Some might object that if I insist on talking about the potential to develop some interests I might as well talk about capacities. Why shall I not use Taylor’s notion of capacities? After all, I ground rights as well on the potential to develop some interests. I do not believe that the term ‘capacities’ is inappropriate, but it is slightly misleading in terms of identifying what is fundamentally valuable. I || 297 Taylor does not make any such claim explicitly – although he grants the claim that we might have intuitions that we should disconnect life-supporting machines in a terminal and life-long coma. Taylor C., ibid., p. 196. 298 See chapter 2 for all the details on the reasons for rejecting accounts based on human nature.

Vinit Haksar’s Argument | 133

do not believe the capacity in itself is valuable. As I argued earlier, what is intrinsically valuable is the engagement with a good. Say you have the capacity for autonomous decision-making. If you then spend the rest of your life following the injunctions of your husband, I do not believe that your having the capacity for autonomous decision-making is as such valuable. It is only valuable to the extent that you actually use this capacity. However, this commitment to the fundamental value of the engagement with the good is compatible with my claim that Political Perfectionism should only promote the opportunities to engage with the goods. When it pertains to PP, it is necessary to focus only on potential and opportunities, so as to respect the autonomy of individuals. Before I present my own argument, let’s look at Haksar’s argument, which starts with a similar claim that a basic liberal commitment (the commitment to moral equality for every human being) has perfectionist implications.

5.3 Vinit Haksar’s Argument Like Taylor, Haksar starts his argument by bringing our attention to the difference in our treatment of human beings and non-human animals. The basic moral intuition that reigns over our treatment of other human beings is moral equality: all human beings should be treated equally. However, this basic moral intuition isn’t extended to non-human animals. Haksar’s main claim is that there are perfectionist pre-commitments in the liberal commitment to attributing moral equality exclusively to human beings. Haksar argues indeed that while we attribute to human beings a strong right not to be killed, non-human animals do not hold such a right. Someone might object that things have changed slightly since the time of Haksar’s writing; there is a more widespread questioning of our treatment of animals. But in defence of Haksar, it could be retorted that the prevailing view is still that animals do not have the same rights as human beings. Haksar claims that this is an indication that human beings hold a different moral status from non-human animals and this is so because of specific intrinsically valuable properties uniquely possessed by human beings: rationality, autonomy and selfconsciousness.299 Haksar argues that these unique properties of human consciousness explain the fundamental difference in the moral status we attribute

|| 299 Haksar V., Equality, Liberty and Perfectionism, Oxford University Press, Oxford, 1979, p. 66.

134 | The Consistency Argument

to human beings as opposed to the moral status we attribute to animals.300 By identifying these properties as specific to human beings, Haksar invokes a form of Human Nature Perfectionism. (Recall, in chapter 2, I identified Human Nature Perfectionism as the view that the goods on the Objective List could all be derived from an account of human nature.) The objection we raised against Taylor can be raised here too however: there is no systematic correlation between displaying these properties and having a distinctive normative status. After all, we give the same normative status to human beings who fail to exhibit these properties, such as babies and the severely cognitively impaired. In order to explain why we give the same status to all human beings, including those who fail to exhibit the properties of rationality, autonomy and self-consciousness, Haksar resorts only to practical considerations. On Haksar’s view, ‘the capacity for rationality’ grounds normative status; someone born without the capacity for rationality would hold a lower moral status than someone with that capacity. But, in order to figure out who has a lower moral status, we would need to distinguish between those who are born with a low rational capacity and those who have become so because they did not strive to develop their inborn capacity. Haksar claims that we are unable to perceive such difference in the three important capacities identified above and that this is the reason why we decide to treat every individual equally.301 This pragmatic argument suffers from two major flaws. To begin with, the claim that we cannot identify those individuals born with low rational abilities has become empirically false. Surely, questions surrounding the assessment of rationality are complex, but we can now identify early signs of severe cognitive disability in young children. But, more importantly, even if we granted the empirical claim that we are unable to identify those individuals, it is counterintuitive to claim that normative status should be sensitive to degrees of rationality. There is a strong intuition that, at least past a certain threshold of cognitive ability, equal normative status should be given to all human beings.302 Haksar also claims that associatives duties could explain why we treat all human beings as morally equal.303 The family-based associative duty he invokes states roughly that belonging to a common family justifies our having special || 300 Haksar V., ibid., p. 41. 301 Haksar V., ibid., p. 71. 302 I would go even further to claim that the opposite intuition is plausible: if an individual who is normally cognitively endowed fails to develop her abilities to the standard degree of human rationality, we would judge her more harshly than an individual who starts with less cognitive skills. 303 Haksar V., p. 38‒39.

Vinit Haksar’s Argument | 135

obligations and duties towards members of the same family.304 The main problem with this type of associative duty argument is the identification of the relevant family; is it the whole world, is it the nuclear family with pets, is it all the members of one nation-state?305 The argument cannot really do what it is asked to do, that is, arguing for a difference in intrinsic worth that would be mapped on the boundaries of the family in question. Belonging to a family cannot in itself justify a difference in normative status. If we are trying to identify what are the relevant boundaries to attribute different moral status, just mentioning the boundaries of a family fails; one needs to be able to point to what criteria make one belong to a certain family and why meeting these criteria will give someone a special normative significance. The associative duty argument is thus useless for our purposes, as it must rely on a prior argument about what are the normatively relevant properties that human beings display. This part of Haksar’s argument fails. Both Haksar and Taylor take as a point of departure the claim that animals have different rights than human beings. From that observation, they go on to claim that this indicates that the capabilities that distinguish us from animals are those that ought to be protected and promoted. I think that this is where they are both mistaken. The first step of their argument is based on the premise that animals do not have the same rights as we do. Given this premise, they believe that whatever rights we have, they must be based on the distinctive properties that we display. However, there is no consensus on what rights animals have. On the list of goods I suggest we endorse, there are many interests that are shared by animals and human beings alike (i.e. pleasure), so I reject the claim that each right is correlated with an interest that only human beings can have. Furthermore, even if it were the case that animals didn’t have rights because of some distinctive properties they failed to display, this wouldn’t amount to claim that each of the rights human beings have ought to be based on a distinctive feature of human beings. One distinctive property exhibited only by human beings might be enough to attribute a different moral status to the beings who display it, such as agency.

|| 304 Associative duties have been used by Dworkin to justify our duties of obedience towards our state. Dworkin R.M., ‘Obligations of Community’, in Raz J. (ed.), Authority, Blackwell, Oxford, 1991, p. 222. Dworkin R.M., Law’s Empire, Harvard University Press, Cambridge (Mass.), 1986, p. 195‒196. 305 For a criticism of the use of associative duties, see Scheffler S., Boundaries and Allegiances: Problems of Justice and Responsibility in Liberal Thought, Oxford University Press, Oxford, 2002, p. 48.

136 | The Consistency Argument

I have examined Haksar and Taylor’s arguments and pointed out some flaws. It is now time to extract what is plausible in these arguments and reformulate them in a way that will avoid the objections just raised. Taylor claimed that if certain capabilities are valuable we ought to protect and further them.306 Taylor’s insistence that this move from the protection of some interests to their promotion is a natural one seems persuasive and deserves further attention. It will constitute the basis for the Consistency Argument I develop below.

5.4 The Consistency Argument In the previous chapter, the arguments I developed endorsed a Service conception of authority. In this chapter, I develop an argument targeting a wider audience, as it starts from the existing commitments of the liberal state to the protection of individual rights. If rights are justified because they protect fundamental interests of human beings, why not promote these interests more directly? After all, in the prevailing interest-based account of rights, rights are already justified by these interests. The Consistency argument could be articulated as follows: (1) The liberal state is committed to the protection of individual rights (2) The protection of individual rights commits the state to the recognition of the value of certain human interests. (3) If the state recognises the value of certain human interests, then it has a prima facie reason to protect these interests. (4) If there is a prima facie reason to protect these interests, there is also a prima facie reason to promote them. Therefore (5) The liberal state has a prima facie reason to protect and promote the interests protected by individual rights. (follows from 1, 2 and 4). This argument moves from the observation that the liberal state is committed to the protection of some rights to the claim that the state has a prima facie reason to promote the goods whose value is protected by the rights. The first premise is undeniable; the liberal state is committed in theory and in practice to the pro-

|| 306 Taylor C., Philosophical Papers, vol. 2: Philosophy and the Human Sciences, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 1985, p. 194.

The Consistency Argument | 137

tection of a certain set of rights.307 In other words, the first claim is a descriptive claim.308 The second premise claims that a commitment to rights implies the recognition of the value of some interests. This second premise is contentious because it implies an Interest Theory of rights. For reasons of space, I will not be able here to mount a conclusive defence of the Interest Theory of rights, but since the Interest Theory is already highly influential, my argument for perfectionism does not entirely depend on my defence. There are several existing powerful defences of interest theories of rights.309 An important result of the Consistency Argument would be that those who already independently endorse the Interest Theory are, if my argument is correct, also committed to PP. Moreover, I will suggest a way of making a similar argument that can convince those who endorse a Choice Theory of rights. The third premise claims that the state has a reason to protect certain interests, if it recognises the value of these interests. This claim is an application of the Guise of the Good Thesis mentioned in chapter 4 (section 6, footnote 47): if we claim that x is valuable, it is implicit in this claim that there is a reason to protect it.310 I do not need thus to say much about this claim here. The last claim, however, suggests that if the state has a reason to protect individuals’ interests, it also has a reason to promote them. Because there might be objections to this move, I will also discuss this claim in section 6 of this chapter. There is something infelicitous about the argument as articulated above. The move from the first to the third premise is somewhat odd: the argument moves from a claim about rights to asserting the value of certain interests/goods, to then return to the assertion of rights, justified this time by the need to protect these interests/goods. In other words, this argument is, as it stands, circular. This circularity is due to the fact that the argument is unclear as to what justifies what. To clarify this, the role of rights needs to be rendered explicit. Rights, I take it, are an indication that the interests they protect are

|| 307 Kekes J., Against Liberalism, Cornell University Press, New York, 1997, p. 8. Waldron J., Liberal Rights, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 2001, p. 38. 308 This being said, I also believe that the liberal state should be committed to the protection of individual rights. 309 MacCormick N., 1977, ‘Rights in Legislation’, in Hacker P. and Raz J. (eds.), Law, Morality and Society: Essays in Honour of H.L.A. Hart, Oxford University Press, Oxford, 1977, p. 189–209. Kramer M., ‘Getting Rights Right’, in Rights, Wrongs, and Responsibilities, Kramer M. (ed.), Macmillan, London, 2001, 28–95. Kramer M., Simmonds N., and Steiner H., A Debate Over Rights, Oxford University Press, Oxford, 1998. Raz J., The Morality of Freedom. 310 Raz J., ‘On the Guise of the Good’, in Tennenbaum S., Desire, Practical Reason and the Good, Oxford University Press, Oxford, 2010.

138 | The Consistency Argument

valuable. If the state protects certain rights, it is because they protect valuable goods. To make sure that the correct direction of fit is made explicit, premise 2 ought to be understood as the claim that the protection of individual rights is an indication of the recognition of the value of certain human interests. Before I turn to look at the premises more closely, I’d like to first enter two caveats about the Consistency Argument. First, I want to point out that this argument isn’t the same as the common communitarian charge that the liberal state is committed to a partial conception of the good. The Consistency Argument is most plausibly interpreted as claiming that the liberal state violates its own principle of neutrality, but it does not need to. The only thing that matters for the argument to be valid is that the liberal state is committed to the protection of individual rights and thereby to the recognition of some individuals’ interests as valuable. The question of whether or not these interests are neutral or belong to a specific conception of the good is terminological at best. The only crucial step is the acknowledgement that the state protects certain individuals’ interests. The second caveat is that I use the word ‘interests’ to emphasize the connection between this argument and the Interest Theory of rights. However, I take interests to mean objective interests, that is, objective goods. The word ‘interests’ in the above argument could thus be replaced by ‘objective goods’ without any change of meaning. There is still much to be said about the second premise and the fourth premise. Let us start with the second premise.

5.5 The Protection of Individual Rights and Interests The second premise states that a commitment to the protection of individual rights entails a commitment to the value of certain goods/interests. However, this premise could be disputed as some would claim that the protection of individual rights could be justified without any reference to human interests. Proponents of the Choice Theory of rights (I will use ‘will theory of rights’ interchangeably with the expression ‘choice theory of rights’) deny that rights are grounded in interests. Choice theorists claim that a right essentially protects the agent’s freedom of will with respect to a particular issue.311 They argue that rights are grounded in the value of individual choice: ‘According to the Choice Theory, a right exists when the necessary and sufficient condition, of imposing or relax-

|| 311 Cruft R., ‘Rights: Beyond Interest and Will Theory?’, Law and Philosophy, 2004, p. 367.

The Protection of Individual Rights and Interests | 139

ing the constraint on some person’s conduct, is another person’s choice to that effect.’312 Choice is sometimes replaced by control, but the idea remains the same, as it is ultimately the value of autonomy or agency that is invoked.313 The adoption of a choice theory of rights would seem to undermine seriously the Consistency argument, as it is articulated here; if a Choice theory of rights were adopted, the second premise would be false. On this view, rights would not be protecting interests but choice. Therefore, I will argue in favour of an Interest Theory of rights.

5.5.1 In favour of the Interest Theory The belief that rights protect interests is found in diverse areas of the literature on rights. The Interest Theory claims that there can be a right only if there is an interest that is strong enough to hold someone else under a duty.314 The Choice Theory of rights claims that rights are attributed because they protect the ability to make choices by agents.315 Some of the main proponents of the Interest Theory of rights are Joseph Raz and Matthew H. Kramer.316 The Choice Theory is defended by Hillel Steiner and N.E. Simmonds among others.317 One of the strengths of the Interest Theory of rights is its plausibility. The normative account of rights we endorse should also be able to give us a correct justification of what general rights we have. Human rights currently recognised are blatantly strongly connected to human interests. These interests range from basic human interests, such as life, health, well-being to more specific ones, such as expression, political representation, etc. Moreover, these rights point to the fact that we do not protect any kind of choice; we are very selective in the choices we protect. The Choice Theory is not able to explain the discrimination between choices which are protected and choices which aren’t. However, the Interest Theory can provide an explanation for why only some choices are pro-

|| 312 Steiner H., An Essay on Rights, Blackwells, Oxford, 1994, p. 57. 313 Sumner L., The Moral Foundation of Rights, Oxford University Press, Oxford, 2004, p. 42. 314 Gewirth A., The Community of Rights, University of Chicago Press, 1996, p. 9. Raz J., The Morality of Freedom. 315 For a brief overview of the debate see the introduction of Waldron J. (ed.), Theories of Rights, Oxford University Press. For a more in-depth examination of the debate, see Kramer M.H, Simmonds N.E., Steiner H., A Debate over Rights, Philosophical Enquiries, Oxford University Press, Oxford, 2000. 316 Raz J., ibid. 317 Sumner L., The Moral Foundations of Rights. Steiner H., An Essay on Rights.

140 | The Consistency Argument

tected by invoking whether or not they protect choices to engage with valuable goods. For instance, there is no institutionalised right to public humiliation, and this is so because this isn’t an interest worthwhile protecting. Someone could retort here that, even if we do not have a right to public humiliation, we have a right to free expression and this right will allow us, if we so wish, to humiliate ourselves publicly. However, this does not change the fact that there is no direct right to public humiliation; there is no explicit right to humiliate ourselves publicly. I believe that this strongly indicates that rights exist in order to protect interests (and that only some interests deserve the protection granted by rights). Another advantage of the Interest Theory of rights is that it is compatible with valuing autonomy and it can thus accommodate some of the intuitive appeal of the Choice Theory. The Interest Theory can very easily take autonomy to be an interest of individuals. And I do not mean by this that they could be understood as equivalent at the level of definitions, as this would fail to differentiate between the two theories of rights, as Steiner has noted.318 On the interpretation I am suggesting, autonomy could be one interest among others within an Interest Theory. To sum up, an appealing element of the Choice Theory could be subsumed as an interest within the Interest Theory if autonomy was taken to be good on the Objective List (recall that the Objective List view is the view that some objective goods are constitutive of human well-being): autonomy is intrinsically valuable yet it also constitutes the well-being of the agent.319

5.5.2 Is the Second Premise Really Necessary for the Consistency Argument? I will now sketch a possible adaptation of the argument that would appeal to those still faithful to the Choice Theory of rights. Even if we believe rights are grounded in the value of choice itself, we still need to make sure that the capacity to choose freely is developed. One can promote the capacity for free choices as well as the range of options available for individuals to choose from. And making good reasonable choices requires a lengthy training. As Kraut has claimed:

|| 318 Steiner H., ibid., p. 58. 319 For instance, James Griffin holds such a view; he claims that liberty and autonomy are constitutive of the good life and are thus both interests.

From Protection to Promotion | 141

One of the great goods that a child must be trained to acquire and enjoy is the ability to make up his own mind about areas of his life that are important to him – what job he will have, whom he will marry, with whom he will associate, where he will live, and so on.320

Kraut implies here that one needs to learn to make good autonomous choices. Charles Taylor has claimed explicitly that the capacity to make choices requires some degree of knowledge, motivation, self-consciousness and autonomy, without fear, sloth, ignorance or superstition.321 So here again, instead of taking choice as being effectively protected by rights, one ought to think of ways of developing the capacity for choice (along with the range of options available). In other words, one could adapt the argument so as to make it compatible with the Choice Theory. The Consistency Argument would not need to be substantially modified by this modification: (1) The liberal state is committed to the protection of individual rights. (2) The protection of individual rights commits the state to the recognition of the value of choice. (3) If the state recognises the value of choice, then it has a prima facie reason to protect choice. (4) If there is a prima facie reason to protect choice, there is also a prima facie reason to promote the capacities that enable individuals to make good choices. Therefore (5) The liberal state has a prima facie reason to protect and promote the capacities that enable individuals to make good choices.

5.6 From Protection to Promotion 5.6.1 The Consistency Argument Now that we have looked at the second premise of the argument in some detail, it is time to turn to another contentious step of the Consistency Argument. Let us return to the set of proposition formulated in section 4 of this chapter and take proposition 4. The fourth premise in the Consistency Argument is the assertion that if there is a prima facie reason to protect some interests, there is also a || 320 Kraut R., What is Good and Why, p. 196‒197. 321 Taylor C., Philosophical Papers 2, p. 197.

142 | The Consistency Argument

prima facie ground to promote them. This is the claim I want to examine in this section. My contention is that neutralist liberals are committed to the claim that the liberal state ought to protect a certain number of interests but not to promote them. But before getting into this debate, it will be easier to see what is at stake if we examine a simplified version of the claims implicit in the fourth premise of the Consistency argument. So consider the relation between the following three propositions: A. X is valuable. B. There is a prima facie reason to protect X. C. There is a prima facie reason to promote X. The claim I want to defend here is that if A is true, then so are both B and C. If B is true, this is an indication that A is also true. And if A is true, then so is C. Two sets of contradictory intuitions might be simultaneously generated by this conceptual suggestion. On one hand, it might seem intuitive to think that B and C must be true if A is true. This intuition is well expressed by Taylor: ...our position would be incomprehensible and incoherent if we ascribed rights to human beings in respect of the specifically human capacities (such as the right to one’s own convictions or to the free choice of one’s life-style or profession) while at the same time denying that these capacities ought to be developed, or if we thought it a matter of indifference whether they were realized or stifled in ourselves or others.322

On the other hand, the move from B to C might appear suspicious, given that protecting interests has a deontological character while promoting interests has consequentialist overtones. The protection of interests has indeed often been equated with rights and rights are often described as fundamentally opposed to any consequentialist or maximising attitude towards goods. Rights are described as protective of interests and this protective character is often taken to be a distinctive feature of rights; they inspire a political morality that is guided by side-constraints and not goals.323 Rights are taken to require an attitude towards individual’s interests that is not ‘promotional’.324

|| 322 Taylor C., Philosophical Papers 1, p. 32‒33. 323 Dworkin R.M., Taking Rights Seriously, Harvard University Press, 1978, p. 171. 324 Pettit P., ‘The Consequentialist Can Recognise Rights’, The Philosophical Quarterly, vol. 38, no. 150, 1988, p. 46.

From Protection to Promotion | 143

Similarly, neutralist liberals take the protection of rights to be required, but they stop short of recommending the promotion of the interests protected by the rights in question. If they do not express it in the exact same terms, they do so by endorsing rights but claiming that promoting the very same interests would be illiberal. Take the right freely to participate in the cultural life of the community and to enjoy the arts. This is a human right and has been recognised as such by the Declaration of Human Rights. Neutralist liberals are committed to the claim that there is such a right and that it needs to be protected, but they are not committed to the claim that we ought to promote it on the basis that an engagement with the arts is intrinsically valuable. One of the implications of this view is that the liberal state cannot subsidise the arts on the basis of their value. Even though Ronald Dworkin has tried to argue that one could justify subsidising the arts on another basis (in order to maintain a diversity of options, which alone could preserve individual autonomy), I do not think it has been successful.325 I believe that a justification according to which what mattered would be to keep options open for individuals to exercise their autonomy fails to indicate what options need to be supported by the subsidies in question. In particular, confronted to the disappearance of a certain video game or the disappearance of dog fights, it would be difficult for these justifications to explain why the state does not need to prevent the disappearance of these options. Neutralist liberals are thus committed to the protection of certain interests but reject the claim that they ought to promote these same interests. In other words, they believe that if A is true, B is true, but not C. Given the prevalence of neutrality in liberal thought, the Consistency argument is thus far from being uncontroversial, and needs some defending. I agree that the protective features identified above are distinctive of rights. However, I believe these contradicting intuitions are only a surface phenomenon, due to our forgetting the raison d’être of rights. As I have argued earlier, rights are ultimately based on interests. Once the interest-based character of rights is recognised, upholding rights appears as only one way to act accordingly to the value of the interests in question, along with their promotion. I will also argue that accepting deontological constraints is fully compatible with the promotion of the good, so long as that promotion does not violate these deontological constraints. There is no fundamental incompatibility between interest protection and interest promotion. This means that if x is valuable, we

|| 325 Dworkin R., ‘Shall the liberal state promote the arts?’, A Matter of Principle, Clarendon Press, Oxford, 1986. For a criticism of Dworkin’s on arts subsidies, see Brighouse H., ‘Neutrality, Publicity, State Funding’, Philosophy and Public Affairs, 1995.

