Egalitarianism : New Essays on the Nature and Value of Equality

Egalitarianism, the view that equality matters, attracts a great deal of attention amongst contemporary political theorists. And yet it has turned out to be surprisingly difficult to provide a fully satisfactory egalitarian theory. The cutting-edge articles in Egalitarianism move the debate forward. They are written by some of the leading political philosophers in the field. Recent issues in the debate over equality are given careful consideration: the distinction between'telic'and'deontic'egalitarianism; prioritarianism and the so-called'levelling down objection'to egalitarianism; whether egalitarian justice should have'whole lives'or some subset thereof as its temporal focus; the implications of Scanlon's contractualist account of the value of choice for egalitarian justice; and the question of whether non-human animals fall within the scope of egalitarianism and if so, what the implications are. Numerous'classic'issues receive a new treatment too: how egalitarianism can be justified and how, if at all, this value should be combined with other values such as desert, liberty and sufficiency; how to define the'worst off'for the purposes of Rawls'difference principle; Elizabeth Anderson's feminist account of'equality of relations'; how equality applies to risky choices and, in particular, whether it is justifiable to restrict the freedom of suppliers who wish to release goods that confer different levels of risk on consumers, depending on their ability to pay. Finally, the implications of egalitarianism and prioritarianism for health care are scrutinized. The contributors to the volume are: Richard Arneson, Linda Barclay, Thomas Christiano, Nils Holtug, Susan Hurley, Kasper Lippert-Rasmussen, Dennis McKerlie, Ingmar Persson, Bertil Tungodden, Peter Vallentyne, Andrew Williams, and Jonathan Wolff. Nils Holtug and Kasper Lippert-Rasmussen Nils Holtug and Kasper Lippert-Rasmussen -- Thomas Christiano Nils Holtug and Kasper Lippert-Rasmussen -- Thomas Christiano -- Ingmar Persson Nils Holtug and Kasper Lippert-Rasmussen -- Thomas Christiano -- Ingmar Persson -- Kasper Lippert-Rasmussen Nils Holtug and Kasper Lippert-Rasmussen -- Thomas Christiano -- Ingmar Persson -- Kasper Lippert-Rasmussen -- Nils Holtug Nils Holtug and Kasper Lippert-Rasmussen -- Thomas Christiano -- Ingmar Persson -- Kasper Lippert-Rasmussen -- Nils Holtug -- Dennis McKerlie Nils Holtug and Kasper Lippert-Rasmussen -- Thomas Christiano -- Ingmar Persson -- Kasper Lippert-Rasmussen -- Nils Holtug -- Dennis McKerlie -- Bertil Tungodden and Peter Vallentyne Nils Holtug and Kasper Lippert-Rasmussen -- Thomas Christiano -- Ingmar Persson -- Kasper Lippert-Rasmussen -- Nils Holtug -- Dennis McKerlie -- Bertil Tungodden and Peter Vallentyne -- Linda Barclay Nils Holtug and Kasper Lippert-Rasmussen -- Thomas Christiano -- Ingmar Persson -- Kasper Lippert-Rasmussen -- Nils Holtug -- Dennis McKerlie -- Bertil Tungodden and Peter Vallentyne -- Linda Barclay -- Peter Vallentyne Nils Holtug and Kasper Lippert-Rasmussen -- Thomas Christiano -- Ingmar Persson -- Kasper Lippert-Rasmussen -- Nils Holtug -- Dennis McKerlie -- Bertil Tungodden and Peter Vallentyne -- Linda Barclay -- Peter Vallentyne -- Andrew Williams Nils Holtug and Kasper Lippert-Rasmussen -- Thomas Christiano -- Ingmar Persson -- Kasper Lippert-Rasmussen -- Nils Holtug -- Dennis McKerlie -- Bertil Tungodden and Peter Vallentyne -- Linda Barclay -- Peter Vallentyne -- Andrew Williams -- Richard J. Arneson Nils Holtug and Kasper Lippert-Rasmussen -- Thomas Christiano -- Ingmar Persson -- Kasper Lippert-Rasmussen -- Nils Holtug -- Dennis McKerlie -- Bertil Tungodden and Peter Vallentyne -- Linda Barclay -- Peter