144 | The Consistency Argument

ought to protect and promote it. In order to argue for this claim, I will have to look at different interpretations of the distinction between protecting an interest and promoting an interest.

5.6.2 Caveats Before I turn to examine different interpretations of the expressions ‘to protect an interest’ and ‘to promote an interest’, a few caveats are in order.

5.6.2.1 Linguistic We will need to find an interpretation of the expressions ‘to protect an interest’ and ‘to promote an interest’ that would be in line with our everyday understanding of the terms ‘protection’ and ‘promotion’. The differences between these two expressions should echo the semantic difference between the words ‘protection’ and ‘promotion’. In order to do that, I will start by clarifying the meaning of the words ‘protection’ and ‘promotion’, by quoting from the Oxford English Dictionary. According to the OED, to protect is to defend or guard from danger or injury; to support or assist against hostile or inimical action; to preserve from attack, persecution, harassment, etc; to keep safe, take care of; to extend patronage to; to shield from attack or damage...

Let us look now at the definition of ‘to promote’: to advance the interests of, move to a stronger or more prominent position...” and also to further the growth, development, progress, or establishment of (a thing); to advance or actively support (a process, cause, result, etc.); to encourage.

These definitions highlight two key differences between protection and promotion. The interpretations I will consider will be based on one of these two key differences. The first key difference is that while protection assumes the existence of its object and aims to shelter it from any deterioration, promotion does not assume the prior existence of its object. Promotion can bring its object into being and then, further its growth and flourishing, rather than aiming to merely conserve or preserve it. Another key difference is that protection often focuses on protecting something from external intentional harm; it is particularly con-

From Protection to Promotion | 145

cerned with ‘hostile or inimical action’, ‘attack, persecution, harassment’.326 Promotion, on the contrary, does not involve any such apparent concern with intentional harm. It aims at furthering the growth and development of its object but it is indifferent to what is the obstacle to its growth. In other words, promotion focuses on the resulting states of affairs and not on how it comes about, while protection is concerned with barring certain types of external interferences.

5.6.2.2 Who’s the Protector? Who is the Protected? I will now specify who is doing the protecting and for whose interest. One could deny the relevance of that question and claim that there is no need to specify who is the agent behind the protection (or promotion) and who is the recipient of that protection (or promotion). What we are trying to establish is whether to claim that x is valuable is to recommend both its protection and promotion. To that extent, this tie holds irrespective of whether it is an individual or a collective, such as the state, which is called to protect x. The emphasis is put on the conceptual relations between stating that x is valuable and the existence of reasons to protect and promote it. However, the argument I am interested in is an argument in favour of Political Perfectionism, so the interpretations will focus on the relationship between the state and its citizens. For this purpose, I will take the protector to be one specific agent – the state and the recipient of this protection (or promotion) to be a collective, the citizens of the state.

5.6.3 Interpretation of Protection and Promotion Now that these two caveats have been articulated, I will consider different interpretations of the distinction between what amounts to the protection of an interest and what amounts to the promotion of an interest. My aim here is to argue that both the protection and the promotion of interest x are normatively required by the value of the interest in question. So looking at these different interpretations is necessary to identify the correct interpretation (if there is one) and show that premise 4 of the Consistency argument is correct.

|| 326 I say ‘often’ because one could nevertheless protect an interest from non-intentional threats, such as fires, storms, etc.

146 | The Consistency Argument

5.6.3.1 The Threshold Interpretation (Sufficiency vs Beyond the Threshold) On the Threshold Interpretation of the distinction, protecting X would imply that a certain minimum threshold of opportunities has been met, whereas promoting X would imply going beyond that threshold. More precisely, the definitions would be the following: To Protect X: to act with the aim of ensuring that agent A has up to a threshold level y of opportunities to engage with x. To Promote X: to act with the aim of ensuring that agent A has more than threshold level y of opportunities to engage with interest x. The only difference between the two is the number of opportunities and whether this number stands below or above a certain threshold. This interpretation fits with some of our intuitions. We might be inclined to describe some actions as the protection of an interest, when the action is perceived as necessary to satisfy an interest at a basic level. Let us take the example of the interest in political participation. In order to protect this interest, many conditions need to be fulfilled for the interest in political participation to be protected. One such condition is that the individual has a legal right to vote. But there are other conditions in the institutional background which need to be fulfilled. Take country A which has a deficient transport system. In country A, on this interpretation of what is entailed by the protection of an interest, widely distributed booths ought to be set up. This is so because widely distributed booths are necessary for the interest in political participation to be protected in this country, given the flaws of the public transport system. However, in a country with a perfectly functioning and cheap transport system, such as country B, the widespread distribution of booths would not be necessary to protect the interest in political participation but only to promote it. On this interpretation, there is a norm as to what is the sufficient threshold for access by individuals to voting; below this norm of what qualifies as easy access, the dissemination of voting booths is necessary for the protection of the interest in political participation, while above it, it constitutes the promotion of that interest. Against this interpretation of what is demanded by the protection of an interest, however, one could point to some ways of encouraging people’s vote which, independently from the extent to which citizens in this country have opportunities to vote, would seem to be better described as the promotion of the interest in political participation. This would be the case, if the state were to launch a state advertising campaign encouraging people to vote. Such a cam-

From Protection to Promotion | 147

paign will be more likely described as a promotion of political participation, not a protection of it. This example seems to suggest that certain actions are typically protective whereas others are promotional. If that is the case, the distinction cannot be described as being based on a difference in the number of opportunities available to individuals. Moreover, a more devastating objection would point out that this interpretation would result in some counter-intuitive results. Take the following case: if a state was providing more than the threshold number of opportunities to engage with interest X, on this interpretation, the state would be promoting interest X, even if it were to aim to reduce the number of opportunities until the threshold is reached.

5.6.3.2 The Status Quo Interpretation This second possible interpretation takes the protection of an interest to mean maintaining current levels of opportunities to X. It differs from the previous interpretation in so far as keeping current levels of opportunities to X does not necessarily correspond to maintaining the satisficing threshold. The current levels of opportunities to engage with an interest could be below the threshold that we take to be sufficient. On this interpretation, the definitions of ‘to protect X’ and ‘to promote X’ are the following: To protect X: To act with the aim of ensuring that the current level of opportunities held327 by individuals to engage with X is maintained. To promote X: To act with the aim of ensuring that individuals have more opportunities than they currently have to engage with X. To illustrate the difference between the previous Threshold Interpretation and the Status Quo Interpretation, I will take the example of Country B, in which actual levels of opportunities to engage with X are below the threshold considered to be adequate. In country B, on the Status Quo interpretation, any action aiming at increasing the number of opportunities that individuals have to engage with the interest X would qualify as promotion, whereas on the Threshold interpretation, as long as the increase of opportunities does not go beyond the threshold, the same action would be taken to be protecting interest X. This interpretation avoids the absurd implication that a state which aims to reduce the

|| 327 The number of opportunities held is meant as an average per person.

148 | The Consistency Argument

number of opportunities to engage with X would be qualified as promoting the interest to X. This interpretation seems also to be in a position to respond better to the first objection I raised against the previous interpretation. In the case of a political campaign to entice individuals to vote, the Status Quo Interpretation would qualify it as a case of promotion, as it aims at increasing the number of opportunities individuals have to vote. However, I believe the Status Quo Interpretation would still fail to fully respond to this objection. The objection claimed that there were certain types of actions that would amount to the promotion of interests. Even though it is the case that the Status Quo Interpretation would take the public campaign to be an instance of promotion of the interest in political participation, it would qualify it as such only because it aims to bring up more opportunities, not because of the type of actions involved. In other words, it qualifies correctly the public campaign as the promotion of the interest in political participation but it does so for the wrong reasons.

5.6.3.3 The Negative/Positive Rights Interpretation So far we examined interpretations that took the distinction between protection and promotion to be about the quantity of opportunities available. The next three interpretations will be looking at the other element identified as crucial in the distinction between protection and promotion of an interest – the identification of the source of potential harm to the agent’s interest. To understand the relevance of the source of harm in these interpretations of the distinction, one can recall the distinction between positive and negative conceptions of freedom.328 A positive conception of freedom should be friendly to my suggestion that if X is valuable, we have a prima facie reason to both protect and to promote it.329 A negative conception of freedom would insist on the normative importance of the distinction between protection of an interest and promotion.330

|| 328 Berlin I., ‘Two Concepts of Liberty’, in I. Berlin, Four Essays on Liberty, Oxford University Press, Oxford, 1969. Taylor C., ‘What’s Wrong with Negative Liberty’, in Ryan A. (ed.), The Idea of Freedom, Oxford University Press, Oxford, 1979. Miller D. (ed.), Liberty, Oxford University Press, Oxford, 1991. Miller D., The Liberty Reader, Paradigm Publishers, Boulder (CO), 2006. MacCallum G. C. Jr., ‘Negative and Positive Freedom’, Philosophical Review, 1967, pp. 312‒334. 329 For a defence of a positive conception of freedom see Taylor C., in The Idea of Freedom, Ryan A. (ed.), Oxford University Press, Oxford, 1979. 330 The negative conception of freedom holds an understanding of political liberty which puts the emphasis on the protection against other agents’ interference. Positive conceptions of

From Protection to Promotion | 149

Let us now turn to the third interpretation of the distinction between protection and promotion of interests; the Negative/Positive Rights distinction. Positive rights demand that positive assistance is provided to the agent A while negative rights require merely non-interference (or omission of actions).331 But seeing the protection of interests as amounting only to omissions fails to capture what the state is doing when it protects its citizens’ interests.332 In order for the state to protect its citizens’ interests and respect their negative rights, it needs to be active in ensuring that these negative rights aren’t violated by anyone.333 Active steps need to be taken to provide citizens with an adequate legal system, an effective police force, a public legal framework to inform citizens about their rights, a penal system to restrain those that threaten the negative rights of others, etc.334 The correct interpretation on the Positive/Negative Right Interpretation should thus claim that what the state does when it protects x is to ensure that no one acts in a way that would constitute an interference with agent A’s engagement with x. To protect X: Ensure that the negative right of A to x is respected To promote X: Ensure that the positive right of A to x is satisfied. On this interpretation, the state as protector of agent A will prevent others from violating the negative rights of agent A. The state will need to take active steps to do so, but the aim is to ensure that other individuals do not act against A’s interest.335 However, there is a major problem with using the negative/positive right distinction to define what protecting or promoting an interest means. A negative right delineates what acts against an agent’s interests others mustn’t take. However, if one tries to specify what kind of actions would be proscribed by this interpretation, it will ultimately come down to any kind of action that violates the agent’s legal rights. But then, it seems that the distinction begs the question,

|| freedom have often been described as ‘freedom to’; the value of freedom depends partly on what one is free to do. See Williams B., In the Beginning was the Deed, p. 83. 331 Gewirth A., The Community of Rights, p. 33. 332 Narveson J., The Libertarian Idea, Peterborough, Broadview (Ontario), 2001. 333 Shue H., Basic Rights, Princeton University Press, Princeton, N.J., 1980, p. 37‒40. 334 Holmes S. and Sunstein C., The Cost of Rights: Why Liberty Depend on Taxes, Norton, New York, 1999, p. 43. 335 Alan Gewirth suggests the same adaptation of the definition for it to be valid in its application to the state. Gewirth A., The Community of Rights, p. 35.

150 | The Consistency Argument

as law would be crucial in determining what counts as omission and what counts as action. If that is the case, the concepts of omission and action are not fundamental, as they are so categorised only when law make it so. If a law authorises a flat owner to take his flat back after two months of non-payment, the action of regaining his flat would not be described as the violation of the tenant’s negative right. Take another example: if people in the UK ask their representatives to pass a law against authorizing people coming from abroad to stay more than three months in the UK, this would be against my interest (as a foreigner in the UK). However, once the law has passed, one cannot describe my expulsion as the violation of my negative right. Negative rights seem to be plainly legal rights, but then if that is the conclusion, it undermines the whole point of this enterprise which was to shed light on the connection between negative rights, the protection of interests and legal rights. In other words, the adaptation of the distinction between negative and positive rights to fit the state’s active role in ensuring both to be protected leaves us with an indeterminate notion of what constitute a violation of negative right. Let us turn to the next possible interpretation.

5.6.3.4 The Intentionality Interpretation This interpretation will draw the line at others’ intentional harms. On this Interpretation, our key notions will be defined as follows: To protect X: To act with the aim of ensuring that agent A’s engagement with X is not undermined intentionally by other agents. To promote X: To ensure that agent A is in a position in which engaging with X is actually possible. (the opportunity to engage with X is not undermined.). On this definition, protection is only concerned with sheltering the interests in question from others’ intentional harm, while the promotion of interests is involved in tackling different sources of harm, from psychological issues to structural disadvantages (not intentionally caused by anyone) created by e.g. a low socio-economic status.336

|| 336 The economic deprivation of an individual would then not be considered as intentional interference by other agents. One could object to this suggestion by arguing that a taxation policy that is harsh on the lower socio-economic classes is intentionally depriving those who

From Protection to Promotion | 151

The Intentionality Interpretation provides us with a neat distinction between protection and promotion of interests. However, there is a crucial objection to the intentionality interpretation; the protection of interests plausibly goes beyond the prevention of others’ intentional wrongdoings. Take the case of an individual running in the streets of Oxford his eyes closed just for the fun of it. If you were to intervene to prevent him injuring someone else, you would be protecting the potential victim’s interest. Once again, this interpretation does not seem to cover all the cases we want it to cover. The next interpretation will also try to identify what the last two interpretations (Positive/Negative Right) have been trying in vain to capture.

5.6.3.5 The Agent Interpretation On this last Interpretation, the distinction is to be drawn on the basis of who/what the source of potential harm is: If it is an agent, then the interest needs to be protected but when the source of potential harm is psychological or institutional, the interest in question needs to be promoted. This interpretation gives the following definitions of protection and promotion of interests: To protect interest X: To ensure that the opportunities of individual Y to engage with interest X are not directly interfered with by individual Z. To promote interest X: To ensure that the opportunities of individual Y to engage with interest X aren’t affected by different obstacles or potential sources of harm. An objection to that Interpretation would be to point out that giving treatment to an individual who is suffering from a painful disease amounts to promoting her interest in freedom from pain. This seems wrong. By giving someone a treatment for her painful disease, I am not sheltering her from harm caused by another citizen, yet it would fit our common sense to describe that as the protection of her interest in freedom from pain. This is because of the intuitions that backed the first and second Threshold Interpretation. We have reached a full circle, it seems that both the intuitions in support of the first two interpretations

|| have financial difficulties to exercise their rights. To a certain extent, this is correct, as the individuals who voted for the representative who promulgated that policy could have intended this (more likely their intention was to cater for their own benefits). However, strictly speaking a policy as such cannot intend anything; policies belong to the domain of interest promotion.

152 | The Consistency Argument

and the intuitions in support of the last three interpretations pull towards different directions. There is no single interpretation that could cover all these cases.

5.6.4 The Normative Arbitrariness of the Distinction between Protection and Promotion of Interests The conclusion of my attempt to find a correct interpretation of the distinction between the protection and the promotion of an interest is that no such single interpretation exists. We use the distinction to cover very different cases in which we use it. But the reason for getting into such an overview of all these possible interpretations was to assess whether premise 4 of the Consistency Argument (which stated: ‘if there is a prima facie reason to protect these interests, there is also a prima facie reason to promote them’) could be vindicated. I will now argue that putting any strong normative weight upon the distinction between the protection and the promotion of an interest is not warranted because the distinction is normatively arbitrary on all of the interpretations examined here. If the distinction is found to be normatively arbitrary, it would indeed be hard for the neutralist liberals to claim that we ought to have fundamentally different attitudes when it pertains to protect interests and promote them. Recall that the Threshold Interpretation took the distinction to be about whether the actions ensured a threshold level of opportunities to engage with x or went beyond the threshold. The Status Quo Interpretation took the distinction to rest on whether the actions ensured that agents had the same number of opportunities as previously or more opportunities than previously. If we take either of these two interpretations, it is difficult to account for the belief that one could have reasons to protect an interest but no such reasons to promote it. If one could either maintain a certain level of opportunities to engage with an interest or increase it, it isn’t clear why, given that one is already committed to the claim that engagement with this interest is good, one wouldn’t want to increase the opportunities to engage with something good. This might be especially relevant if one thinks about this issue from an impersonal perspective; as increasing the number of opportunities might have a huge impact on the number of individuals who would be able to engage with the interest. This exclusive concern for the protection of interests is especially difficult to rationalise given that, on the Status Quo Interpretation of the distinction, the existing levels of opportunities to engage are arbitrary. This difficulty to rationalise why we would take current levels of opportunities to be of any normative significance has been highlighted by Nick Bostrom and Toby Ord. Bostrom and

From Protection to Promotion | 153

Ord have identified what they label a Status Quo Bias, which makes us irrationally attached to whatever amounts to the status quo.337 Against this claim, an objector could point out that, on the Threshold Interpretation of the distinction, it could be normatively relevant. In conditions of scarcity, one might want to give priority to the protection of interests, because it amounts to making sure that individuals have a threshold level of opportunities to engage with each interest. After that point is reached, if further resources remain, they could then be allocated for the promotion of interests. In other words, in this case, the normative importance of the distinction is parasitic on the normative importance of having access to a threshold level of opportunities to engage with each interest. This would ensure that individuals have at least a minimum set of opportunities to engage with each interest before more resources are channelled into providing more opportunities to engage with them. In response to that objection, one could grant the point: of course, one might want to stop at protecting an interest (when the distinction is applicable) for the sake of something else, say protecting or promoting another interest. But I am trying only to defend the assumption that, in the absence of any such commitments, if we are prima facie committed to the protection of interests, we are also prima facie committed to their promotion. Neutralist liberals do not claim that promotion is permitted bar conditions of scarcity; they imply that there is a principled reason for not promoting the opportunities to engage with the interests. In other words, neutralist liberals claim not only that the liberal state does not have a duty to promote interest, but also claim that the liberal state has a duty not to promote interests. Neutralist liberals explain such a duty to abstain from promoting interests by invoking a commitment to the value of autonomy or by a commitment to neutrality with respect to substantive conceptions of the good and/or metaphysical disputes. Although my focus wasn’t on rejecting the objections to perfectionism but on making a positive case for Political Perfectionism, I have nevertheless constructed my case in such a way that an objection based on the value of autonomy couldn’t be valid. Recall that I am focusing on the protection and promotion of opportunities to engage with interest x. The state’s action is restricted to ease the access to certain interests. Moreover I am explicitly committed to the intrinsic value of autonomy. With respect to the neutrality principle, I have argued here and elsewhere that the liberal state isn’t, cannot, and ought not to be committed to neutrality with respect to metaphysical disputes.

|| 337 Bostrom N. and Ord T., ‘The Reversal Test: Eliminating Status Quo Bias in Applied Ethics’, Ethics, 116, 2006.

154 | The Consistency Argument

In order to rebut the neutralist liberal claim, it is thus not necessary for me to claim that in every circumstances, when one is committed to the protection of interests, one is simultaneously committed to the promotion of interests. It is enough for me to claim that – in principle, the value of x commits us to endorse both the duty to protect and the duty to promote x. And this is exactly what the Consistency Argument claims: given that x is valuable, we have a prima facie duty to protect and promote x. To affirm such a prima facie duty does not entail that this duty cannot be defeated. To sum up what has been said so far, on the Threshold and Status Quo Interpretations, it is difficult to explain why one would have a duty to protect a valuable interest but no such duty to promote it. Let us look now at the Negative/Positive Rights Interpretation. Recall that the Negative/Positive Rights Interpretation claims that protection amounts to ensuring that the negative rights of the agent are respected whereas promotion amounts to ensuring that the positive rights of the agent are provided for. However, on the Negative/Positive Rights Interpretation, for protection of interests to take place, there must be some existing opportunities to engage with interest x. Without these opportunities, a commitment to the protection of interests becomes useless. In other words, negative rights can only have a function in a context of already minimally satisfied positive rights. With no opportunities to engage with interest x, negative rights are useless, as there would be nothing left to protect. Take the example of one of the goods on the Objective List: understanding. For understanding ever to take place, external reliable sources of information and access to learning methods must exist. In the long-run, the negative right to education cannot really be sustained without the positive right to education being satisfied to a certain extent. It is thus normatively incoherent in the long run to focus on the protection of interests and overlook the promotion of interests, as protection of interests on the Negative/Positive Rights Interpretation would be useless if there were no (or very few) existing opportunities to engage with the good. There would be nothing left to protect. An objection to this argument would point out that the scenario I depicted is rather extreme. It is not very plausible to assume that there would be no (or very few) opportunities left to engage with an interest in the long run. I grant the claim that this is not a very plausible scenario. But in a much more plausible scenario, focusing on the protection of interests over their promotion would leave many with not enough opportunities to engage with a good. If not enough effort is put into making sure that there are many opportunities available, the number of individuals able to engage with the good will drop drastically. And this should certainly matter if what we care about is individuals engaging with the goods in question.

From Protection to Promotion | 155

Recall that the reason for protecting some interests in the first place is the value that is attributed to individuals’ engagement with these interests. Even if there are opportunities, it seems normatively arbitrary to restrict oneself to protect these few opportunities from interference if what we are committed to is the value of engagement with the interest in question. We ought to make sure that agents have enough opportunities to engage with these interests. In the long run, the engagement with interests will be minimal if interests are only protected. Let us turn now to the final interpretations of the distinction, to see if they also fail to give a normatively plausible account of the distinction. Both the Intentionality Interpretation and the Agent Interpretation map the distinction between protection and promotion on the basis of what (or who) the source of harm is. These interpretations would find it especially difficult to give a plausible normative account of the distinction. Take the Agent Interpretation. Recall that on the Agent Interpretation, the distinction was based on whether the source of harm was an agent or not. But it remains mysterious why one ought to be concerned with an inability to engage with the interest only when it is due to another agent. If one cares about the opportunity to engage with interest x, then it shouldn’t matter whether the source of harm is an agent’s action or an economic policy. What matters ultimately is whether or not the agent has the opportunity to engage with the interest in question. The intentionality of the action barring the agent to engage with the good is only relevant for the ethical evaluation of the action and/or of the agent causing the obstacle.338 The same problem affects the Intentionality Interpretation. Recall that the Intentionality Interpretation mapped the distinction between the protection and the promotion of an interest on whether or not the action was intentional. But, if an action interferes with my engagement with an interest, whether it is intentional or not is irrelevant. Being deprived of the opportunity to engage with an interest is bad for the agent who cannot engage with the interest in question. This being said, the intentionality of the interference might be relevant for different purposes; if one wants to determine whether the interferer should be blamed or punished. But if we are committed to the value of the engagement

|| 338 One possible way of trying to ground the normative import of this distinction would be psychological. One could imagine that in one case, when another agent is involved, one could resent this other agent. When there is no such agential involvement, it would be hard to feel anger towards, say, a tornado. When another agent is involved anger is justifiably experienced. But I don’t think that one should ground a normative distinction only on the basis of whether or not anger is experienced.

156 | The Consistency Argument

with an interest, there is no normative ground for an exclusive concern with intentional interferences with this engagement. I have reviewed the claims made by each interpretation of the distinction between protection and promotion of interests and concluded that the distinction seems normatively arbitrary. If the distinction is normatively arbitrary, it is hard to argue, as the neutralist liberal does, that there is a prima facie duty to protect interests but not such a duty to promote them. I am thus inclined to conclude that there is no great normative difference we should make between protecting and promoting interests. In addition, the existence of a prima facie duty to protect interests is generally recognised. If such a prima facie duty to protect interests exist and the distinction between the protection and the promotion of interests is normatively arbitrary, then premise 4 seems much more plausible. Moreover, I have argued that on all interpretations, to be also committed to the protection of interests without being so committed to the promotion of interests does not make sense if what we care about is the engagement with the interest in question. Premise 4 is vindicated.

5.6.5 In favour of the Consistency Argument I will now explain briefly why I take both protection and promotion of interest x to be warranted once we are committed to the value of interest x. Protection and promotion of interests are two different sets of behaviours required by the same judgement-sensitive attitude of valuing something. In other words, protection and promotion are two alternative modes of behaviour both expressing the same judgement-sensitive attitude. Raz says something similar about the implications of respecting something of value: In general, respecting something of value, say a painting, involves not only refraining from damaging it, but also taking steps to protect it from decay, e.g. by constructing a display case with regulated temperature and humidity. The point of respect is to make engagement with value possible, and the protection of the painting has to assure not merely its continued existence, but the possibility of appreciating it. Respecting persons requires more than refraining from unduly limiting their opportunities to exercise their powers of rational agency. It requires making sure that such opportunities are available. This too follows from the fact that the value of a capacity is in its proper exercise.339

Raz is claiming that showing respect to a valuable thing, such as a painting, would entail not damaging it, but also protecting it from any possible damages || 339 Raz J., ‘The Role of Well-Being’, p. 289.

From Protection to Promotion | 157

so as to ensure its continued existence and the possibility for individuals to appreciate it. He argues further that respecting individuals entail providing them with opportunities to engage with some goods. In other words, commitment to the value of agents entail further commitment that actively provide for their flourishing, as a commitment to honour the value of objects would commit us to provide actively for their preservation.

5.6.6 Relation to Consequentialism Let us now consider a last objection to premise 4 of the Consistency Argument (the claim that if x is valuable we ought both to protect and promote it). This objection would argue that the distinction between protection and promotion is normatively important because each implies a different ethical theory. The objection claims that the liberal state can only be committed to the protection of interests and not to the promotion of interests because, otherwise, it would be committed to a consequentialist theory that would be disrespectful or even damaging to the protection of individual rights. But this objection ultimately fails. The promotion of the good can operate within a framework of deontological requirements. In support of this objection, interest promotion, in the interpretations considered here does share some features with consequentialism, such as promotion (in the quantitative sense) of the valuable and a concern for states of affairs over actions. The different interpretations of the distinction between protection and promotion of interests shifted the focus alternately to one or the other of these distinctive features. The first two interpretations (The Threshold Interpretation and the Status Quo Interpretation) took promotion to be about the quantitative increase of opportunities to engage with the good. The last three interpretations (The Negative Right/Positive Right Interpretations, Intentional Interpretation and Agent Interpretation) took promotion to focus on states of affairs (whereas protection of interests was merely concerned with blocking some types of actions). Granted, maximisation isn’t required by deontological outlooks. But deontological ethics praises actions that go beyond merely conforming to sideconstraints and promote the good. Let us consider two such instances in existing deontological theories. First, Kantian Ethics argue that we all have an imperfect duty to promote the good. There is thus a clear admonition to promote the good, even though there is no specification as to when and how the promotion of the good should occur. Second, non-Kantian deontological theories also leave room for supererogatory acts, acts that go beyond the call of duty, and

158 | The Consistency Argument

these are commended as praiseworthy. A concern for the promotion of value (in our case, the promotion of interests) is thus fully compatible with deontological ethics; it even frequently belongs to a theory of deontological ethics, as long as no deontological rule is violated. And such a commitment to the promotion of value does not commit us to consequentialism and does not undermine our commitment to individual rights. Someone might press on to argue that the Consistency argument implies that protection and promotion of interests are equivalent and that, to that extent, it is committed to consequentialism. However, I will argue that the Consistency Argument does not claim that protection and promotion are equivalent either analytically or normatively. To begin with, if both protection and promotion were analytically equivalent, they would mean the same thing. But this isn’t what is claimed, as it should have been obvious from the way I distinguished them in each interpretation examined. What the Consistency Argument argues is that the identification of value gives us a prima facie reason both to protect and promote the value in question: To say that something is good is to say that there is a prima facie reason to protect and promote it. The analytical equivalence holds thus between the claim that ‘x is valuable’ and ‘having a prima facie reason to protect and promote it’ (and not between ‘protecting an interest’ and ‘promoting an interest’). Protection and Promotion of interests might also be said to be normatively equivalent. But I didn’t argue that they were. I argued that if one is committed to the protection of interests, one ought also to be committed to the promotion of interests. But I also claimed that, on the Threshold Interpretation, there were conditions, in which the distinction would be normatively relevant (such as conditions of scarcity and conflict with other interests). In such conditions, I argued that priority could be justifiably given to protection in order to ensure that each individual has access to a certain threshold of opportunities. This in no way commits me to claim either that they are normatively equivalent, as I believe that protection of interests might have priority in the conditions outlined above. We have established here that the liberal state is not only committed to the value of certain interests and to their protection, but that it also has a prima facie duty to promote the interests identified as having intrinsic value. The conclusion reached here is important for the overall aim of this book to defend the validity of liberal perfectionism. Recall that, on my definition of Political Perfectionism, the state is permitted and justified to protect and promote the opportunities for citizens to engage with intrinsically valuable goods on the basis of their intrinsic value (see chapter 1, section 10).

Conclusion | 159

I have argued that it was difficult to explain why we would give any normative weight to the protection of interests and not to their promotion. I have claimed that, the only way to explain the normative relevance of the distinction would be to consider cases in which resources are limited and the interest in question would already have been satisfied to a certain degree. If promotion is taken to mean going beyond a certain level in the satisfaction of an interest (as in the Threshold Interpretation), it might make sense to want to discriminate where to allocate resources on the basis of the extent to which interests are satisfied. My claim was that, nevertheless, once one recognises the value of an interest, one has both a prima facie duty to protect and promote that interest. Of course I have not established that there are conclusive reasons for the liberal state to promote these interests. For that to be the case, I will have to consider further objections to the promotion of interests by the state. But I have rebutted the validity of the neutralist liberal assertion that the liberal state ought not to promote interests as a matter of principle and I have argued that there is a prima facie reason for the state protecting and promoting the opportunities to engage with the goods. Before I conclude someone might point out that I have not argued that there was a reason to protect and promote the goods on the basis of their intrinsic value. But I do not think that this is hard to show, given that if one endorses the Consistency Argument, it is clear that such a duty derives from the pre-existing commitment of the liberal state to protect individual interests. Moreover, I have argued that such a commitment can best be accounted for in terms of the value of the interests that these rights protects. If that is the case, then the value of these interests should be invoked once again. Doing otherwise, suggesting that the state is justified to protect and promote the opportunities to engage with these goods for another reason would recommend the state to be dishonest about its justifications.

5.7 Conclusion In this chapter, I set myself the task of simultaneously establishing an argument in favour of Political Perfectionism and rejecting the validity of the neutralist claim. I started by clarifying some arguments made by Charles Taylor and Vinit Haksar. Both argued that the liberal commitment to the protection of liberal rights might entail some perfectionist commitments. I discussed mainly their view that some essential properties of human beings are what grounds rights. I rejected this claim by pointing to some of the problems that such a claim would entail in justifying the rights of some members of our species.

160 | The Consistency Argument

After that, I made explicit the main steps of the Consistency Argument which moves from the observation that the liberal state is committed to the protection of some rights to the claim that the state has a prima facie reason to promote the goods whose value is protected by these rights. I examined more closely the two premises of the Consistency Argument which were contentious. Premise 2 was contentious because it implied an Interest Theory of rights. If the Consistency Argument works, it would have the important result of committing all those who are already convinced by the Interest Theory of rights to endorse some perfectionist claims. Given the prevalence of the Interest Theory of rights, this is no small result. In order to establish the validity of that premise, I have argued briefly in favour of an Interest Theory of rights. Moreover, I argued that one could modify the Consistency argument to suit the supporters of the Choice Theory of rights. I then examined premise 4, which claims that if an interest is valuable, there is a prima facie reason to protect and promote this interest. In order to argue for that claim, I argued that in all the plausible interpretations of the distinction between protection and promotion, it would be hard to justify attributing normative weight exclusively to the protection of interests and not to the promotion of interests. Finally, I looked at the claim that a commitment to the promotion of interests would lead to the endorsement of consequentialism. A lot of the confusion that surrounds the distinction between protection and promotion of interests has to do with the assumption that protection is somehow a deontological notion and promotion is a consequentialist notion. This assumption was rejected on the basis that there is nothing in deontological theories that would bar them from endorsing the promotion of interests. I also claimed that deontological theories were already committed to praise the promotion of the good, as long as it operated within a framework of side-constraints. This chapter’s task was to go beyond the arguments in favour of Political Perfectionism articulated in the previous chapter and claim that it would be inconsistent for neutralist liberals not to endorse the perfectionist claim that the state ought to promote some individual goods. In doing that, I hope to have shifted the burden of argument to the neutralist liberals. The Consistency Argument also specifically argues in favour of Political Perfectionism. Given that I addressed the problems raised by two of the contentious claims of the Consistency argument, I can reiterate the argument with confidence. The protection of individual rights by the liberal state entails the promotion of the interests protected by these rights. Any principled refusal of endorsing a commitment to the promotion of individuals’ interests is inconsistent with the actual commitments of the liberal state to the protection of individual rights.

6 The Location of Unfairness 6.1 Introduction The argument I propose in this chapter relates to two distinct values: the value of equality and the value of responsibility (or control over one’s life, and its outcomes). I will ask how these two values interact in the context of questions about justice. We have strong intuitions about the unfairness of luck. When it is obvious that people get lucky, we do not issue praise. When people work hard and get what they deserve, we praise them because we hold them responsible for the good outcomes they get. In other words, we believe that a certain entitlement to goods results from responsibility. In order to accommodate this intuition, luck egalitarians argue that only relative deprivations for which individuals are not responsible ought to be compensated. Luck egalitarianism is also the egalitarian response to two influential conservative objections to egalitarianism.340 The first conservative objection states that egalitarianism does not recognise the values of responsibility, agency and effort. The second objection focuses on the possible consequences egalitarianism would have; the practice of egalitarianism might have the further impact of eroding the values of responsible agency and achievement by failing to give appropriate incentives. If individuals are not given the appropriate incentives, they might stop valuing responsibility over advantages. In response to these objections, luck egalitarians have suggested introducing a sharp distinction between choice and circumstances when assessing whether a certain distribution of resources (or welfare) is just. This would allow one to recommend redistribution only when inequalities are not the result of different choices. Luck egalitarians claim that this allows them to show respect for the value of responsibility, agency and achievement. In this chapter I will argue, however, that luck egalitarians fail to successfully respond to the first conservative objection. I will argue that luck egalitarians need to go further in the recognition of the value of responsibility, agency and achievement. This chapter argues that the fundamental problem with luck egalitarianism is in where it locates unfairness. Luck egalitarians claim that unfairness is lo|| 340 As Cohen puts it, ‘Dworkin has, in effect, performed for egalitarianism the considerable service of incorporating within it the most powerful idea in the arsenal of the anti-egalitarian right: the idea of choice and responsibility’. Cohen G.A., ‘On the Currency of Egalitarian Justice’, Ethics, 1989, p. 933.

162 | The Location of Unfairness

cated at the point where individuals end up with relative disadvantages through no fault of their own. I will argue that luck egalitarians take the value of responsibility into account too far downstream. They want to redistribute resources, instead of looking at the source of the differential distribution, which is that people are more or less lucky in life. I think the source itself, luck, rather than the resulting distribution, is what we identify as unfair and that luck is itself unfair independently of the consequences that it will have on the shape of our lives. In other words, I agree with the luck egalitarians that there is something unfair about being unlucky through no fault of one’s own, but I do so not because of the resulting inequality, but because of luck itself. I will further claim that this disagreement has important implications not only at the theoretical but also at the practical level. This is so because unfairness has to be reduced, if not eliminated. Different locations of unfairness will thus lead to different aims in terms of policies. Luck egalitarians identify as their aim the elimination of brute luck. Given this aim, I will argue that there are two alternative ways of achieving it. One is to focus on the inequalities and try to reduce their extent and impact. The other is to focus on responsibility (or the reduction of brute luck) and try to make sure that individuals have a certain number of opportunities available to them. Luck egalitarians focus exclusively on the first strategy to achieve their aim. I will argue not only that it would be better for them to use the second strategy to achieve their own aim, but that they should endorse as an aim the promotion of conditions for responsibility. This change might seem trivial at first, but I believe that it entails a radical change of focus away from compensation towards structural changes at the level of opportunities. The conclusion of this chapter will thus be that the promotion of conditions for responsibility should be the central aim of our theory of justice. This does not prevent compensation from having any role in social justice, as there are many instances in which luck will nevertheless interfere with our lives. Some instances of luck might be preventable but many are not. Compensation will have to step in and correct the resulting injustices. Nevertheless the view I will defend will give compensation only a subsidiary role. Before I begin, I would like to point out that there are two elements in this chapter, one critical and one constructive, each with different scope and ambition. The critical part of this chapter has as its ultimate ambition the rebuttal of the Basic Luck Egalitarian Intuition – the claim that it’s unfair for some to be worse off than others through no fault or choice of their own. If my argument is correct, the Basic Luck Egalitarian Intuition must be rejected and, with it luck egalitarianism as it currently stands. The Basic Luck Egalitarian Intuition is twolegged: it appeals to the unfairness of a combination of features whose norma-

Introduction | 163

tive weight, I will argue, cannot be explained. In order to be defensible, I will argue, this normative claim needs to be part of a more general claim about the unfairness of all inequalities or about the unfairness of any distribution that is not responsibility-sensitive. Moreover, the endorsement of the latter general claim would entail further support to my suggestion that the promotion of the conditions for responsibility should be the central aim of our theory of justice. In the constructive part, I am not putting forward an alternative theory of justice, but merely pointing to what I take to be the key elements that a theory of justice should have. The promotion of certain opportunities for responsibility over advantages will be key to my suggestion. I will also suggest some possible ways to account for the intrinsic value of responsibility. The reader need not assent to any of the suggestions I offer in the constructive part of this chapter to accept the conclusions of its critical part.

6.1.1 The Luck Egalitarian Location of Unfairness Let us start by clarifying the luck egalitarian conception of unfairness. Luck egalitarians disagree on many aspects of their conception, but they agree on two fundamental aspects of unfairness: the location of unfairness and the appropriate remedy to correct that unfairness. Luck egalitarians claim that it is unfair for an individual to suffer relative deprivations of advantage if she is not responsible for it (where advantage stands for any currency of justice endorsed, whether it is welfare, resources, capabilities or opportunities for welfare). Temkin, for instance, states that ‘it is bad – unjust unfair – for some to be worse off than others [through no fault or choice of their own.]’.341 I will refer to this claim as the Basic Luck Egalitarian Intuition [BLEI]: Basic Luck Egalitarian Intuition [BLEI]: It is unfair for some to be worse off than others through no fault or choice of their own. There is a strong consensus among luck egalitarians on this identification of the location of unfairness.342 The same fundamental intuition about unfairness is

|| 341 Temkin L., Inequality, Oxford University Press, Oxford, 1993, quoted in Lippert-Rasmussen K., ‘Egalitarianism, Option Luck, and Responsibility’, Ethics, 2001, vol. 111, n. 3, p. 548. 342 Otsuka M., ‘Luck, Insurance and Equality’, Ethics 113, 2002, p. 40.

164 | The Location of Unfairness

sometimes articulated in terms of the distinction between brute and option luck.343 This distinction was introduced by Ronald Dworkin: Option luck is a matter of how deliberate and calculated gambles turn out – whether someone gains or loses through accepting an isolated risk he or she should have anticipated and might have declined. Brute luck is a matter of how risks fall out that are not in that sense deliberate gambles.344

In other words, brute luck is typically the kind of luck the agent could not have foreseen, expected or protected herself against. If the agent is suddenly afflicted by an unknown genetic disease, this is a case of brute luck. On the contrary, option luck refers to the occurrence of luck in a way that was foreseeable by the agent. A case in point would be gambling. The bad luck suffered by an agent who gambles is option bad luck, as the agent could have averted it by not engaging in the activity of gambling. The distinction between brute and option luck renders the concept of luck much more adequate in its application to individuals’ choices. It should have become by now clear that from the luck egalitarian perspective, if there is no brute luck, there is responsibility. Brute luck and responsibility are ‘conceptual mirror images of each other’.345 Now that the distinction between brute luck and option luck has been clarified, one can express the luck egalitarian basic intuition in the following way: it is unfair for individuals to have less than others when this is due to brute luck.

6.1.2 The Luck Egalitarian Aim Once some inequalities have been identified as unfair, it follows quite naturally that the aim of luck egalitarians is to eliminate those inequalities. Here again, I believe there is a strong consensus among luck egalitarians that the aim of luck

|| 343 Dworkin states that ‘it is unjust when some people lead their lives with less wealth available to them, or in otherwise less favourable circumstances, than others, not through some choice or gamble of their own but through brute bad luck.’ Dworkin R., Sovereign Virtue, p. 6. Gerald Lang describes luck egalitarianism as condemning ‘inequalities amongst agents, in respect of a certain currency or metric of goods, if those inequalities reflect brute luck.’ Lang G., ‘Luck Egalitarianism, Permissible Inequalities and Moral Hazard’, Journal of Moral Philosophy, 2009, p. 317. 344 Dworkin R.M., ‘What is Equality, Part 2: Equality of Resources’, Philosophy and Public Affairs, 1981, p. 293. 345 Lang G., ibid., p. 317.

Introduction | 165

egalitarianism is to eliminate those inequalities that are due to brute luck.346 In order to achieve that, luck egalitarians recommend the use of redistributive mechanisms. There are two noteworthy points to bear in mind about this luck egalitarian aim. First, luck egalitarians do not aim to eliminate inequalities in general, but only those that are unfair by their criterion. Second, luck egalitarians claim that compensation is the appropriate remedy for such unfairness. I will address these two points separately in this chapter. I will start by addressing general issues affecting the endorsement of compensation as an appropriate remedy to unfairness. Then, I will focus on the problems affecting the Basic Luck Egalitarian Intuition in section 2.1.

6.1.2.1 Redistribution, Compensation and what Money doesn’t Buy Given their identification of the location of unfairness, luck egalitarians are committed to the claim that correcting relative deprivations is sufficient to restore justice. I will argue against this claim in detail later. For now, I want to look at three objections targeting compensation as a mechanism for restoring justice. This is not to say that we have to get rid of compensating mechanisms. Compensating mechanisms are perfectly appropriate to the extent that they can be recognised and used as second-best mechanisms for social justice. One might think that since my account also gives an important role to compensatory mechanisms, I fall prey to my own objections. However, I will argue that these objections have real force only if one endorses compensatory mechanisms as the main remedy against unfairness. On the account I develop later, compensation will be given a subsidiary role and wil not pretend to eliminate all injustices. It is thus far less vulnerable to the following objections.

6.1.2.2 Compensation up to the Envy Free Distribution? The first objection claims that assigning to compensation the main role in fighting injustice will lead to bad consequences. In particular, I want to consider extreme cases in which the redistribution recommended by luck egalitarians would make the majority of the population very badly off. Michael Otsuka points out that Dworkin’s envy-free distribution can only be realized at the cost of radically lowering the welfare of the majority. Otsuka takes as his example compensation for severe disabilities. If an agent is born with a set of crippling disabilities, Otsuka claims that, on a Dworkinian view, we are required to lower

|| 346 Lang G., ibid., p. 318

166 | The Location of Unfairness

the welfare of the rest of the population severely just so as to satisfy the requirements of equality of resources.347 Otsuka argues that the redistribution between the able-bodied and the severely incapacitated would have to proceed until ‘the point is reached at which no incapacitated person prefers any ablebodied person’s bundle of personal and impersonal resources to his or her own.’ Otsuka claims further that, in the case of the severely incapacitated, it will be either impossible or fantastically expensive to compensate them until this point is reached. In this case, Otsuka argues that approximating an envy-free distribution of resources would lead us to a ‘state of mutually shared misery.’ The main point here is that financial compensation that aims to satisfy equality of welfare would lead to a bad state of affairs. This is thus the first criticism that one could level against the luck egalitarian aim. Otsuka suggests that this problem should lead us to adopt a pluralist approach to justice. If justice requires not only equality of resources, but also the promotion of freedom and utility, Otsuka argues that the situation of shared misery described above would not occur, as these different values would balance each other. This is a possible response. My response to this sort of case is different. On my account, compensation is not claimed to eliminate all unfairness, so it is less likely to lead to a state of affairs in which shared misery would result.