Vallentyne -- Andrew Williams -- Richard J. Arneson -- Jonathan Wolff Nils Holtug and Kasper Lippert-Rasmussen-- Thomas Christiano-- Ingmar Persson-- Kasper Lippert-Rasmussen-- Nils Holtug-- Dennis McKerlie-- Bertil Tungodden and Peter Vallentyne-- Linda Barclay-- Peter Vallentyne-- Andrew Williams-- Richard J. Arneson-- Jonathan Wolff-- Susan Hurley Egalitarianism attracts a great deal of attention amongst contemporary political theorists. And yet it has turned out to be surprisingly difficult to provide a fully satisfactory egalitarian theory. The cutting-edge articles in Egalitarianism move the debate forward. They are written by some of the leading political philosophers in the field. Recent issues in the debate over equality are given careful consideration: the distinction between 'telic' and 'deontic' egalitarianism; prioritarianism and the so-called 'levelling down objection' to egalitarianism; whether egalitarian justice should have 'whole lives' or some subset thereof as its temporal focus; the implications of Scanlon's contractualist account of the value of choice for egalitarian justice; and the question of whether nonhuman animals fall within the scope of egalitarianism and if so, what the implications are. Numerous 'classic' issues receive a new treatment too: how egalitarianism can be justified and how, if at all, this value should be combined with other values such as desert, liberty, and sufficiency; how to define the 'worst off' for the purposes of Rawls' difference principle; Elizabeth Anderson's feminist account of 'equality of relations'; how equality applies to risky choices and, in particular, whether it is justifiable to restrict the freedom of suppliers who wish to release goods that confer different levels of risk on consumers, depending on their ability to pay. Finally, the implications of egalitarianism and prioritarianism for health care are scrutinized. An Introduction To Contemporary Egalitarianism / Nils Holtug And Kasper Lippert-rasmussen -- A Foundation For Egalitarianism / Thomas Christiano -- A Defence Of Extreme Egalitarianism / Ingmar Persson -- The Insignificance Of The Distinction Between Telic And Deontic Egalitarianism / Kasper Lippert-rasmussen -- Prioritarianism / Nils Holtug -- Egalitarianism And The Difference Between Interpersonal And Intrapersonal Judgments / Dennis Mckerlie -- Who Are The Least Advantaged? / Bertil Tungodden And Peter Vallentyne -- Feminist Distributive Justice And The Relevance Of Equal Relations / Linda Barclay -- Of Mice And Men : Equality And Animals / Peter Vallentyne -- Liberty, Liability, And Contractualism / Andrew Williams -- Desert And Equality / Richard J. Arneson -- Market Failure, Common Interests, And The Titanic Puzzle / Jonathan Wolff -- The 'what' And The 'how' Of Distributive Justice And Health / Susan Hurley. Edited By Nils Holtug And Kasper Lippert-rasmussen. Most Of The Chapters In This Book Were Presented At A Conference On Egalitarianism At The University Of Copenhagen In 2004--pref. Includes Bibliographical References And Index. Egalitarianism, the view that equality matters, attracts a lot of attention amongst contemporary political theorists. This work considers various issues in the debate over equality - the distinction between 'telic' and 'deontic' egalitarianism; prioritarianism and the so-called 'levelling down objection' to egalitarianism; and more Introduction 1. Context and Logical Form 2. On Quantifer Domain Restriction 3. Nominal Restriction 4. Semantics, Pragmatics, and the Role of Semantic Content 5. Making it Articulated 6. Semantics in Context 7. Review of Francois Recanati's Literal Meaning Postscript Index During the 1980s, the number of homeless people in the United States grew rapidly.