6.1.2.3 It isn’t the Money Another problem with the idea that the unfairness is in the relative deprivation of some individuals through no fault of their own is that it suggests that unfairness can be entirely eliminated through financial compensation. This is so because luck egalitarians assume that redistribution can fully compensate for relative deprivations of advantages. It might appear that this objection would only concern those luck egalitarians who adopt a specific metric of equality, namely equality of resources. However, this is not so, as even those who aim at equalising welfare do so via transfer of resources. As Ronald Dworkin sharply puts it: equality of welfare… holds that a distributional scheme treats people as equals when it distributes or transfers resources among them until no further transfer would leave them more equal in welfare.348

|| 347 Otsuka M., ‘Luck, Insurance and Equality’, Ethics 113 (October 2002), p. 45‒46. 348 Dworkin R.M., ‘What is Equality: Part 1’, Philosophy and Public Affairs, 1981, p. 186.

Introduction | 167

As this quote makes clear, those egalitarians that reject equality of resources nevertheless use resources to equalize the currency they favour, be it welfare or capabilities. I will now argue that this exclusive focus on financial compensation as a way to remedy unfairness is fundamentally mistaken for reasons that pertain to the nature of some sources of unfairness. I have pointed out above that some disabilities might require redistribution of such scope that this might result in making the majority of the population very badly off. But something else might be said about disabilities; their nature is such that financial compensation might never really eliminate the injustice inherent in and caused by them. Whereas the previous objection was pointing to the consequences that trying to compensate for some deprivations would have for society as a whole, the current criticism focuses on what compensation can achieve for the individual who is the recipient of it and it concludes that some injustices just cannot be compensated financially. I have discussed physical impairments, but this comment could be extended to different aspects of an individual’s well-being which cannot be compensated financially. Let us take the example of an individual starting up a company. The agent can insure against some kind of losses but not against other non-financial losses that would be caused by the failure of her start-up. The failure might damage her self-esteem, she might lose the friends she made amongst her colleagues, she might get out of this venture with her pride affected, etc., etc. These are all different aspects of her well-being that couldn’t be compensated for. One way in which luck egalitarians could reply to that line of criticism is to claim that these injustices should not be the concern of a conception of social justice. But it might be difficult for luck egalitarians to give such a response, because their view implies such a broadening of the scope of justice. Many critics have been sceptical of the fact that luck egalitarians have endorsed such a broad scope of justice. Elizabeth Anderson, for instance, has criticised the luck egalitarian commitment to compensate for any kind of undeserved loss.349 Some luck egalitarians have admitted that some sources of unfairness are such that they cannot be compensated for. Richard Arneson, for instance, || 349 Anderson expresses this powerfully: ‘A negligent driver might suffer far more from the death of her son in a car accident she caused than from denial of rehabilitative surgery to her injured leg. Society owes her no compensation for the worse suffering, even if it brings her below some threshold of welfare, but ought not to deprive her of health care, even if she would not drop below that level without it. Egalitarians must try to secure certain kinds of goods for people.’ Anderson E., ‘What is the Point of Equality’, p. 301‒302.

168 | The Location of Unfairness

claims that some harms cannot be compensated. He calls such harms, such as death, ‘a fact of life’. This seems to indicate that Arneson believes that the scope of justice should not extend to including these aspects of one’s life. But this is not so, as he states explicitly that such ‘fact of life’ is an obstacle to the fulfilment of equality of opportunity: At least, strict equal opportunity can be fulfilled so long as the unavoidable misfortune that befalls people is fully compensable. If it is held, as is plausible, that some harms such as premature death are noncompensable, then strict equal opportunity cannot be completely fulfilled, but this is not a defect in the principle, but just a fact of life.350

Arneson states clearly here that the non-compensable facts of life are preventing the realisation of equality of opportunity for welfare (which is the particular conception of justice he examines in the article from which this quote is extracted.). If these facts of life constitute a failure of the realisation of justice, such facts of life must belong theoretically to the scope of justice; this is implied by Arneson’s claim above. In this case, the response that these aspects of life do not belong to the scope of justice seems to be precluded by luck egalitarians themselves.

6.2 Location of Unfairness I claimed that there was a fundamental problem with the Basic Luck Egalitarian Intuition, which corresponds to its location of unfairness. Recall that the Basic Luck Egalitarian Intuition [BLEI] claims that it is unfair that individuals end up with relative disadvantages through no fault of their own. My claim will be that luck egalitarians are building on shaky foundations, as the BLEI cannot be accounted for.

6.2.1 A Dilemma for the Basic Luck Egalitarian Intuition Let us try to look at the Basic Luck Egalitarian Intuition and the implications it has. Please note that I will now consider an interpretation of the BLEI according to which it exhausts claims of unfairness. Below, however, I will also discuss an

|| 350 Arneson R., ‘Debate: Equality of Opportunity for Welfare Defended and Recanted’, The Journal of Political Philosophy, vol. 7, n. 4, 1999, p. 490‒491.

Location of Unfairness | 169

interpretation of the BLEI according to which it does not exhaust claims about unfairness. So consider the following claims: (1) A distribution is unfair if and only if X has less than Y through factors due to brute luck. (2) Inequality is not always unfair. (3) It’s not unfair if X has less than Y, if this difference is completely due to factors under the control of each. And, supposing that X and Y are the only members of a society, (4) If due to luck both X and Y have less than they could have had, but to the same degree, the differential might be unfortunate, but is not unfair. (5) If X has the same amount, Z, as Y, but while X is responsible for Z, Y has merely been lucky, then the differential is not unfair. The first claim assumes that the Basic Luck Egalitarian Intuition exhausts claims about unfairness. The second claim further specifies the Basic Luck Egalitarian Intuition: if only certain inequalities are unjust, not all inequalities are unjust. The third claim is an implication of the Basic Luck Egalitarian Intuition. If an inequality is due to a difference in the choices that were taken by X and Y, the inequality is not unfair. The fourth claim shows that luck egalitarianism claims that only relative differences in advantages can be relevant objects of social justice. Luck egalitarians who endorse the first claim – that the Luck Egalitarian claim exhausts claims about unfairness – must also endorse claim 5, which follows from it. Let us call such luck egalitarians Fundamentalist Luck Egalitarians. According to claim 5, if there is a differential in responsibility over one’s life outcomes but no inequality, that is, if Marco is not responsible for his advantages, but merely lucky, while Jana has been working hard for the same level of advantages, there is no injustice. I believe that claim 5 is a highly counterintuitive implication of the Basic Luck Egalitarian Intuition. If one believes that it is wrong when a certain agent has less than another for factors that are not in her control, it is implausible to believe that, when there is no such inequality, but an agent is responsible for the outcome while another isn’t, there is no injustice. However, one could object that the first premise misrepresents the Basic Luck Egalitarian Intuition. The objector – let us call her the Equality of Opportunity Luck Egalitarian – could claim that, on the correct interpretation of luck egalitarianism, the first premise does not exhaust claims about unfairness, but

170 | The Location of Unfairness

only states a sufficient condition. I call them Equality of Opportunity Luck Egalitarians because, as it will become apparent below, these egalitarians seem to be committed first and foremost to equality of opportunity and not to equality of outcomes.351 The first premise should thus be stated as follows: ‘it is unfair if X has less than Y through no fault of his own.’ If this claim was held, then the luck egalitarian could reject (5) and endorse (5’), which claims the opposite of (5): (5’) If X has the same amount, Z, as Y, but while X is responsible for Z while Y has merely been luck, the differential is unfair. But if (5’) is endorsed, then it would suggest that luck egalitarians are indeed in favour of redistribution even when there is equality. Luck egalitarians would thus be committed to the creation of inequalities in cases where equality does not reflect differences in responsibility. To sum up, the luck egalitarian faces a conundrum. Either he accepts the first premise (which exhausts claims of justice) and would then be committed to (5) as well, which is a counter-intuitive bundle of views to hold. Or he revises the first premise so as to claim that it does not exhaust claims of unfairness and he then can reject (5) and endorse (5’). In this case though, he would be advocating the creation of new inequalities, every time circumstances are similar to the ones described in (5’) which would recast his views as anti-egalitarian.

6.2.2 How can the Fundamentalist Luck Egalitarian attempt to Justify her Position? Let us look at the Basic Luck Egalitarian Intuition once again in order to identify the origin of the problem. Luck egalitarians seem to identify unfairness only in the specific combination of two features: a relative deprivation and a lack of responsibility for this relative deprivation. This two-part identification is, I believe, the root of the problem. Let us consider three alternative ways of explaining why the combination of both factors should be relevant to identifying unfairness. One possible route would be to claim that both the elements of that equation are unfair independ-

|| 351 I mention this sub-category of luck egalitarianism, because a luck egalitarian claimed in discussion that luck egalitarians are in favour of equality of opportunity. It isn’t clear to me how many actual philosophers endorse this view as such; this seems to me another example of some existing confusion as to who the luck egalitarians are.

Location of Unfairness | 171

ently. In other words, this would amount to the claim that inequalities are in themselves unfair and it is also unfair for agents to get outcomes for which they are not responsible; each is a sufficient condition for unfairness. Each of these intuitions would be backed by a justificatory account, given that these are common intuitions. However, I think there is no good available justification for believing both these independent claims to be correct. Moreover, both these claims are explicitly rejected by luck egalitarians. As outlined in claim (2) above, luck egalitarians claim that inequalities as such are not necessarily unjust and they claim that having advantage for which one is not responsible is not unfair. So this route can be eliminated right away, as it does not match the luck egalitarian intuition. The second route would be to believe that only one of the elements of the conjunction is unfair; one element is necessary and sufficient for unfairness to obtain while the other one is neither necessary nor sufficient. But, once again, this explanation is rejected explicitly by those Fundamentalist Luck Egalitarians who take premise 1 to exhaust claims of unfairness. By having this two-part identification of unfairness, neither the inequality itself nor the lack of responsibility could be said to explain the unfairness alone. The third possibility is that unfairness is attached only to the unique combination of the two elements, but not either of them considered independently. Each element is necessary and they are jointly sufficient for unfairness to obtain. But then one still needs to explain why the combination of these two elements renders the outcome unfair. However, it is hard to see why the only unique combination of these two features is unfair. I thus suggest that there is no plausible candidate account for the justification of the Basic Luck Egalitarian Intuition as it stands – and that this is so because, taken on its own, this intuition cannot be defended. Discussions of Luck egalitarianism have done a less than thorough job in addressing the most fundamental questions about the basic justification of this position.352

6.2.3 How the Existing Literature accounts for the Two Forms of luck Egalitarianism If one examines the existing literature, the combination of criteria which is distinctive of fundamentalist luck egalitarianism cannot be formulated in terms of

|| 352 Scheffler S., ‘What is Egalitarianism?’ Philosophy and Public Affairs, 31, 1, (2003), p. 13.

172 | The Location of Unfairness

the distinctions that are taken to have normative significance. Take one of the most important distinctions in the egalitarian debate, the distinction between telic and deontic egalitarianism, which has been formulated by Derek Parfit.353 According to Parfit, telic egalitarians claim that it is in itself bad if some people are worse off than others. On the deontic view, ‘what is unjust, and therefore bad, is not strictly speaking the state of affairs, but the way in which it was produced.’354 In other words, deontic egalitarians care only about the process by which a result comes about.355 In other words, telic egalitarianism takes unfairness to be primarily located in the resulting inequality and deontic egalitarianism takes it to be located in the way that inequality came about. Parfit claims that luck egalitarians are telic egalitarians. Of course, luck egalitarians do not only care about outcomes so Parfit should not identify them solely as telic egalitarians. They also care about the source of outcomes. Now Parfit does explicitly state that telic egalitarians could add the claim ‘through no fault or choice of theirs’.356 But I do not believe this make this identification correct either, as it implies that luck egalitarians identify inequality itself as unfair, whereas luck egalitarians object to inequalities only when they arise in a certain way, namely, out of brute luck. Luck egalitarians are not committed to the claim that inequalities, as such, are bad in themselves. If they were, they would object to every inequality. Luck egalitarians thus cannot be telic egalitarians. It is also clear that Parfit only discusses what I called Fundamentalist Luck Egalitarians, as Equality of Opportunity Luck Egalitarians are deontic egalitarians, to the extent that they want to redistribute even when equality obtains, for the sake of a more responsibility-sensitive redistribution. Lippert-Rasmussen criticises the distinction made by Parfit and suggests a slightly different conception of the distinction between telic and deontic egalitarians.357 Deontic and telic egalitarians differ, in his view, because of the account they give of the badness of inequalities. Deontic egalitarians claim that inequalities are bad if they are unjust, and they are unjust only if they involve agency. Telic egalitarians, on the contrary, claim that states of affairs can be in themselves bad even if they do not involve agency or representations. LippertRasmussen also distinguishes between those egalitarians whose evaluative || 353 For the distinction, see Parfit D., ‘Equality and Priority’, Ratio X, 3, 1997, p. 204. 354 Parfit D., ibid., p. 208. 355 This view is similar to Nozick’s ‘historical principles of distribution’. Nozick R., Anarchy, State and Utopia, Blackwells Publishing, p. 153 and following. 356 Parfit D., ibid., p. 204. 357 Lippert-Rasmussen K., in Holtug N. and Lippert-Rasmussen K (eds.), Egalitarianism, New Essays on the Nature and Value of Equality, p. 105.

Location of Unfairness | 173

focus is on the genesis of inequalities and those egalitarians whose evaluative focus is on outcomes. Finally, Lippert-Rasmussen claims that luck egalitarianism is a form of ‘genesis-and-outcome-focused telic egalitarianism’.358 LippertRasmussen clearly has in mind Fundamentalist Luck Egalitarians, as Equality of Opportunity Luck Egalitarians would again belong to the category of deontic egalitarians. According to Lippert-Rasmussen, (fundamentalist) luck egalitarians remain telic egalitarians because they condemn states of affairs that do not involve agency, such as inequalities due to differences in talents (given that such differences are not traceable to the intentional acts of other agents). But I am not convinced that luck egalitarians can be thus categorised. After all, if they are concerned with the way some inequalities came about, this seems to indicate that they give quite a lot of consideration to human actions. To sum up, it is hard to classify Fundamentalist Luck Egalitarians. The impossibility of giving an account of the Basic Luck Egalitarian Intuition in terms of these existing distinctions is an important indication of a problem, given that each of these distinctions has its own normative account. There are natural justifications for disvaluing inequality regardless of how caused and natural justifications for regarding outcomes determined by brute luck as unfair. But, so far as I can see, there are no natural justifications for regarding only unequal outcomes that are determined by brute luck as unfair. I believe that these considerations should lead us to, first, give up on the Basic Luck Egalitarian Intuition as it stands and, second, to endorse instead the more general claim that it is valuable for individuals to be responsible for the level of advantages they enjoy. It is hard to dislodge the intuition that it is fair when individuals enjoy the level of advantage they are responsible for. In other words, my argument claims that luck egalitarians should reform their views and become Equality of Opportunity Luck Egalitarian. However, as we shall see below, some further revisions need to be made for Equality of Opportunity Luck Egalitarianism to be a plausible view. Moreover, Equality of Opportunity Luck Egalitarianism faces several problems. First, such luck egalitarians do not articulate their view in an unambiguous way, leaving it unclear how they relate and how they differ from Fundamentalist Luck Egalitarians. Too often, the BLEI has been used to capture the basic intuition of luck egalitarianism, but I believe I have shown that it is misleading to present it as such. It can only serve as a basic intuition for Fundamentalist Luck Egalitarians. Second, the existing literature only explicitly addresses Fundamentalist Luck Egalitarians, not Equality of Opportunity Luck Egalitarians.

|| 358 Lippert-Rasmussen K., ibid., p. 104.

174 | The Location of Unfairness

For example, in both Parfit and Lippert-Rasmussen’s discussions mentioned above, there is no discussion of Equality of Opportunity Luck Egalitarianism. Third, there is widespread confusion as to whether luck egalitarians are really egalitarian. According to the following classification by Lippert-Rasmussen of different states of affairs from a luck egalitarian point of view, equality isn’t consistently taken to be valuable. Lippert-Rasmussen’s classification is the following: The Best State of affairs is one in which equality reflects equivalent exercises of responsibility. The Second Best State of affairs is one in which there are inequalities but they reflect differential exercises of responsibility. The Third Best State of affairs is one in which there is inequality (or for that matter equality) failing to reflect differential exercises of responsibility.359

This seems to be inconsistent. Either Equality of Opportunity Luck Egalitarians only value responsibility, in which case, they cannot distinguish between the best and the second-best state of affairs, or they value equality, in which case, they cannot be indifferent towards which of the two scenarios ranked as third best obtains. Even if we set these considerations aside, the view I wish to defend differs from Equality of Opportunity Luck Egalitarianism in two important ways. First, I will advocate giving normative priority to the prevention of unfairness by interventions at the level of social structure (section 5). Second, I will claim that responsibility over advantages is not valuable only because it is just, but also because it is prudentially valuable (section 7.3).

6.2.4 Practical Implications It might be objected that this classificatory discussion is an academic issue of no practical relevance. This isn’t true. This is a problem that extends far beyond an academic debate, if we think of luck egalitarianism as a potential guide for social policies. Indeed, it isn’t even clear whether luck egalitarians are egalitarians or not. Some, like Susan Hurley and Richard Arneson, have argued that luck egalitarianism isn’t conducive to equal patterns of distribution.360 However, others have claimed that luck egalitarians are first and foremost egalitarian and || 359 Lippert-Rasmussen K., ‘Egalitarianism, Option Luck and Responsibility’, Ethics, 2001, p. 576. 360 Hurley S. and Arneson R., ‘Luck and Equality’, Aristotelian Society Supplementary, 2003, p. 53.

Same Destination, Different Routes | 175

that their focus is on the compensation of disadvantage.361 Of course, the latter claim is inconsistent with what I claimed to be the only plausible account of luck egalitarianism, Equality of Opportunity Luck Egalitarianism. First, given that only a certain type of inequalities is identified as unjust, it isn’t clear whether luck egalitarianism will lead to more egalitarian outcomes. That will depend on an empirical fact, that is, on how much of existing inequality is due to brute luck. Moreover, if, as I suggested above, only Equality of Opportunity Luck Egalitarians is a plausible normative view, then luck egalitarians would have lost all credentials as egalitarians: as we saw, they would even recommend the creation of inequalities, if this happened to better correspond to what individuals are actually responsible for. So the inability to pinpoint what really accounts for the basic intuition behind luck egalitarianism leads not only to theoretical but also to practical confusion. It is not only that one cannot put luck egalitarianism into one neat category; this problem leads to some confusion as to what political direction it might take. Luck egalitarianism will be a poor guide in making policies that pertain to social justice, if it is not clear whether they are egalitarian or not.

6.3 Same Destination, Different Routes I have so far discussed the problems of endorsing the Basic Luck Egalitarian Intuition. I claimed that the intuition couldn’t be neatly fitted into normative distinctions made in the existing literature and couldn’t be given a normative justification. I also claimed that there was a confusion as to who the luck egalitarians were and what they were fighting for, I drew a distinction between the Fundamentalist Luck Egalitarians and the Equality of Opportunity Luck Egalitarians. I have argued above that only Equality of Opportunity Luck Egalitarians offers a defensible version of luck egalitarianism. In this section, however, I will raise issues that apply to both forms of luck egalitarianism. I will argue that, even if we retain the standard luck egalitarians aim, there are different ways of achieving this aim and that the strategy they adopt is less efficient in realizing their aim than the alternative strategy I recommend.

|| 361 Ramsay M., ‘Problems with Responsibility: Why Luck Egalitarians should have Abandoned their Attempt to reconcile Equality with Responsibility’, Contemporary Political Theory, 2005, 4, p. 447.

176 | The Location of Unfairness

6.3.1 The Same Destination, Different Routes Argument As the aim of luck egalitarianism is the elimination of brute luck, the ideal luck egalitarian society is a society such that there is no difference in advantage (whatever the currency of justice adopted.) due to brute luck. There are two ways to approximate this ideal. One way is to redistribute advantages so as to correct differences in advantages that are due to brute luck. The other way to approximate the luck egalitarian ideal is to implement change at the level of opportunities available to individuals in order to minimise the impact of luck at the starting point. My argument in this section claims that, given the luck egalitarian identification of unfairness, they ought to recognise and recommend the use of both strategies. The Same Target, Different Routes Argument takes the following form: (1) The Luck Egalitarian Ideal is a society where no differences in advantage are due to brute luck. (2) One way to promote this ideal is by redistributing advantage so that people do not have less than others due to brute luck (so that we take from Y and give to X what Y has more due to luck). (3) Another way is to try to minimize the impact of luck at the starting point The first claim gives a description of the Ideal Luck Egalitarian society, given their commitment to the Basic Luck Egalitarian Intuition. The second claim states the strategy currently endorsed by luck egalitarians which focuses on compensation. The third claim suggests an alternative strategy that would prevent the occurrence of what luck egalitarians identify as unjust with the Basic Luck Egalitarian Intuition. Both strategies (2) and (3) are ways of achieving the aim in (1). Luck egalitarians thus cannot reject (3) as a possible strategy to reach their own aim.

6.3.2 Other Instrumental Benefits of Minimising Luck Choosing the reduction of brute luck over redistribution might have other advantages. First, if one gives priority to the reduction of the impact of luck at the starting point, this would be a more efficient means of achieving the luck egalitarian aim. Reducing the impact of luck would result in a lesser need for redistribution, as it would reduce the extent of inequality individuals are not respon-

Same Destination, Different Routes | 177

sible for. Choosing the reduction of brute luck’s impact on the lives of individuals would thus minimise the costs associated with redistribution. If luck egalitarians want redistribution to proceed on the basis of substantive responsibility, increasing the number of goods individuals can be held substantively responsible for should significantly reduce the extent of redistribution. Second, one possible further advantage that reducing the impact of brute luck on individuals’ lives has over redistribution is that it would be better for the recipient’s self-esteem. Elizabeth Anderson has claimed that the luck egalitarian ground for redistribution is very detrimental to the individual’s self-esteem because it implies some inferiority on her part. I am not fully convinced by the strength of Anderson’s criticism. Empirically, it might be correct to hold that some people might feel humiliated by receiving financial help from the state. However, if we held that these psychological effects were enough to stop us giving financial help, this would have very negative implications for pretty much any kind of redistribution. The actual emotional reactions of individuals shouldn’t be relevant to how we define the boundaries of justice. Moreover, in this case individuals have no reasonable ground to feel humiliated. The luck egalitarian explanation for the redistribution is that this is what is owed to individuals; redistribution restores justice. It would thus be inappropriate to feel humiliated by it. If individuals see some of their attributes as the result of brute luck (as luck egalitarians would encourage them to do), they should become less ashamed of them. They would end up regarding them as on a par with an illness, which we no longer take to be a sign of inferiority. But Anderson has argued that the specific luck egalitarian ground for compensation would be particularly problematic for the self-esteem of citizens, because luck-egalitarian redistribution is based on differences in natural and social endowments. If individuals are compensated for their lack of natural endowments in particular, they might be offended by such compensation. Anderson suggests that the compensation cheques could arrive with different insulting letters signed by an Equality Compensation Board. A letter addressed to the Stupid and Untalented would, according to her, take the following form: Unfortunately, other people don’t value the little you have to offer in the system of production. Your talents are too meagre to command much market value. Because of the misfortune that you were born so poorly endowed with talents, we, the productive ones, will

178 | The Location of Unfairness

make it up to you: we will let you share the bounty of what we have produced with our vastly superior and highly valued abilities.362

But the luck egalitarian aim is not to correct injustices generated by different natural endowments as Anderson suggests,363 but to correct the injustices created by the high social rewards that some natural endowments receive in comparison to others. This is a crucial difference: luck egalitarians can thus take the current pattern of social rewards associated with certain natural endowments as entirely contingent; they need not be committed to the view that certain natural endowments are valuable and that an individual lacking these endowments ought to be pitied. Anderson argues further that luck egalitarians can only treat the individuals at the receiving end of redistribution with pity and not even with compassion.364 But luck egalitarianism does not need to rely either on compassion or pity. It is a conception of justice, so there is already an account of what motivation might bring individuals to support luck egalitarianism; there is no need for pity or compassion. This being said, aiming at the reduction of brute luck over redistribution could nevertheless have a beneficial impact on citizens’ self-esteem. Unlike being in receipt of state redistribution, feeling appropriately proud of one’s level of advantage (because one is responsible for it) is beneficial to one’s selfesteem. Christine Sypnowich has argued along similar lines.365 This stance would not be vulnerable to the objection articulated above, because the positive feelings associated with responsibility are appropriate. It is reasonable to feel self-satisfied for being responsible for one’s actions, thoughts or level of advantage (even though it might be petty to be extremely satisfied by one’s level of advantage).

|| 362 Anderson E., ‘What is the Point of Equality’, Ethics, 1999, p. 305. 363 Anderson E., ibid., p. 313. 364 Anderson E., ibid., p. 306‒307. 365 Sypnowich writes that: ‘feeling deserving of resources – which comes from being productive – is constitutive of wellbeing just as resources themselves are.’ Sypnowich C., in Sypnowich C. (ed.), The Egalitarian Conscience: Essays in honour of G.A.Cohen, Oxford University Press, Oxford, 2006, p. 22.

Same Destination, Different Routes | 179

6.3.3 Is Redistribution instrumental to the Promotion of Responsibility? Given that luck egalitarians identify luck as the mirror concept of responsibility, I will take the reduction of luck’s occurrence to be equivalent to the promotion of conditions that would allow individuals to be responsible for their advantages. What is meant by minimizing the impact of luck at the starting point is an intervention at the level of the social structure to ensure that individuals have the opportunities to be responsible for their level of advantage. I will give a more detailed account of my understanding of responsibility later on. In 3.1 above, I have argued that minimising luck at the starting point would be instrumental to the luck egalitarian aim. But if that is the case, one might wonder if compensation would also be instrumental to the promotion of opportunities for responsibility. Consider the two following claims: A. If we increase the extent to which people have control over their lives, fewer of the things that happen to them (and differences in advantages) will be due to brute luck (thus helping to fulfil the luck egalitarian aim). B. Redistribution to minimize differences in advantages due to brute luck does not by itself promote the value of control. Claims (A) and (B) state that my preferred remedy (which is the promotion of conditions for being responsible over one’s level of advantages) can bring about the changes that are wanted by luck egalitarians while the luck egalitarian strategy of eliminating unfairness via its preferred remedy, compensation, is not likely to bring about any of the changes that my view takes to be valuable. I have already argued for A, as I have argued that one of the main advantages of my view was that the objective luck egalitarians are aiming at could be better reached via the promotion of conditions for responsibility. But let me say more about B, which claims that the luck egalitarian objective to minimise difference post-facto does not in itself bring about positive changes in terms of responsibility. First, the compensation one receives from the state isn’t itself the product of factors under one’s own control. It is in one sense a matter of brute luck – it is brute good luck that I live in a Luck Egalitarian state that compensates for my previous brute bad luck. Second, luck egalitarianism is indifferent to the overall amount of control people have over their lives; it is perfectly satisfied if what is not under control is compensated for. Where bad luck is compensated (or does not lead to differences in outcome), Luck Egalitarianism does not distinguish between differing levels of control/luck, whether absolute (how much of our lives we control) and relative (how much of my life I control com-

180 | The Location of Unfairness

pared to you). This is again quite counter-intuitive. My own view takes responsibility to be valuable and as such aims at promoting the extent to which individuals are responsible by providing appropriate institutional conditions. To sum up, redistribution fails to promote conditions of responsibility whereas the promotion of conditions for responsibility is instrumental in achieving the luck egalitarian aim. Let us now turn to consider how the luck egalitarian could respond to the argument so far.

6.4 The Luck Egalitarian Response 6.4.1 Attempting an Account of the BLEI Let us now look at what luck egalitarians could possibly say against my argument that they are bound to be committed to the minimisation of luck (i.e. the promotion of conditions for responsibility) as a possible strategy for the pursuit of their own aim, which is the absence of inequalities that do not reflect differences in responsibility. They could start by reiterating that this claim does not represent their views accurately. After all, the luck egalitarians’ ‘fundamental aim… [is] to eliminate involuntary disadvantage, not to reward voluntary effort or to redistribute benefits to the most deserving and responsible.’366 But I believe that this response is question-begging. Luck egalitarians need to give an account of why they take responsibility to matter only when it has an impact on levels of advantages and not in itself. They cannot merely assert their basic commitments – they need to explain why we should accept these commitments, given that luck egalitarians do not give any value to responsibility considered in itself. Under pressure, the luck egalitarian could nevertheless attempt to provide such a normative account by invoking the difference between negative and positive value. The luck egalitarian could thus point to the fact that she does not disvalue the lack of responsibility per se, but only the lack of responsibility when it has a negative impact on levels of advantages.

|| 366 Ramsay M., ibid., p. 447.

The Luck Egalitarian Response | 181

6.4.2 The Impact on one’s Level of Advantages Two aspects can be noted in this response. First, normative weight given to responsibility is attributed only to the extent that it has an impact on one’s level of advantages. Second, normative weight is attributed only when the impact on the level of advantages is negative or/and when there is no responsibility for disadvantages. Let us start by the first aspect of that response; the fact that normative weight is attributed to responsibility only when it has an impact on one’s relative level of advantages. If justice requires more than a narrow concern for advantage, one can reject the possibility of attributing normative weight to responsibility only when it has an impact on advantages. I will argue in section 5.2 below that justice is not only about one’s relative level of advantages: the social basis of self-respect and the kind of opportunities that are open to an individual are relevant to justice independently from the question of whether or not it has an impact on this individual’s level of advantages.

6.4.3 The Normative Distinction between Negative and Positive Value Let us now consider the second aspect of the response available to luck egalitarians; it would amount to giving a different normative weight to negative value over positive value. Luck egalitarians want responsibility-sensitive redistribution because they are concerned with those individuals who are not responsible for their disadvantageous situation. There is a normative importance in helping those who are unlucky that is not matched by the normative importance of ‘sanctioning’ those who are lucky. I believe that this is the most plausible defence of the Basic Luck Egalitarian Intuition, and the strongest objection to the claim that responsibility for one’s level of advantages is valuable. However, this claim could be understood in three different ways depending on what we identify as possessing negative value and, once again, the Basic Luck Egalitarian Intuition faces some problems. First, having less than others could be taken to possess negative value. Second, the combination of having less than others through no fault of one’s own could be taken to possess negative value. Third, not being responsible for one’s level of advantage could be taken to possess negative value. I will consider each interpretation in turn. First, attaching negative value to having less advantage than others (however this came about) is slightly puzzling. I can see ready explanations of why having less than enough (or having less than a certain threshold for a pleasant socially integrated life) could be disvaluable. But the mere fact that I have less

182 | The Location of Unfairness

than someone else does not seem to warrant such disvalue. More importantly, if we grant that having less than others is disvaluable, then we find ourselves in a conundrum. If having less than others is disvaluable, then all inequalities are disvaluable. This is, once again, not what luck egalitarians are asserting. So the problem I just raised now is that the attribution of negative value in the conjunction of having less than others through no fault of one’s own is difficult to account for. Either I attribute negative disvalue to the lack of responsibility which would entail that having responsibility over one’s goods is valuable. Or I attribute negative value to having less than others, which would attribute disvalue to all inequalities. Second, luck egalitarians could attach negative value to the combination of an absence of responsibility for relative disadvantages. But as I argued in section 2.2, it is hard to explain why we should ascribe value only to this combination of features. Third, one could take the absence of responsibility as having negative value. But then the question to be addressed is why one would attach negative value to the lack of responsibility without attaching positive value to the presence of responsibility over goods. In the case of responsibility, for our purposes, either you are responsible for your level of advantages or you are not. So it seems that attributing negative value to the absence of such responsibility would entail attributing either neutral or positive value to its opposite, responsibility. It seems intuitive to me that responsibility for one’s level of advantage should be positive. But luck egalitarians specifically reject the claim that there is positive value in being responsible for one’s level of advantages. However, they do not really explain why this should be so. Finally, luck egalitarians could point to the normative difference between the prevention of negative value and the promotion of positive value. Luck egalitarians could thus object to the move from compensation to structural changes because compensation aiming at reducing the occurrence of brute luck on the basis that this move would imply that the prevention of the negative value of an agent having fewer goods than others is normatively equivalent to the promotion of the positive value of being responsible for one’s level of advantages. Luck egalitarians could add, however, that these are not normatively equivalent. But, this is not a plausible answer for them to make, as I will argue in section 5.1 below that the structural changes I recommend in order to promote responsibility would also prevent the occurrence of the negative value of an agent having fewer goods than others. Structural changes (or the promotion of internal and external opportunities) would be able to prevent unfairness where compensation would merely try to financially alleviate its impact. So even if we

The Location of Unfairness | 183

agree with luck egalitarians that we ought to give more normative weight to the prevention of negative value over the promotion of positive value, this would still lead us to give normative priority to a structural change aiming at the promotion of responsibility. In this section I considered how luck egalitarians could try to respond to the suggestion that they ought to use the alternative strategy of minimising luck in order to achieve their official aim. I concluded that luck egalitarians couldn’t reject the suggestion that they ought to use it as an alternative strategy for their own aim, along with redistribution.

6.5 The Location of Unfairness 6.5.1 Inconsistency So far I demonstrated that luck egalitarians would find it difficult not to endorse the promotion of conditions for responsibility over goods along their strategy of compensation in order to reduce the number of unfair inequalities. It is now time to go further. I will argue next that, given the claims endorsed by luck egalitarians, it is actually inconsistent for them not to give normative priority to minimising the impact of luck at the starting point. Here is a sketch of the argument: (1) The Luck Egalitarian Ideal is a society where no differences in advantage are due to brute luck. (2) One way to promote this ideal is by redistributing advantage so that people do not have less than others due to brute luck (so that we take from Y and give to X what Y has more due to luck). (3) Another way is to try to minimize the impact of luck at the starting point. (4) Minimizing the impact of luck at the starting point, if successful, prevents the occurrence of unfairness. (5) Preventing the occurrence of unfairness is better than compensating for it. Therefore (6) Minimizing the impact of luck has normative priority over redistributing advantages.

184 | The Location of Unfairness

You might have recognised the first three claims of this argument as belonging to the Same Destination, Different Routes Argument, formulated in section 3.1 above. The society described in (1) is ideal from a luck egalitarian perspective, because there is no difference in advantage due to brute luck. The conclusion of this argument articulated in (6) above is that the strategy (3) ought to be given normative priority, so as to minimise the occurrence of unfairness. Giving normative priority to the strategy described in (3) is justified because it would prevent injustice from arising, as opposed to correcting existing unjust situations. Preventing injustices from arising is surely better than merely later correcting them. This does not require an elaborate argument. If a certain state of affairs is identified as unjust, it is better to prevent its occurrence than to compensate individuals for it. If there is an injustice that is likely to arise, the priority is to prevent its occurrence, not to try to alleviate its impact once it has happened. It would thus be inconsistent for luck egalitarians to claim the BLEI without also giving normative priority to preventing situations they themselves take to be unfair. Given that luck egalitarians take inequalities for which individuals are not responsible to be unfair, they ought to be committed to prevent these unfair situations from occurring. I do not think luck egalitarians can provide any satisfying response to this part of my argument. This is already a significant conclusion on its own, and would require luck egalitarians to substantially change their views. I do not suggest that it would be possible to entirely pre-empt injustices from occurring, but as I will explain in further detail later, this feasibility objection does not interfere with the point I am making here, which is that reducing the extent to which unfairness occurs should be given normative priority over compensation. My view also give compensation a role in justice, but even if in practice it will be used extensively, normatively, it will remain a second-best option. Compensation, on my view, has only a subsidiary role. Even though it is only a second-best remedy, there are nevertheless many cases in which compensation would be the only remedy available. Take, for example, genetic disadvantages: we are not able to reduce the extent to which genetic luck will have an impact on individual lives. I have argued that it is inconsistent for luck egalitarians not to give normative priority to interventions at the level of the social structure in order to prevent unfair inequalities. However, I would like to make a further claim: giving priority to the reduction of luck at the starting point is what justice requires.

The Location of Unfairness | 185

6.5.2 What Justice Requires: Promoting the Conditions for Responsibility 6.5.2.1 Can Luck Egalitarians adapt their views in order to fit the Same Destination, Different Routes Argument? So far I have claimed that luck egalitarians should endorse the minimisation of the impact of luck as their best strategy to prevent unfairness as they define it from occurring. But one might object that if that was all I wanted, luck egalitarians could adapt their views to accommodate the changes I suggest. Although Luck Egalitarians also sometimes claim that they wish to structure society in ways that promote opportunity and minimize brute luck, their official remedy for doing so is too narrow, as it is only the aim of preventing uncompensated inequality due to brute luck. But I want to argue here that this would not be enough. Even if Luck Egalitarians were to adopt promotion of greater responsibility, they would do so for pragmatic reasons (e.g. efficiency), not for normative reasons. They would take (i) promotion of greater responsibility and (ii) compensation for inequalities due to lack of responsibility as different means to the same end-state. But intuitively (i) should clearly have a far stronger priority, and (ii) should be a corrective measure where (i) is impossible (because already in the past, or because impracticable, etc.). Promoting control is, in this sense, only a means to this end where, logically, it should be the other way round. Redistribution should be there as a subsidiary mechanism when our ability to promote responsibility has failed to equalize luck.

6.5.2.2 The Correct Normative Account of the Basic Luck Egalitarian Intuition Recall that brute luck covered everything that was not under my control, including the actions of others. Recall also that what is under my control corresponds to what I am responsible for (I will say more about my understanding of responsibility later on). Whereas luck egalitarians claim that it is bad if people lack certain advantages due to no fault of their own, they do not want to commit themselves to the claim that it is good for individuals to be responsible for their advantages. But, I claimed, this is highly implausible. I will argue now that the only way to give a normative explanation of the Basic Luck Egalitarian Intuition (on the Equality of Opportunity Luck Egalitarian interpretation of it) is to invoke the intrinsic value of autonomy/responsibility – and thus also to endorse the claim that being responsible for one’s level of advantages is valuable. Recall that I argued in section 2 that the most plausible interpretation of the BLEI was the one put forward by those I called the Equality of Opportunity Luck Egalitarians – those luck egalitarians who take the BLEI not to exhaust claims

186 | The Location of Unfairness

about unfairness. I will now focus on their interpretation of the BLEI (see (1) below) and suggests a possible account to explain it (2): (1) It’s bad (in one way) if people do not have things due to factors they are not responsible for. (2) It’s good (in one way) that what people have is entirely due to factors they are responsible for. Luck Egalitarianism presupposes (1) but not (2). For, in principle, it might claim that it’s neutral/indifferent that what people have is due to their own responsibility. I argued so far that even if luck egalitarians were not ready to endorse (2) above, they would still need to give normative priority to the aim I suggest they should endorse – the promotion of opportunities for responsibility over goods – because adopting this as an aim is instrumental to pre-empting situations they themselves describe as unfair from arising (such as (1)). I claimed that once unfairness has been identified, it is hard to reject the claim that we ought to give normative priority to pre-empt the occurrence of unfairness over the provision of financial compensation for it retrospectively. I want to go further now. If unfairness is identified as the interference of luck, the reduction of luck and the promotion of its mirror concept of responsibility should be the central aim of our theory of justice. I have claimed that the best way to achieve a reduction in luck’s interference in individuals’ lives was to focus on change at the institutional level, so as to increase the internal and external opportunities available. There are different things that could be said about the relationship between (1) and (2) above. A side issue would be that (1) might not fully address one of the conservative objections that partly motivate luck egalitarianism. Recall that one of the conservative objections was that egalitarians fail to properly value responsibility. If luck egalitarians stop at (1) but do not endorse (2), as they presently do, they merely disvalue the lack of responsibility when it results in inequalities, but they still fail to value responsibility as such. If they were committed to (2), they would be in a better position to fully address the conservative objection. More importantly for our purposes, however, it’s just implausible that (1) is true but (2) isn’t. It rather seems that (1) is true because (2) is true. I have earlier dismissed the possibility that this could be explained in terms of the badness of inequalities (given that luck egalitarians explicitly distance themselves from that claim). I have also shown that no other plausible normative justification of (1) seems available.

The Location of Unfairness | 187

This insight hasn’t been entirely overlooked by political philosophers working in this area. For example, Scheffler asserts that luck egalitarians are committed to giving a more fundamental role to desert. This suggests that Scheffler might share my view on the inconsistency of the Basic Luck Egalitarian Intuition.367 Arneson similarly claims that he suspects that responsibility matters for its own sake.368

6.5.2.3 Location of Unfairness and What Justice Requires I have argued above that explaining (1) in terms of (2) re-establishes the direction of explanation in the right order. But I have only hinted at what was implied by (2). There are different ways to account for (2). On one account, being responsible for one’s advantage is valuable because this corresponds to what social justice requires. On the other account, being responsible for one’s advantage is valuable because it contributes to the good life of the individual who has the advantages. I will endorse both of these accounts, but I will focus for now on the former account. On this account, it is fair or just for individuals to be responsible for their levels of advantages. This has fundamental implications for what unfairness is. Recall that I claimed that I was going to argue against the luck egalitarian location of unfairness. The luck egalitarian location of unfairness is in the relative deprivation of advantages through no fault of one’s own. What my suggestion amounts to is the endorsement of a different location of unfairness: on my account, unfairness is located in the very interference of luck in an individual’s life. In other words, if we identify unfairness as the interference of luck within our lives, we ought to give priority to the promotion of conditions for individual responsibility, because only this would truly be fair. If some individuals are disadvantaged through no fault of their own, the primary unfairness here is not that they have to bear these negative consequences but that they were not being responsible for these factors in the first place. When I say ‘primary’, I mean ‘fundamental’ in the explanatory sense of what explains the normative disvalue of a certain state of affairs.369 This point might once again sound purely theoretical, but it has very important implications. In order to test the impact of this re-location of unfairness, we || 367 Scheffler S., Boundaries and Allegiances, p. 174. 368 Arneson R., ‘Debate: Equality of Opportunity for Welfare Defended and Recanted’, The Journal of Political Philosophy, vol. 7, n. 4, 1999, p. 497. 369 It does not mean that it is always the most important thing that individuals care about. Individuals might care more about the amount of advantages they have.

188 | The Location of Unfairness

should now see if its implications are intuitive. Take the example of an individual who chooses her profession in a set of circumstances in which she has very few opportunities – she was born unlucky in such a way that limited her options in life. The unfairness is not only in her having a lower income than another person, it is located in her not having had certain opportunities in the first place. It is unfair that luck had such an impact in her life that it deprived her of the ability to make a real choice. When it pertains to the opportunities that are available to individuals, it seems quite instinctive that unfairness does not occur only when an individual has less than another. I might end up enjoying the same level of advantages as you do, but if it were the case that my set of opportunities was narrower or less qualitatively good than yours, it is still unfair. My location of unfairness is the result of the arguments I developed in two previous sections. In section 1.2.3, I argued that some aspects of our lives couldn’t be compensated financially. In section 5.1 above, I argued that the prevention of unfairness was better than retrospective attempts to alleviate its impact. The point I am making here is that, given that some aspects of our lives cannot be compensated financially, justice requires from us that we prevent unfairness rather than attempt to compensate for it. This is so merely because if these aspects, such as opportunities, cannot be compensated, any attempt to do so would be less than what justice requires. This is why justice requires that we give normative priority to the prevention of unfairness by intervening at the level of the social structure. It seems that this would make us lean towards Equality of Opportunity Luck Egalitarians. But Equality of Opportunity Luck Egalitarians still identify themselves by using the BLEI as in (1) whereas I argued that they ought to endorse the more fundamental claim stated in (2). These luck egalitarians have not truly understood the role they give to responsibility and the absence of role equality has in their account.370 Moreover, unlike my suggestion here, they are far from claiming that one should attempt to change social structure so as to allow for that goal to be reached. Finally, I will later distinguish myself further from them by endorsing another account of (2) above, which appeals to its prudential value (See section 7.3).

|| 370 Recall for instance that Lippert-Rasmussen ranked as the Best State of Affairs a situation in which equality reflected equal exercise of responsibility. A Second-Best State of Affairs, according to him, obtained when inequalities reflected differential responsibility. This order does not seem to grant the point that equality, given the Equality of Opportunity Luck Egalitarian Interpretation does not have any role and only responsibility does. Lippert-Rasmussen K., ‘Egalitarianism, Option Luck and Responsibility’, Ethics, 2001, p. 576.

The Location of Unfairness | 189

6.5.3 Justice Requires Structural Changes I have argued in the previous section that luck egalitarians should stop taking responsibility to be normatively relevant only when it is associated with inequalities of advantages and hold responsibility to be valuable independently from its impact on relative welfare. Once we do so, we locate unfairness as the interference of luck in one’s life and it follows from that commitment that we ought to prevent such unfairness from occurring. In other words, I have argued that justice requires that one gives normative priority to the promotion of conditions for responsibility. I need to sketch in further detail what kind of structural changes I have in mind. Recall that I took the reduction of luck’s impact on individual’s lives to be equivalent to the promotion of conditions that would allow individuals to be responsible for their advantages. Now I take the promotion of conditions for responsibility (see below) to be best achieved through intervention at the level of the social structure. I will here relate the extent to which my claim that this is what justice requires relate to similar arguments that have been made in the literature. Luck egalitarians’ exclusive focus on distribution has already raised some worries.371 I am certainly not the only one to press for a change of direction towards more focus on structural change in the egalitarian agenda: both Iris Marion Young and Elizabeth Anderson have done so. Young argues towards the abandonment of what she calls ‘the distributive paradigm’ of justice, in order to endorse a conception of justice that would be more focused on structure and institutions.372 Some of the specific institutional features she addresses are decision-making (by which citizens can truly contribute to political decision-making) and division of labour (by which tasks are defined as belonging to a specific job), both features that are taken for granted by luck egalitarians. More importantly for our purposes, Young, along with Andrew Mason, has also expressed concern about the impact of cultural and social norms on individuals’ opportunities, which luck egalitarians do not even consider. As an instance of social norms powerful shaping individuals’ opportunities, one could give the example of a woman socialised to believe that she

|| 371 Scheffler argues that luck egalitarians are misguided in their belief that equality is an essentially distributive ideal. Scheffler S., ‘What is Egalitarianism?’ Philosophy and Public Affairs, 31, 1, (2003), 27 372 Young I.M, Justice and the Politics of Difference, Princeton University Press, New Jersey, 1990, p. 15‒22.

190 | The Location of Unfairness

ought to be the primary carer for her children.373 Iris Marion Young has thus argued that opportunity should be conceived as an enablement: ‘evaluating social justice must involve evaluating not a distributive outcome but the social structures that enable or constrain the individuals in relevant situations.’374 This enablement has many aspects, and we cannot conceive of opportunities just in terms of the material resources that a person has, even though it is an important determinant of the opportunities one has.375 Anderson has also argued in favour of looking beyond income and resources to consider factors that are included in the broader agendas of actual egalitarian movements. She points to the importance of providing what Rawls has called the social basis of self-respect.376 On Anderson’s view, it is crucial to fight damages to self-esteem that are rooted in prejudicial treatment and in demeaning stereotypes against certain individuals. In other words, Anderson is clearly committed to the claim that there is much more to fairness than redistribution and that excluding these other factors from consideration is a big mistake.377 Anderson urges egalitarians to focus on structural issues that pertain to the real opportunities that individuals have, as she insists on fairness of treatment and the important impact it has on individuals’ lives. Both Iris Marion Young and Elizabeth Anderson have claimed that it is necessary to focus on institutional change over redistribution. The novelty of my argument, if novelty there is, lies in its claim that the endorsement of this new aim is required by the Basic Luck Egalitarian Intuition, as I demonstrated it in section 5 above. The argument is thus not only, as others have argued, that changes at the level of the social and institutional structure is a better strategy, or even a more appropriate strategy if we are concerned with social justice (although I have argued specifically for this claim in this section). It is that, given the endorsement of the Basic Luck Egalitarian Intuition, it is inconsistent for luck egalitarians not to endorse this aim (as I argued in section 5.1).

|| 373 Mason A., ‘Equality, Personal Responsibility and Gender Socialization’, Proceedings of the Aristotelian Society 100, 2000, p. 227‒246. 374 Young I.M, ibid., p. 26. 375 Young I.M., ibid., p. 41. 376 Some might object here that the social basis of self-respect could be an object of redistribution even in a Rawlsian perspective. But this would be missing the non-distributive nature of an intervention that would focus on establishing the so-called social basis of self-respect. 377 Anderson E., ‘What is the Point of Equality’, p. 288.

The Location of Unfairness | 191

6.5.4 An Account of Responsibility We have so far identified responsibility as having explanatory value for the luck egalitarian intuition. If it is correct to assume that responsibility has this explanatory value for the luck egalitarian intuition, then it suggests that the value of responsibility is more fundamental in our assessment of justice than the resulting inequalities in the level of advantages. There are different accounts of responsibility that could be used. The aim of this chapter is not to debate the various strengths and weakness of the different accounts of responsibility that have been put forward. I will endorse parts of McKenna’s account, because I find it particularly persuasive. However, I will complement it with some further conditions. On his view, responsibility is constituted by the satisfaction of epistemic and control conditions.378 The first condition is epistemic; a certain degree of information and knowledge is necessary for being responsible. On McKenna’s account, the epistemic conditions that are necessary for an individual to be responsible for an action include all the information relevant to the choice in question.379 The second condition is about control; it describes the ability to keep in check irrational impulses (such as addictive cravings)380 and the ability to control one’s physical movements. The epistemic conditions would include rational capacity and knowledge of the information relevant to the choice, but also an awareness and control of the social pressures and the psychological biases that inform us. The fulfilment of these two conditions is important normatively because it indicates that I use my rational and psychological powers in an adequate way. But I do not think that the conditions that McKenna identifies are sufficient for individual responsibility. Both the conditions he describes point to what I will call internal opportunities, which identify properly agential responsibility but is not appropriate to account for responsibility over goods.381 For an agent to have responsibility over goods, another set of conditions needs to be present, namely social and economic opportunities. Without those, no matter how

|| 378 Philip Pettit’s account also include epistemic and control conditions. Pettit P., ‘Responsibility Incorporated’, Ethics, 117, 2007, p. 171‒201, p. 175. 379 McKenna M., ‘The Relationship between Autonomous and Morally Responsible Agency’, in Taylor J.S., Personal Autonomy: New Essays, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, p. 205‒235, p. 209. 380 McKenna, ibid., p. 208. 381 For more on the distinction between agential responsibility and responsibility for goods, see Stemplowska M., ‘Making Justice sensitive to Responsibility’, Political Studies, vol. 57, issue 2, 2009, p. 237.

192 | The Location of Unfairness

knowledgeable and in control you are of your body and mind, you will just not be able to go to the Oxbridge school that allows you to fulfil your dream career of becoming a lawyer. I will refer to both the epistemic and control conditions and the socio-economic opportunities as internal and external opportunities for short.382

6.5.5 The Practice of Responsibility Promotion An agent is responsible for something if he enjoys both external opportunities (I take this category to include legal and economic opportunities) and internal opportunities (which include the relevant psychological capacities, specifically, meeting the epistemic and control conditions). I think that it is relatively easy to figure out what needs to be done to promote economic opportunities. However, I need to specify what kind of institutional conditions would be beneficial to the promotion of the epistemic and control conditions for responsibility. Some institutional conditions would increase the opportunities for individuals to fulfil the epistemic and control conditions. These institutional provisions would include sufficient opportunities for education and selfdevelopment; wide access to psychological techniques for self-control and decision-making; the use of choice architecture383 by insurance companies. Providing sufficient opportunities for education and self-development would require the public funding of educational projects not only restricted to children but that would target adults as well, allowing for individuals to train themselves in other sets of skills. But this would also require opportunities to access free and reliable information on diverse topics, aside from these specific training programs. With respect to the control conditions, some of them are already adequately protected by our currently existing legal system. For instance, the ability to control my body requires that some laws prevent others from interfering with my actions. However, much more need to be said about the more subtle opportunities to ensure that individuals gain control over their own minds. Efficient techniques for better psychological control have already been developed and || 382 This being said, one shouldn’t assume that the epistemic and control conditions correspond to the internal opportunities as control conditions require the absence of external interference to one’s bodily actions. Some external opportunities are thus necessary for the control conditions of responsibility to be upheld. 383 Sunstein C.R. and Thaler R.H., Nudge: Improving Decisions about Health, Wealth and Happiness, Yale University Press, New Haven, 2008.

The Luck Egalitarian Response | 193

should be more widespread than they currently are. By that I do not mean only that they should be available and advertised but that some state institutions should use them to influence for the better individuals’ behaviour. This is where choice architecture comes in. Choice architecture is the expression used by Sunstein and Thaler in Nudge to refer to the design of choice options, that is the setting in which choices are made. According to them, a choice architect has the responsibility for organising the context in which people make decisions. These techniques of choice architecture are based on research in behavioural economics, which focuses on different non-relevant factors that have nevertheless a strong impact on our decision-making procedures. Such non-relevant factors include the saliency of costs, extremities aversion, the specification of the default option, the status quo bias and the mental accounting that we use to make decisions. Given that we are influenced by different psychological biases, choice architecture could be very helpful in giving us a hand in making better decisions.384 I believe that these techniques could be used more widely than they currently are and that they would be beneficial to responsibility to the extent that they improve the information of the agent about the available options.

6.6 The Luck Egalitarian Response 6.6.1 The Good Luck Objection I earlier argued for claim (1) and (2) below. If you endorse these two claims, as I have argued you should, then (3) follows: given the same level of advantages, it is bad in one way, if one person wasn’t in control of most of the factors that led her to have a certain level of advantages. (1) It’s bad (in one way) if people do not have things due to factors they are not responsible for. (2) It’s good (in one way) that what people have is entirely due to factors they are responsible for.

|| 384 Sunstein and Thaler discuss ways in which we could mitigate the effects of some biases to enable individuals to make decisions that are not driven by these biases. See Sunstein C.R. and Thaler R.H., ibid., p. 83.

194 | The Location of Unfairness

Therefore (3) Thus it is bad (in one way) if due to brute luck, I have more than I would have had due purely to my agency. The Good Luck objection concerns the counterintuitive nature of (3). In cases in which the individual is not responsible for a factor that makes her life go best, that is in cases of good luck, it might seem counter-intuitive to claim that the occurrence of luck in her life is bad. This is so because good luck is something not to be regretted and there is a tendency to associate unfairness with something negative. However, to say that something is unjust is just to say that it is in one way bad, it does not mean that it is all things considered bad. We might thus say that it is unfair for an agent to have more than what she is responsible for. This would not entail that her high level of welfare is altogether a bad thing. It is good for people to have a high level of well-being. There is no contradiction in the acknowledgement that luck can be in one way good because it benefits the agent and increase her level of advantage, and in another way bad, because her ending up better off than others without being responsible for it is unfair. However, I would like to claim further that it is also bad in another way. I believe not only that it is unfair for someone to enjoy advantages that one is not responsible for, but that there is something bad about not being responsible for one’s level of advantage. Being responsible for one’s level of advantages indicates that one has had certain opportunities and has exercised one’s own ability to make choices. Surely these choices might sometimes be bad choices, but such responsibility nevertheless indicates that there has been an exercise of autonomy (I return to this in section 7.3). The lottery winner might be justified in not feeling regret for having won the lottery. Despite not being responsible for her level of advantages, from her point of view, winning the lottery is all things considered a good occurrence. But if we had to compare two different counterfactual situations, one in which the individual in question wins the lottery and one in which she is responsible for a similar amount of advantages, I do not think it would be absurd to believe that the latter state of affairs is better. She might prefer it too.

6.6.2 The Feasibility Objection If the identification of unfairness is in the occurrence of luck itself, then the aim of egalitarians should be to reduce the interference of luck with people’s lives. The claim that the aim should be the elimination of luck could be greeted by the objection that this amounts to aiming for the impossible. This might be one rea-

Responsibility | 195

son why luck egalitarians might not be willing to identify unfairness as located in the interference of luck: luck is never going to disappear. There is nothing that can be done politically to erase brute luck from the face of the earth, so this aim ought not to detain our attention any further. I will respond to that line of attack by conceding that some degree of luck might not be eliminable but by pointing out that there is still much that social institutions can do to reduce the interference of brute luck in an individual’s life. Surely, not being able to achieve ideal fairness should not prevent us from trying our best to approximate this ideal. For example, the provision of free good quality education to all cannot be considered to be the equivalent of redistribution, as the public provision of good quality education pre-empts the extent to which luck (such as the wealth of one’s parents) has an impact on individuals’ lives.

6.7 Responsibility 6.7.1 Two thought experiments I will present two thought experiments designed to show the intuitive force of claiming that responsibility is prudentially good. The first thought experiment will be an application of Parfit’s Levelling Down argument. The second thought experiment would encourage us to conceive of a parallel world in which no responsible agent exists.

6.7.1.1 Levelling down One way of eliciting our intuitions about the value of responsibility would be to use a version of the Levelling Down argument. I will start by briefly describing Derek Parfit’s original thought experiment and then use it to show what kind of value is attributed to responsibility. Parfit famously designed a thought experiment to test our intuitions about the intrinsic value of equality – the Levelling Down Argument.385 Take society X divided into two groups, one having more resources than the other. If we thought that equality was intrinsically valuable, we would think that the shift from society X to society Y is in one way good, where both groups have as little as the previously poorer group had. The excess that the richer

|| 385 Parfit D., ‘Equality and Priority’, Ratio, vol. 10, no. 3, 1997.

196 | The Location of Unfairness

group had in society X has not been redistributed but has been removed altogether. Nobody is better off in terms of resources in society Y, but there is equality. The point raised by the Levelling Down objection relies on the intuition that there is no respect in which society Y is better than society X.386 Many egalitarians would agree that it might be better not to level down, because they are concerned not only with equality but also with utility, etc. But if one further claims that society Y is in no way better than society X, it seems that there is no intrinsic value to equality as such. In order to test whether responsibility has some independent value, one might use a slightly revised version of the Levelling Down Argument. Take two societies. Society X contains two groups with sharp inequalities between them. Group B is poorer than Group A. Take Society Y in which there are also two groups A’ and B’ but they both have the same level of advantages which corresponds to the lower level of advantage of the group B in Society X. Now let us imagine that we level down society X into society Y, in which both Group A’ and Group B’ have the same level of advantage, which was previously the lower level of advantages enjoyed in society X by Group B only. However, in society Y, every individual is responsible for her level of advantages. In other words, levelling down corresponds to a responsibility-sensitive distribution. However, in this thought experiment, there is no redistribution, only the disappearance of the previous excess of advantages that were enjoyed by Group A in Society X. The first reaction with respect to this levelling down is to claim that it is overall bad. Levelling down entails a worsening of the situation of a whole group without benefiting anyone. However, I believe that, unlike the original Levelling Down Argument, we could say here that there is some respect in which society Y is better because it is responsibility-sensitive. One might not conclude that levelling down is vindicated in this case, as it might still be the case that all things considered, it is better not to level down. But, in order to show that responsibility over advantages is in one way good, it is enough to show that levelling down here is in one way good.

6.7.1.2 Parallel Worlds This intuition about the value of responsibility can also be elicited using the example of a parallel world. Imagine a world in which individuals would not be responsible for anything they did, including their own resources. It is not that the relationship between actions and outcomes would not follow some predict-

|| 386 Parfit D., ibid., p. 211.

Responsibility | 197

able patterns. It is rather that, in this parallel world, there is no sense in which someone could be said to be an agent, to the extent that we take agents to be responsible for their actions. This world seems less valuable than a world in which responsibility – and responsibility over advantages – does exist. Even in cases in which individuals have to endure excruciating suffering, a world in which individuals endure such suffering without any responsibility for it is considerably worse. These two thought experiments aim to show that there is intuitive force to the claim that responsibility is valuable in itself. I will now attempt to briefly sketch an account of this value.

6.7.2 ‘She did it her way’ or the Prudential Value of Responsibility I have claimed so far that there was a fundamental problem with the Basic Luck Egalitarian Intuition (See (1) below) and I have claimed that, in order to justify it, one ought to endorse the more general claim that responsibility over goods is valuable (See (2) below). Recall the two claims I examined in section 5.2: (1) It’s bad (in one way) if people do not have things due to factors they are not responsible for. (2) It’s good (in one way) that what people have is entirely due to factors they are responsible for. I have argued above that justice is one plausible ground for (2). However, I want to defend the view that (2) can also be accounted for in terms of prudential value. The first way of grounding (2) claims that a responsibility-sensitive redistribution is just and thus valuable. If my arguments so far are correct, luck egalitarians are thus committed to a redistribution that is responsibility-sensitive and thus to the claim that it is valuable to be responsible over one’s advantages because this is just (as it corresponds to a responsibility-sensitive redistribution). I have claimed further that Equality of Opportunity Luck Egalitarians need to make their commitment to the value of responsibility explicit. I will therefore discuss now the second ground for claiming that responsibility is valuable, which is that being responsible for one’s advantages is good for the individual herself (and this will differentiate me further from Equality of Opportunity Luck Egalitarians). I will take the value of being responsible over one’s advantage to be merely a specific token of the value of being more generally responsible over different elements of one’s life. Given that I mentioned that

198 | The Location of Unfairness

responsibility is valuable in itself, one way of accounting for that would be to claim that responsibility is itself one of the goods in our Objective List. However, I do not think that this is the correct way to think about the value of responsibility. A better way of accounting for what is at play in our valuing responsibility over advantages is to invoke the value of autonomy. This view would take the value of responsibility to derive from the value of autonomy, which is one of the goods on my Objective List (See chapter 2). Autonomy is a necessary component of responsibility. Thus although autonomy is more fundamental than responsibility, it would be misleading to claim that responsibility is merely instrumentally valuable. Rather, responsibility is valuable because of its constitutive relation to autonomy. On this view, having control over goods, states of mind, relationships and activities is inherently valuable. More fundamentally, this means that by having responsibility over my life; I own it. The interference of luck in an individual’s life is itself bad, whatever the consequences this luck has in one’s life, because it interferes with one’s ability to control one’s life. In other words, luck interferes with agential powers. If one focuses on agential loss, the value of responsibility is not only accounted for because it is fair; it is accounted for because it is good for the individual who retains agential powers. Moreover, and unlike fairness, a loss of agential powers is disvaluable absolutely and not only relatively speaking. To repeat: on this view, the interference of luck in an individual’s life is itself bad, whatsoever the consequences this luck has in ones’ life, because it interferes with the individual’s ability to control one’s life. Let us illustrate this by taking the example of Farrah and Farrid. They both enjoy the same level of advantages which is much lower than the average. Let us assume that their basic needs are satisfied. While Farrah is responsible for her relatively low well-being, Farrid isn’t responsible for his relatively low wellbeing. We might deplore the fact that they are both relatively deprived, but we will certainly find that there is something fair about Farrah getting what she is responsible for. The reason why we think Farrah’s situation is fair but not Farrid’s might have to do partly with the fact that she is responsible for what she has. However, something else could be said about Farrah. She lived her life and, even if she might be unhappy about the result, she is responsible for her life. And her life, on an Ethical Perfectionist account, is better for that, as she engaged with the good of autonomy to a demanding level. She ‘did it her way’.

Conclusion | 199

6.8 Conclusion I started this chapter by formulating some of the basic commitments of luck egalitarians. I claimed that despite a lack of consensus on many matters, luck egalitarians agree on the location of unfairness and the remedy appropriate to this unfairness. I captured their view with the Basic Luck Egalitarian Intuition, which states that it is unfair for someone to have less than others through no fault of her own. According to luck egalitarians, the remedy appropriate for such unfairness is compensation through redistribution. I then considered different objections to using compensation as the main remedy against unfairness. First, in some cases, compensation until the luck egalitarian aim is reached would lead to a state of shared misery. Second, there are some forms of unfairness for which compensation is not an appropriate remedy, as it fails to give proper attention to the nature of the unfairness in question. I next considered the Basic Luck Egalitarian Intuition and claimed that it was problematic given that it identified a combination of features as normatively relevant but failed to give an appropriate normative account for the significance of this combination of features. I pointed to the difficulty in mapping the luck egalitarian position onto some key distinctions discussed in the existing literature and I claimed that this was probably due to the implausibility of the Basic Luck Egalitarian Intuition. I distinguished between two possible interpretations of the Basic Luck Egalitarian Intuition which corresponded to two kinds of luck egalitarianism. On one hand, Fundamentalist Luck Egalitarians take the BLEI to exhausts claims of unfairness, but I argued that this view is inconsistent and lack a normative ground. On the other hand, Equality of Opportunity Luck Egalitarians do not take the BLEI to exhausts claims of unfairness. Equality of Opportunity Luck Egalitarians, I argued, could provide some normative account for their view, but are committed to advocating the creation of new inequalities, if this corresponds more closely to differentials of responsibility. I then moved on to consider the Same Destination, Different Routes Argument which started from the very aim endorsed by luck egalitarians – the elimination of unfairness as identified by the Basic Luck Egalitarian Intuition. I argued that reducing the occurrence of luck at the starting point would be instrumental to reaching the aim identified by luck egalitarians themselves. I took the reduction of luck to require certain changes at the level of the social and institutional structure in order to promote internal and external opportunities for advantages.

200 | The Location of Unfairness

Confronted with the possibility that luck egalitarians would dig their heels and reassert their commitments to be limited to the Basic Luck Egalitarian Intuition, I argued that they needed to give it some grounding. However, after considering the possibility that luck egalitarians would invoke the normative difference between negative and positive value, I claimed that this response was not available to them, as changes at the level of the social and institutional structure can prevent the occurrence of what luck egalitarians identify as having negative value. I then went further and claimed that it was inconsistent for luck egalitarians to use redistribution as the main remedy for injustice, given their identification of the location of unfairness. I argued that, even if luck egalitarians reject everything else I claim in this chapter, they must agree with me that, once they identify a certain state of affairs as unfair, they ought to give normative priority to pre-empting this state of affairs over trying to remedy to it after the fact with financial compensation. This conclusion is independent from further claims I made in this chapter and, I think, resistant to any luck egalitarian objection, as it is grounded in the Basic Luck Egalitarian Intuition itself and in a claim that would be difficult to dispute (namely that if unfairness is identified as x, one ought to pre-empt x from occurring instead of trying to compensate for it). Luck egalitarians thus ought to adopt as an aim the reduction of the interference of luck on individual’s lives (or the promotion of internal and external opportunities for responsibility over goods). This is so, even if they stick to their own aim, because the promotion of internal and external opportunities for responsibility over goods would be instrumental to achieving this luck egalitarian aim. The promotion of internal and external opportunities for responsibility would lead us to pre-empt sources of unfairness and this isn’t feasible through compensation. I then claimed that justice requires us to give normative priority to the promotion of internal and external opportunities for responsibility over goods over redistribution. I argued that this was so because of the limits of compensation. Compensation just cannot correct every instance of injustice. I gave the example of differences in opportunities and argued that such differences didn’t need to result in differences in levels of advantages to be unjust. I further argued that such differences couldn’t be rectified by compensation; only the promotion of internal and external opportunities could pre-empt such situations. Luck egalitarians take a state of affairs in which an individual has less than others through no fault of her own to be bad but they fail to take a state of affairs in which the agent is responsible for the level of advantages she has to be good. I claimed that, if there was some truth to the Basic Luck Egalitarian Intui-

Conclusion | 201

tion, it was probably explained by the more general statement that it is good if individuals were responsible for the level of advantages they enjoyed. Two objections were then considered. The first objection was the Good Luck Objection. This objection claimed that if an individual benefited from luck, this is not to be regretted and thus it seemed wrong to claim that good luck was, in one way, bad. I argued that this objection was mistaken. Second, the Feasibility Objection stated that, given that it wasn’t possible to completely eliminate luck from the face of the earth, it was futile to even try. I argued that even though some sources of luck might be impossible to eliminate, other sources of luck could (and should) be eliminated by the appropriate social and institutional changes I suggested. I gave my own account of responsibility which included some of the conditions given by McKenna for agential responsibility. McKenna’s account identifies two sets of conditions as necessary for responsibility: control conditions and epistemic conditions. Given that luck egalitarians focus on responsibility over advantages, I decided to add a further condition: the presence of social and economic opportunities to these advantages. With this account, a commitment to promote responsibility over advantages would amount to the promotion of both internal and external opportunities. Finally, I made a further suggestion. I presented two thought experiments to show that responsibility is valuable in itself. I then looked at some arguments that could support the claim that responsibility is valuable in this way. On the one hand, responsibility over goods is valuable because it is just. On the other hand, responsibility over goods is valuable because it is good for the individual. In the later case, I argued that the value of responsibility derives from one of the intrinsically valuable goods, autonomy, as autonomy is constitutive of responsibility. Responsibility is, in other words, valuable in itself but this value is explained in terms of autonomy being a constitutive feature of responsibility. It is important to bear in mind that the more constructive parts of the argument presented in this chapter are in no way necessary for the earlier critical part. In other words, my argument charging luck egalitarianism with inconsistency could stand even one disagrees with my claim that responsibility over goods is valuable not only because this corresponds to the demands of justice, but also because this is prudentially good.

7 Conclusion I have developed in this book a prima facie argument in favour of liberal perfectionism. However, I suspect that this prima facie argument might fail for pragmatic reasons to recommend political perfectionism, when we need to decide which instantiations of the goods we ought to protect and promote. In non-ideal conditions, there might be too much disagreement on which particular goods we ought to protect and promote. But let me turn now to explain some of the distinctive features of my defence of liberal perfectionism.

7.1 Three Distinctive Features Three features of my book might be surprising as they differ from other defences of Political Perfectionism. First, I devote quite a bit of space to discuss Ethical Perfectionism. Second, I focus on building a positive case in favour of Political Perfectionism instead of discussing the objections that have been raised against it. Third, an entire chapter is devoted to a discussion of luck egalitarianism. Let me now explain each of these features in turn.

7.1.1 Ethical Perfectionism First, quite a substantial part of my book is devoted to discussing Ethical Perfectionism. This might seem odd, as Political Perfectionism is often considered independently from its ethical foundations. But I argue that Political Perfectionism is necessarily based on a perfectionist ethical theory. Political Perfectionism presupposes the endorsement of Ethical Perfectionism, but the reverse isn’t true: the endorsement of Ethical Perfectionism does not require the endorsement of Political Perfectionism. This is so, because one may endorse an ethical theory yet still believe that it is not the proper role of the state to enforce an ethical theory on its citizens – this is indeed the view held by the proponents of neutrality.387 Moreover, the discussion of Ethical Perfectionism allows me to specify the kind of perfectionism we are talking about. There is a wide variety of perfectionism, and different forms of Ethical Perfectionism will ground very different forms of Political Perfectionism. Moreover, some forms of Ethical Per|| 387 Although PP isn’t implied by EP, I have argued that the step from EP to PP is a small one, and that EP gives strong prima facie reasons to endorse PP.

Three Distinctive Features | 203

fectionism are counter-intuitive and should thus not be used to ground Political Perfectionism. Specifying Ethical Perfectionism in a more attractive way provides a more plausible basis for Political Perfectionism. Once we have selected an appropriate basis for Political Perfectionism, some of the objections against Political Perfectionism can be rejected fairly easily.

7.1.2 Positive Arguments Second, I focus on developing positive arguments instead of discussing objections to perfectionism. Here again my approach differs from the norm in that it focuses on establishing a positive case for Political Perfectionism. However I believe that not enough attention has been paid to constructing such positive argument. As a result of this lack in the existing literature on perfectionism, perfectionism is often assumed to be a strange, slightly suspicious view. Political Perfectionists might be suspected of either being religious zealots, prudish bigots or conservative extremists. I believe that this is due to the lack of exposure to the very intuitive arguments in favour of the most plausible forms of Political Perfectionism. Building a case in favour of Political Perfectionism (as well as specifying Ethical Perfectionism in a way that can ground a plausible version of Political Perfectionism) is thus important to restore legitimacy to the view. Finally, provided that these arguments are convincing, they allow us to shift the burden of argument to the neutralist liberal. I focused in chapter 4 and 5 on examining in detail the strength of several prima facie arguments in favour of perfectionism. The main objection to these ‘prima facie’ arguments is that they are ‘prima facie’ only; there might be further reasons that would nevertheless support the view that the state should stop at the negative protection of interests. I do not deny that there might be such reasons, but my main aim in this book is to clarify and defend the main positive case in favour of perfectionism, not to consider various objections against it. An exaggerated focus on various worries against perfectionism can make us lose sight of the considerations that make it attractive in the first place. Throughout the book, I consider and try to address various worries against perfectionism. But since I do not have space here to consider such worries in a comprehensive way, the case I offer in favour of liberal perfectionism is, in this respect, incomplete.

204 | Conclusion

7.1.3 Luck Egalitarianism The chapter on luck egalitarianism is motivated first by the assumption that perfectionism is not compatible with social justice. I have qualified the political perfectionism I recommend here in such a way as to make it compatible with a concern for social justice. The perfectionism I recommend is broad in that it only promotes goods accessible to everyone (see chapter 3, section 1). Moreover, I suggest that it can give priority to the prevention of negative value (in chapter 3, section 5). Finally, non-exclusive Political Perfectionism can integrate other principles, such as principles of justice (see chapter 3, section 1). Despite these qualifications, I thought it would still be important to discuss in more detail what conception of social justice could be held by a perfectionist – an important task, given that some might think that Political Perfectionism has nothing useful to say about justice. Moreover, the final chapter allowed me to demonstrate how Political Perfectionism could be a relevant point of view for diverse areas of contemporary political philosophy. The critical element of the chapter on luck egalitarianism is not necessarily perfectionist, but its constructive element is distinctly perfectionist, as it relies on taking autonomy to be intrinsically valuable. I try to show how some of our independent intuitions about justice might be best accounted for in terms of the Objective List conception of well-being.

7.2 Objections I have now explained in what ways and why my defence of perfectionism differs from other defences of perfectionism. While doing so, I pointed out that an adequate specification of Political Perfectionism allows us to pre-empt many objections against it. But I did not consider a range of other objections often levelled against perfectionism. This is largely for reasons of space, but also because some of these objections have been discussed by others. It might nevertheless be useful to end this book by reviewing some of these key objections, showing why I do not think they present a serious threat to perfectionism, as well as how my account of perfectionism makes it easier to resist them.

7.2.1 Autonomy There have been many objections against Political Perfectionism, so much so that one of the aims of this book was to allay a general suspicion that perfec-

Objections | 205

tionism is a politically outrageous view. This general suspicion is due to the seriousness of the two main charges brought against perfectionism. First, perfectionism is accused of restricting individual freedom and of being incompatible with our respect for autonomy. Against this objection, I offered several responses. Autonomy could be understood either procedurally or substantively. Along Hurka, Sher, Raz and Wall, the liberal Political Perfectionism I endorse is opposed to the use of coercion in the promotion of goods. Liberal Political Perfectionism (in contrast with paternalism) would not violate procedural autonomy, as it involves no coercion: political perfectionism would promote opportunities rather than coerce individuals into engaging with goods (in other words, the state would be concerned with ‘capabilities’ and not ‘functionings’).388 Moreover, in the second chapter of this book, I specify ways by which Political Perfectionism could be restricted in such a way that it would not violate individual autonomy. On the perfectionist view I advocate, I take autonomy to be intrinsically valuable. This gives autonomy further protection. Moreover, I build into Prudential Perfectionism a second-order endorsement constraint; engagement with each one of the goods is constitutive of individual well-being only if it is endorsed by the individual in question. This again means that promotion of the goods through coercion is largely ruled out. In other words, this first serious issue is dealt with in my specification of political perfectionism during the three first chapters of the thesis. When we turn to consider substantive autonomy, Political Perfectionism could actually considerably increase it. This is because, as Raz has argued, substantive autonomy is increased when there are more valuable options to choose from. It would be even further increased if the state would actively provide societal support for the value of autonomy. As Kymlicka writes, ‘for meaningful individual choice to be possible, individuals need not only access to information, the capacity to reflectively evaluate it, and freedom of expression and association. They also need access to a societal culture.’389

7.2.2 Moral Equality Second, perfectionism is accused of being incompatible with a concern for the moral equality of citizens. This second accusation stems partly from the mis-

|| 388 Arneson R.J., ‘Perfectionism and Politics’, Ethics, 111, 1, 2000, p. 61. 389 Kymlicka W., Liberalism, Community and Culture, Clarendon Press, Oxford, 1989, p. 84.

206 | Conclusion

taken assumption that perfectionism must take an elitist form which gives consideration only to the excellences of the select few. Given my specification of Ethical Perfectionism and Political Perfectionism, they give each person equal moral consideration. An upshot of the same objection might make the claim that perfectionism is incompatible with social justice. I have argued that my version of Political Perfectionism was immune to that objection, given some key qualifications I made. A version of this objection has been made by Jonathan Quong in his new book, Liberalism without Perfection. Quong claims there that perfectionism is necessarily motivated by a negative judgment about citizen’s abilities. Quong’s argument makes two assumptions. First, he seems to assume that some perfectionist theories do not have a say in what they take to be the currency of justice. However, as my account by now has shown, Political Perfectionism being necessarily grounded in Ethical Perfectionism must endorse an Objective List conception of well-being which would presumably also specify what our currency of justice is. Second, Quong assumes further that these perfectionist accounts which would not be committed to a specific account of justice would need to distinguish themselves from a Rawlsian conception of justice. In order to do so, these theories would be committed to asking for a further re-distribution of resources, after each individual has received her Rawlsian fair share, so as to subsidize some perfectionist activities. But, once again, the Political Perfectionism I have in mind will have an important impact on what a fair share is. To claim that perfectionism would recommend redistribution after citizens’ fair share is distributed is begging the question. Liberal perfectionists would have their own view of what a fair share is. Both these assumptions which Quong relies on are thus rejected by the liberal perfectionism I defend here. But even if I granted these two assumptions, I do not think that allocating to an individual more than her Rawlsian fair share would necessarily involve a negative judgment of the individual’s abilities. In my account of liberal perfectionism, no such judgment is made. In chapter 3, section 4, I argue that perfectionism does not need to evaluate individuals; it only needs to evaluate lives as good. Political Perfectionism could thus refrain from having a view on whether the individual is responsible or not for the goodness of his life.390 I argue that the || 390 In chapter 6, I do develop a conception of justice that is interested in the degree of responsibility a person has for advantage in her life. This is compatible with the above remark, since the focus there wasn’t on promoting the scope of a person’s opportunity for being responsible for her life, not on assessing her in light of what she made of the opportunities she did have.

Objections | 207

motivation behind political perfectionism is to make sure that people use their abilities to the full. Even in the case in which a life is judged to be missing in some goods, this evaluation would be made for the purpose of enabling the individual in question to have more opportunities available to engage with the goods in question. The emphasis once again is not on the judgement of the individual but on the judgement of lives, for the purpose of benefitting the individual. More importantly, perfectionists do not make any judgement on any specific individual’s abilities. They do recognise the undeniable fact that there are many factors that can have a devastating impact on an individual’s opportunities for a good life. Among them, there are socio-economic circumstances and general weaknesses in human psychology. On the liberal perfectionist view, the individual is not responsible for the impact of both these factors on her life. Recognising the importance of these psychological dispositions in how one’s life go isn’t a denial of the moral equality of all citizens. On the contrary, it could be argued that it actually indicates that all citizens are similar in sharing these dispositions. All citizens share some psychological features (e.g. they do not enjoy godlike omniscience). It is thus inaccurate to represent the perfectionist state as holding a position of superior contempt towards its citizen. Instead, an accurate representation would depict both the perfectionist state and its citizens as morally equal; they both are self-aware enough of general problems in human psychology to try to adopt some remedies to prevent them from causing trouble to themselves. Moreover, claiming as Quong does, that redistributing further after a Rawlsian distribution in order to subsidises certain activities is paternalist and thus mistaken has some implications for justice. As many critics have acknowledged, Rawls’ distribution fails its own ambition of achieving justice to the extent that it fails to consider all the factors that individuals are not responsible for. There are many factors that could have an impact on how an individual life goes. Socio-economic factors have been widely recognised to have an unjust impact on how an individual life goes. But psychological dispositions have a similar unjust impact if individuals are not responsible for them. Quong claims that it is mistaken for perfectionists to express concern about how psychological dispositions shared by most could have an impact on how one’s life goes. On this view, presumably, individuals are pictured as imbued with Kantian transcendental reasoning abilities along with Sartre-inspired radical choice abilities. Picturing human beings as slightly more deficient than that amounts to showing them lack of respect. But I believe that holding this view about human beings is a big mistake. Rawls himself recognised that a theory of justice should take into account some accurate assumptions about human psy-

208 | Conclusion

chology. However, at the time of his major writings, we knew much less about psychology than we currently do. The belief that any psychological advance is irrelevant to political theory is wrong. Finally, claiming that it is mistaken for perfectionists to take into account psychological dispositions implies that deep down you reject the claim that individuals are not responsible for some of their psychological features. If you truly believe that individuals cannot be responsible for some socio-economic factors and some of their psychological features and dispositions, you would want to take this point into account so as to correct for it. If you deny that it should be taken into account, you are actually arguing that individuals are responsible for all of their psychological features and dispositions. Even if you believed that individuals can be responsible for some of their psychological dispositions, this does not imply that you believe that individuals are responsible for all of them. Moreover, there are many deficient dispositions that are very widespread, such as irrational bias and prejudices discussed in the behavioural economics literature. It is implausible to claim that we chose to have them. In other words, to claim that perfectionism is paternalist is to deny that one can only become responsible for some of our psychological dispositions if we are made to be aware of them. And many of these psychological dispositions might have to be taken into account in our institutions without making the effort of bringing citizens to be self-aware about them, because it would just be a waste to bring too much attention to them.

7.2.3 Pragmatic Objections There are nevertheless several pragmatic arguments against political perfectionism I would like to consider because I take them to be the most serious ones. First, worries about political stability stem from the belief that many citizens would reasonably disagree with the conception of the good promoted by the state and contest it. Unlike Steven Wall’s definition, my definition of political perfectionism does not take the contentious nature of goods to be a necessary condition for perfectionism.391 The list of goods I described in chapter 2 is not, I believe, deeply contentious. Joseph Chan’s list of prudential goods is not particularly contentious either (he includes aesthetic experiences, human relation-

|| 391 Kraut R., ‘Politics, Neutrality and the Good’, Social Philosophy and Policy, vol. 16, n. 1, 1999, p. 315‒332, p. 331‒332.

Objections | 209

ship, amusement and play, knowledge).392 The objection might seem once again pre-empted by my discussion of the list of goods. This being said, I am not suggesting either that it is a necessary condition of perfectionism that the goods endorsed are uncontroversial. So the objection remains valid to the extent that the goods could turn out to be controversial and in this case, this would constitute a genuine threat to political stability. Moreover, although the goods I suggested in chapter 2 do not seem controversial, when stated at some degree of generality, controversy is more likely to arise when we move to a discuss the instantiations of these goods at a more specific level. And if there is a serious danger of political instability, it might be true that perfectionist interventions should be rejected. This could be so even if, as I argued in this book, liberal perfectionists would be justified only in protecting and promoting opportunities to engage with the goods. If there is a disagreement about which opportunities the state should support, then there could be political instability about this issue. This conclusion, however, only has limited force against the perfectionist argument articulated in this book. Recall that my definition of perfectionism does not claim that the state ought always to protect and promote goods on the basis of their intrinsic value but only that it has a reason to do so. This is enough to refute the neutralist liberal claim that conception of the good should never be invoked for reasons of stability, as I have shown that conceptions of the good can be invoked without necessarily causing political instability, as this would be the case if the conception of the good endorsed isn’t controversial.393 I can thus accept the claim that in some circumstances there would be strong enough reasons against perfectionist interventions. Second, epistemic worries might prevent us from promoting any conception of the good. These worries stem from the limits of our knowledge about which conception of the good is the correct one. However, epistemic worries cannot be only relevant when it pertains to conceptions of the good. If there is a genuine epistemic problem, it would also affect the state ability to know and enforce a conception of social justice.394 Those who put forward the epistemic objection must thus explain why the very same objection does not prevent the state from being committed to a conception of the right. Nagel for instance gives two arguments in order to justify the asymmetry between conceptions of the right and conceptions of the good. But Chan has convincingly shown that both these ar|| 392 Chan J. ‘Legitimacy, Unanimity and Perfectionism’, Philosophy and Public Affairs, vol. 29, n. 1, 2000, p. 11‒12. 393 Chan J., ibid., p. 18 394 Sher G., Beyond Neutrality, Perfectionism and Politics, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 1997.

210 | Conclusion

guments actually vindicate perfectionism.395 Nagel use the argument from higher-order unanimity and the argument of negative responsibility.396 The argument from higher-order unanimity states that there are situations in which it the state ought to enforce a policy decision even if there is reasonable disagreement about it, because there is a need for some policy decision to be made about it. For instance, citizens might reasonably disagree about specific policies of national defence, but recognise nevertheless that the state must adopt a policy of national defence, whatever it is. Nagel argues that this is the case with national defence and other areas, but not for conceptions of the good. But Chan argues convincingly that a lot hinges on how much a policy decision is needed. Some might reject Nagel’s claim that some national defence are needed, as one might endorse pacifism and argue that no such decision ought to be made. If we relax the requirement of need to account for the case of national defence, then one could similarly argue that some conceptions of the good are needed for individuals to be able to make meaningful choice. This claim amounts to the Social Forms Thesis, which was a premise of the Service and Well-Being argument I discussed in chapter 4. The Social Forms Thesis describes how some conceptions of the good are crucial in making a meaningful choice. In other words, either we put the bar of what counts as ‘a need’ for some policy decision very high (in which case, a state would not need any defence policy) or we put the bar of what counts as ‘a need’ for common policy much lower (in which case conceptions of the good could be argued to be needed.). To sum up, if we can overcome epistemic worries when they pertain to questions of social justice, then we should be also able to do so when it pertains to questions about the good. Another argument claims that perfectionism is self-defeating. On a plausible understanding of perfectionist goods, a conception of the good should be endorsed not artificially but through genuine recognition of the value of the relevant goods. If citizens are forced to endorse some conception of the good by a perfectionist state, they would not genuinely benefit from the goods thus endorsed. To use an example of Galston’s, if citizens were coerced to endorse a particular religion, this would be incompatible with genuine faith, and thus set back and corrupt rather than promote the goods supposedly associated with religious belief.397 Arneson has similarly argued that Political Perfectionism would corrupt the motivations of agents in ways that would distort the perfec-

|| 395 Chan J., ibid. 396 Nagel T., Equality and Partiality, chap. 14. 397 Galston W., Liberal Purposes, p. 271.

Final Thoughts | 211

tions the state was trying to promote.398 But again, Political Perfectionism needn’t take a paternalist form. The Political Perfectionism I describe is certainly not committed to coercing individuals to engage with what it takes to be good; it only provides opportunities for such engagement. The kind of motivation individuals have to engage with the goods thus need not be affected by the mere presence of a greater range of opportunities to engage with these goods. The nature of the motivation to engage with the goods could only be affected if there is coercion (as the motivation might be to avoid the punishment associated with not complying) or if they could benefit financially from engaging with the goods. The political perfectionism I recommend is once again not coercive and would certainly not recommend financially rewarding individuals for engaging with the goods.

7.3 Final Thoughts I have argued here in favour of what I take to be a plausible form of liberal perfectionism. Recall that the purpose of this book was to argue merely for Political Perfectionism and not Bold Political Perfectionism. Recall that Bold Perfectionism stated: The Bold Definition: The state ought to protect and promote intrinsically valuable goods on the basis of their intrinsic value. Whereas Political Perfectionism was defined as: Political Perfectionism: The state is permitted and justified to protect and promote the opportunities for citizens to engage with intrinsically valuable goods on the basis of their intrinsic value. Arguing for Political Perfectionism does not commit me to the implausible claim that the state should always act in a perfectionist way. It allows for the justifications in favour of Political Perfectionism to be sometimes defeated by practical considerations, such as consideration of political stability. In order to argue for Bold Perfectionism, I would have had to consider all the objections that have been levelled against perfectionism. But my argument here was much more limited than that: I just aimed to show first, that there is no blanket general

|| 398 Arneson R., ‘Perfectionism and Politics’, p. 43.

212 | Conclusion

principle that can ground the exclusion of references to intrinsic value in the justification of state policies and second, that there is a significant reason for the state to protect and promote opportunities for citizens to engage with goods on the basis of their intrinsic value. In this conclusion, I have nevertheless tried to show how some of the objections against liberal perfectionism can be resisted. Moreover, I have argued that the Political Perfectionism I recommended included various specifications that made it immune to the charges that it violates autonomy or the principle of moral equality. I believe this should restore further legitimacy to Political Perfectionism. This book falls short of addressing the practical implications political perfectionism would have on specific policies. I have hinted at the research done in behavioural economics. But much more work has been done in experimental psychology that might be relevant in this connection (for example, work on racist and sexist prejudices that are often held only unconsciously). I have argued in the first chapter of this thesis that perfectionism was more apt to capture what people really care about: it permits us to refer to goods that most people find intuitively valuable. This is why I have argued in the last chapter that perfectionism can also provide us with a better currency of justice. This parallels similar developments in the social sciences to measure individual well-being by developing indexes of quality of life and favouring their use over the use of economic measures. I have argued that these intuitive ethical conceptions of what is valuable in human life should ground our political philosophy. Political philosophy, I have argued, should start with the reasons that goodness gives.

Bibliography Anderson E., ‘What is the Point of Equality’, Ethics, 1999, p. 287‒337. Annas J., The Morality of Happiness, Oxford University Press, Oxford, 1995. Anscombe G.E.M., ‘Modern Moral Philosophy’, Philosophy, vol. 33, n. 124, 1958, p. 1‒19. Arneson R.J., ‘Equality of Opportunity for Welfare Defended and Recanted’, The Journal of Political Philosophy, 1999, p. 488‒497. Arneson R.J., ‘Flourishing versus Desire’, Social Philosophy and Policy, 16, 1, 1999, p. 113‒142. Arneson R.J., ‘Perfectionism and Politics’, Ethics, 2000, p. 37‒63. Arneson R.J., Luck and Equality, Aristotelian Society Supplementary Volume, 2001, p. 73‒90. Avineri and de-Shalit (eds.), Communitarianism and Individualism, Oxford University Press, Oxford, 1992. Barry B., Culture and Equality, Harvard University Press, Cambridge (Mass.), 2002. Berlin I., ‘Two Concepts of Liberty’, in Berlin I., Four Essays on Liberty, Oxford University Press, London, 1969, p. 118‒172. Bostrom N. and Ord T., ‘The Reversal Test: Eliminating Status Quo Bias in Applied Ethics’, Ethics, 116, July 2006, p. 656‒679. Brighouse H., ‘Neutrality, Publicity, State Funding’, Philosophy and Public Affairs, 1995, p. 35‒63. Brink D.O., Perfectionism and the Common Good, Oxford University Press, Oxford, 2003. Broome J., ‘Are Intentions Reasons’, in Morris C.W. and Ripstein A. (eds.), Practical Rationality and Preferences: Essays for David Gauthier, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 2001, p. 98‒121. Buchanan A., ‘Political Legitimacy and Democracy’, Ethics, 2002, p. 689‒719. Byron Michael (ed.), Satisficing and Maximising, Moral Theorists on Practical Reason, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 2004. Casal P., ‘Why Sufficiency is not Enough’, Ethics, 2007, p. 296‒326. Cavell S., Moral Perfectionism, in Mulhall S. (ed.), The Cavell Reader, Blackwell Publishers, 1996, p. 353‒369. Chan J., ‘Legitimacy, Unanimity and Perfectionism’, Philosophy and Public Affairs, vol. 29, n. 1, 2000, p. 5‒42. Cohen G.A., ‘On the Currency of Egalitarian Justice’, Ethics, 1989, p. 906‒944. Cohen G.A., Rescuing Justice and Equality, Harvard University Press, Cambridge (Mass.), 2008. Crisp R. and Slote M. (eds.), How Should One Live?, Oxford University Press, Oxford, 1998. Crisp R., ‘Raz on Well-Being’, Oxford Journal of Legal Studies, vol. 17, n. 3, 1997, p. 499‒515. Crisp, R., Routledge Philosophy Guidebook to Mill on Utilitarianism, Routledge, London, 1997. Cruft R., ‘Rights: Beyond Interest and Will Theory?’, Law and Philosophy, 2004, p. 347‒397. Darwall S. (ed.), Deontology, Blackwell, Oxford, 2003. Darwall S., Welfare and Rational Care, Princeton University Press, Princeton, 2002. Dworkin R.M., A Matter of Principle, Clarendon Press, Oxford, 1986. Dworkin R.M., Law’s Empire, Harvard University Press, Cambridge (Mass.), 1986. Dworkin R.M., ‘Obligations of Community’, in Raz J. (ed.), Authority, New York University Press, New York, 1990, p. 208‒239. Dworkin R.M., Sovereign Virtue, The Theory and Practice of Equality, Harvard University Press, Cambridge (Mass.), 2002, p. 237‒284. Dworkin R.M., Taking Rights Seriously, Harvard University Press, Cambridge (Mass.), 1978.

214 | Bibliography

Dworkin R.M., ‘What is Equality, Part 2: Equality of Resources’, Philosophy and Public Affairs, vol. 10, n. 3, 1981, p. 283‒345. Dworkin R.M., ‘What is Equality: Part 1’, Philosophy and Public Affairs, vol. 10, n. 3, 1981, p. 185‒246. Dzur Albert W., ‘Liberal Perfectionism and Democratic Participation’, Polity, 1998, p. 667‒690. Etzioni A., The Spirit of the Community: Rights, Responsibilities and the Communitarian Agenda, Crown Publishers, Inc., New York, 1993. Finnis J., Natural Law and Natural Rights, Clarendon Press, Oxford, 1979. Foot P., Natural Goodness, Oxford University Press, Oxford, 2010. Frankena W.K, Ethics, Second Edition, Prentice Hall, 1988. Frankfurt H., ‘Equality as a Moral Ideal’, Ethics, 1987, p. 21‒43. Galston W.A., Liberal Purposes: goods, virtues and diversity in the liberal state, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 1998. Gardner J., ‘Law’s Aim in Law’s Empire’, in Hershovitz, S. (ed.), Exploring Law’s Empire – The Jurisprudence of Ronald Dworkin, Oxford University Press, Oxford, 2009, p. 207‒225. Gewirth A., The Community of Rights, The University of Chicago Press, Chicago, 1996. Gray J., Two Faces of Liberalism, The New Press, New York, 2000. Griffin J., Well-Being: Its Meaning, Measurement and Moral Importance, Clarendon Press, Oxford, 1989. Guyer P., ‘Kantian Perfectionism’, in Jost L. and Wuerth J. (eds.)., Perfecting Virtue: New Essays on Kantian Ethics and Virtue Ethics, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 2011, p. 194‒215. Haksar V., Equality, Liberty and Perfectionism, Oxford University Press, Oxford, 1979. Haybron D., The Pursuit of Unhappiness, Clarendon Press, Oxford, 2008. Hershovitz S., ‘Legitimacy, Democracy and Razian Authority’, Legal Theory, 2003, p. 201‒220. Hershovitz S. (ed.), Exploring Law’s Empire – The Jurisprudence of Ronald Dworkin, Oxford University Press, Oxford, 2008. Holmes S. and Sunstein C., The Cost of Rights: Why Liberty Depend on Taxes, Norton, New York, 1999. Holtug N. and Lippert-Rasmussen K. (eds.), Egalitarianism: New Essays on the Nature and Value of Equality, Oxford University Press, Oxford, 2007. Hooker B., ‘Does Moral Virtue Constitute a Benefit to the Agent?’, in Crisp R. (ed.), How Should One Live?, Oxford University Press, Oxford, 1998, p. 141‒157. Hurka T., ‘Book Review: Sher G., Beyond Neutrality: Perfectionism and Politics, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge’, Ethics, vol. 109, n. 1, 1998, p. 187‒190. Hurka T., ‘On Normative Ethics’, in Normative Ethics: 5 Questions in Petersen T. S. and Ryberg J. (eds.), VIP/Automatic Press, 2007, p. 55‒65. Hurka T., Perfectionism, Oxford University Press, Oxford, 1993. Hurka T., Virtue Vice and Value, Oxford University Press, Oxford, 2003. Hurley S., ‘Luck and Equality’, Aristotelian Society Supplementary, 2001, p. 51‒72. Hurley S.L., Natural Reason: Personality and Polity, Oxford University Press, Oxford, 1992. Hursthouse R., On Virtue Ethics, Oxford University Press, Oxford, 1999. Kant I., On a Supposed Right to Lie because of Philanthropic Concerns, in Groundings for the Metaphysics of Morals (translated by Ellington J.), Hackett Publishing Company, Indianapolis, 1993. Keefe R. and Smith P. (eds.), Vagueness: A Reader, MIT Press, Cambridge (Mass.), 1997. Kekes J., Against Liberalism, Cornell University Press, New York, 1997.

Bibliography | 215

Kierkegaard S., Either/Or: Fragments of a Life, Princeton University Press, New Jersey, 1987. Korsgaard C., ‘Two Distinctions in Goodness’, The Philosophical Review, XCII, n. 2, April 1983, p. 169‒195. Kramer M.H., Objectivity and the Rule of Law, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 2007. Kramer M.H, Simmonds N.E., Steiner H., A Debate over Rights: Philosophical Enquiries, Oxford University Press, Oxford, 2000. Kramer M., ‘Getting Rights Right’, in Kramer M. (ed.), Rights, Wrongs, and Responsibilities, Palgrave, Basingstoke, 2001, p. 28‒95. Kraut R., ‘Book Review: The Morality of Happiness by Julia Annas’, Philosophy and Phenomenological Research, vol. 55, n. 4, Dec. 95, p. 921‒927. Kraut R., ‘Politics, Neutrality and the Good’, Social Philosophy and Policy, vol. 16, n. 1, 1999, p. 315‒332. Kraut R., What is Good and Why, Cambridge, MA, Harvard University Press, 2007. Kymlicka W., ‘Liberal Individualism and Liberal Neutrality’, Ethics, 99, 1989, p. 883‒905. Kymlicka W., Liberalism, Community and Culture, Oxford University Press, Oxford, 1989. Lang G., ‘Luck Egalitarianism, Permissible Inequalities and Moral Hazard’, Journal of Moral Philosophy, vol. 6, n. 3, 2009, p. 317‒338. Larmore C., Patterns of Moral Complexity, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 1987. Lear J., Happiness, Death and the Remainder of Life, Harvard University Press, Cambridge (Mass.), 2001. Lecce S., ‘Should Egalitarians Be Perfectionists?’, Politics, vol. 25, issue 3, 2005, p. 127‒134. Lippert-Rasmussen K., ‘Egalitarianism, Option Luck, and Responsibility’, Ethics, vol. 111, n. 3, 2001, p. 548‒579. MacCallum G.C. Jr., ‘Negative and Positive Freedom’, Philosophical Review, 1967, p. 312‒344. MacCormick N., ‘Rights in Legislation’, in Hacker P. and Raz J. (eds.), Law, Morality and Society: Essays in Honour of H.L.A. Hart, Oxford University Press, Oxford, 1977. MacIntyre A., After Virtue, London, Duckworth, 1985. Macklem T. and Gardner J., ‘Value Interest, and Well-Being’, Utilitas, vol. 18, n. 4, 2006, p. 362‒382. Mason A., ‘Equality, Personal Responsibility and Gender Socialization’, Proceedings of the Aristotelian Society 100, 2000, p. 227‒246. McCabe D., ‘Joseph Raz and the Contextual Argument’, Ethics, 2001, p. 493‒522. Mill J.S., ‘Utilitarianism.’ Classics of Political and Moral Philosophy, in Cahn S. (ed.), Oxford University Press, New York, 2002, p. 893‒927. Miller D. (ed.), Liberty, Oxford University Press, Oxford, 1991. Miller D. (ed.), The Liberty Reader, Paradigm Publishers, Boulder (CO), 2006. Moore G.E., Principia Ethica, Barnes and Noble, New York, 2006. Morris C.W. and Ripstein A. (eds.), Practical Rationality and Preferences: Essays for David Gauthier, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 2001. Mulgan T., ‘Was Aristotle an Aristotelian Social Democrat’, Ethics, vol. 111, 2000, p. 79‒101. Nagel T., The View from Nowhere, Oxford University Press, Oxford, 1989. Nagel T., Equality and Partiality, Oxford University Press, Oxford, 1991. Narveson J., The Libertarian Idea, Peterborough, Broadview (Ontario), 2001. Naticchia C., ‘Book Review: Beyond Neutrality: Perfectionism and Politics by George Sher’, The Philosophical Review, vol. 108, n. 3, July 1999, p. 444‒447. Nozick R., Anarchy, State and Utopia, Blackwell Publishing, Oxford, 2003.

216 | Bibliography

Nussbaum M., ‘Aristotle, Politics and Human Capabilities: A Response to Antony, Arneson, Charlesworth and Mulgan’, Ethics, vol. 111, n. 1, 2000, p. 102‒140. Nussbaum M., Frontiers of Justice: Disability, Nationality, Species Membership, Harvard University Press, Cambridge (Mass.), 2006. Nussbaum M., ‘Human Functioning and Social Justice’, Political Theory, May 1992, p. 202‒246. Nussbaum M., Women and Human Development: a Capabilities Approach, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 2000. Nussbaum M. and Sen A. (eds.), The Quality of Life, Clarendon Press, Oxford, 1993. O’Neill O., ‘Book Review: Equality, Liberty and Perfectionism by Vinit Haksar’, Mind, vol. 21 (364), 1982, p. 625‒629. Otsuka M., ‘Luck, Insurance and Equality’, Ethics 113, 2002, p. 40‒54. Parfit D., ‘Equality and Priority’, Ratio, vol. 10, no. 3, 1997, p. 202‒221. Parfit D., On What Matters, Oxford University Press, Oxford, 2011. Parfit D., Reasons and Persons, Clarendon Press, Oxford, 1992. Pettit P., ‘Responsibility Incorporated’, Ethics, 2007, p. 171‒201. Pettit P., ‘The Consequentialist Can Recognise Rights’, The Philosophical Quarterly, 1988, p. 42‒55. Quong J., Liberalism without Perfection, Oxford University Press, Oxford, 2011. Ramsay M., ‘Problems with Responsibility: Why Luck Egalitarians should have Abandoned their Attempt to reconcile Equality with Responsibility’, Contemporary Political Theory 4, 2005, p. 431‒450. Rasmussen D.B and den Uyl’s D., Norms of Liberty, Pennsylvania State University Press, University Park, 2005. Rawls J., ‘Justice-as-Fairness: Political Not Metaphysical’, Freeman E. (ed.), Collected Papers, Harvard University Press, Cambridge (Massachusetts), 1999, p. 388‒414. Rawls J., A Theory of justice (Revised Edition), Oxford University Press, Oxford, 1999. Rawls J., Political Liberalism, Columbia University Press, New York, 1996. Rawls J., ‘Classical Utilitarianism’, in Scheffler S. (ed.), Consequentialism and its critics, Oxford University Press, Oxford, 1988, p. 14‒20. Rawls J. ‘Two Concepts of Rules’, Philosophical Review 64, 1955, p. 3‒32. Rawls J., Political Liberalism, Columbia University Press, New York, 2005. Raz J. (ed.), Authority, Blackwell, Oxford, 1991. Raz J., ‘Facing Diversity, the Case of Epistemic Abstinence’, Philosophy and Public Affairs, vol. 19, n. 1, 1990, p. 3‒46. Raz J., ‘Facing Up: a Reply’, Southern California Law Review 62, 1989, p. 1153‒1256. Raz J., ‘The Problem of Authority: Revisiting the Service Conception’, Minnesota Law Review, 2006, p. 1003–1044. Raz J., Ethics in the Public Domain, Clarendon Paperback, Oxford, 2001. Raz J., ‘On the Guise of the Good’, in Tennenbaum S., Desire, Practical Reason and the Good, Oxford University Press, Oxford, 2010, p. 111‒138. Raz J., The Morality of Freedom, Oxford University Press, Oxford, 1988. Raz J., The Practice of Value, Oxford University Press, Oxford, 2005. Raz J., ‘The Role of Well-being’, Philosophical Perspectives, 2004, p. 269‒294. Ross W.D., The Right and the Good, Clarendon Press, Oxford, 1967. Ryan Alan (ed.), The Idea of Freedom, Oxford University Press, Oxford, 1979. Scanlon T.M., ‘Preference and Urgency’, The Journal of Philosophy, 1975, p. 665‒669. Scanlon T.M., What Do We Owe to Each Other?, Belknap Press, Harvard, 1998.

Bibliography | 217

Scheffler S., ‘What is Egalitarianism?’ Philosophy and Public Affairs, 31, 1, 2003, p. 5–39. Scheffler S., Boundaries and Allegiances, Problems of Justice and Responsibility in Liberal Thought, Oxford University Press, Oxford, 2002. Scheffler S., The Rejection of Consequentialism, Oxford University Press, Oxford, 1982. Scheffler S. (ed.), Consequentialism and its critics, Oxford University Press, Oxford, 1988. Sen A., ‘Capabilities and Well-Being’, in Sen A. and Nussbaum M. (eds.), The Quality of Life, Clarendon Press, Oxford, 1993, p. 30‒54. Sher G., Beyond Neutrality, Perfectionism and Politics, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 1997. Sher G., In Praise of Blame, Oxford University Press, Oxford, 2006. Sherman J., ‘Unresolved Problems in the Service Conception of Authority’, Oxford Journal of Legal Studies, vol. 30, n. 3, 2010, p. 419‒440. Shue H., Basic Rights, Princeton, N.J., Princeton University Press, 1980. Singer P., ‘Is Act-Utilitarianism Self-Defeating’, Philosophical Review, 1972, p. 94‒104. Slote M., ‘Two Views on Satisficing’, in Byron M. (ed.), Satisficing and Maximizing: Moral Theorists on Practical Reason, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 2004, p. 14‒29. Slote M., From Morality to Virtues, Oxford University Press, Oxford, 1995. Slote Michael, From Morality to Virtue, Oxford University Press, Oxford, 1992. Steiner H., An Essay on Rights, Blackwell, Oxford, 1994. Stemploska M., ‘Making Justice sensitive to Responsibility’, Political Studies, vol. 57, issue 2, 2009, p. 237‒259. Stocker M., ‘The Schizophrenia of Modern Ethical Theories’, in Crisp R. and Slote M. (eds.), Virtue Ethics, Oxford University Press, Oxford, 1997, p. 453‒466. Strawson P.F., Freedom and Resentment and other Essays, Methuen, London, 1974. Sumner L., The Moral Foundation of Rights, Oxford University Press, Oxford, 2004. Sumner W. Welfare, Happiness, and Ethics, Clarendon Press, Oxford, 1996. Sunstein C.R. and Thaler R.H., Nudge: Improving Decisions about Health, Wealth and Happiness, Yale University Press, New Haven, 2008. Sypnowich C. (ed.), The Egalitarian Conscience: Essays in honour of G.A.Cohen, Oxford University Press, Oxford, 2006. Taylor C., Philosophical Papers, vol. 2: Philosophy and the Human Sciences, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 1985. Taylor C., Philosophical Papers, vol. 1: Human Agency and Language, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 1985. Taylor C., ‘No community, no democracy’, in Etzioni A., Volmert A., Rothschild E. (eds.), The Communitarian Reader, Rowman & Littlefield publishers, Inc., 2004, p. 27‒44. Taylor C., ‘What’s Wrong with Negative Liberty’, in Ryan A. (ed.), The Idea of Freedom, Oxford University Press, Oxford, 1979, p. 175‒193. Taylor J.S., Personal autonomy: New Essays, Autonomous and Morally Responsible Agency, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 2005. Temkin L., Inequality, Oxford University Press, Oxford, 1993 Temkin L., ‘Equality, Priority and the Levelling-Down Objection’, in Clayton M. and Williams A. (eds.), The Ideal of Equality, Macmillan and St. Martin’s Press, 2000, p. 126‒162. Thompson J.J., Goodness and Advice, Princeton University Press, New Jersey, 2001. Thompson J.J., The Realm of Rights, Harvard University Press, Cambridge (Mass.), 1990. Velleman D., ‘A Theory of Value’, Ethics, 2008, p. 410‒436. Waldron J. (ed.), Theories of Rights, Oxford University Press, Oxford, 1984.

218 | Bibliography

Waldron J., Liberal Rights, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 2001. Waldron J., ‘Autonomy and Perfectionism in Raz’ Morality of Freedom’, Southern California Law Review, 1988‒1989, p. 1097‒1153. Wall S., Liberalism, Perfectionism and Restraint, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 1998. Wall S., ‘Neutralism for Perfectionists: The Case of Restricted State Neutrality’, Ethics, 2010, p. 232‒256. Wallace R.J., ‘Reasons, Values and Agent-Relativity’, Dialectica, 2010, p. 503‒528. Walzer M., Spheres of Justice, Blackwell, Oxford, 1983. Williams B., Ethics and the Limits of Philosophy, Routledge, London, 2006. Williams B., In the Beginning was the Deed, Princeton University Press, New Jersey, 2005. Williams B., Moral Luck, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 1981. Young I.M., Justice and the Politics of Difference, Princeton University Press, New Jersey, 1990.