## 1. Defining the Concept



'Equality' is a contested concept: "People who
praise it or disparage it disagree about what they are praising or
disparaging" (Dworkin 2000, p. 2). Our first task is therefore
to provide a clear definition of equality in the face of widespread
misconceptions about its meaning as a political idea. The terms
'equality' (Greek: *isotes*; Latin:
*aequitas*, *aequalitas*; French:
*egalite*; German *Gleichheit*),
'equal', and 'equally' signify a qualitative
relationship. 'Equality' (or 'equal')
signifies correspondence between a group of different objects,
persons, processes or circumstances that have the same qualities in at
least one respect, but not all respects, i.e., regarding one specific
feature, with differences in other features. 'Equality'
must then be distinguished from 'identity', which refers
to one and the same object corresponding to itself in all its
features. For the same reason, it needs to be distinguished from
'similarity' - the concept of merely approximate
correspondence (Dann 1975, p. 997; Menne 1962, p. 44 ff.; Westen 1990,
pp. 39, 120). Thus, to say that men are equal, for example, is not to
say that they are identical. Equality implies similarity rather than
'sameness'.



Judgements of equality presume a difference between the things
compared. According to this definition, the notion of
'complete' or 'absolute' equality may be seen
as problematic because it would violate the presumption of a
difference. Two non-identical objects are never completely equal; they
are different at least in their spatiotemporal location. If things do
not differ they should not be called 'equal', but rather,
more precisely, 'identical', such as the morning and the
evening star. Here usage might vary. Some authors do consider absolute
qualitative equality admissible as a borderline concept (Tugendhat
& Wolf 1983, p. 170).



'Equality' can be used in the very same sense both to
describe and prescribe, as with 'thin': "you are
thin" and "you are too thin". The approach taken to
defining the standard of comparison for both descriptive and
prescriptive assertions of equality is very important (Oppenheim
1970). In the *descriptive* case, the common standard is itself
descriptive, for example when two people are said to have the same
weight. In the *prescriptive* use, the standard prescribes a
norm or rule, for example when it is said people ought to be equal
before the law. The standards grounding prescriptive assertions of
equality contain at least two components. On the one hand, there is a
descriptive component, since the assertions need to contain
descriptive criteria, in order to identify those people to which the
rule or norm applies. The question of this identification - who
belongs to which category? - may itself be normative, as when we
ask to whom the U.S. laws apply. On the other hand, the comparative
standards contain something normative - a moral or legal rule,
such as the U.S. laws - specifying how those falling under the
norm are to be treated. Such a rule constitutes the prescriptive
component (Westen 1990, chap. 3). Sociological and economic analyses
of (in-)equality mainly pose the questions of how inequalities can be
determined and measured and what their causes and effects are. In
contrast, social and political philosophy is in general concerned
mainly with the following questions: *what kind* of equality,
if any, should obtain, and with respect to *whom* and
*when*? Such is the case in this article as well.



'Equality' and 'equal' are incomplete
predicates that necessarily generate one question: equal in what
respect? (Rae 1980,p. 132 f.) Equality essentially consists of a
tripartite relation between two (or several) objects or persons and
one (or several) qualities. Two objects A and B are equal in a certain
respect if, in that respect, they fall under the same general term.
'Equality' denotes the relation between the objects
compared. Every comparison presumes a *tertium comparationis*,
a concrete attribute defining the respect in which the equality
applies - equality thus referring to a common sharing of this
comparison-determining attribute. This relevant comparative standard
represents a 'variable' (or 'index') of the
concept of equality that needs to be specified in each particular case
(Westen 1990, p. 10); differing conceptions of equality here emerge
from one or another descriptive or normative moral standard. There is
another source of diversity as well: As Temkin (1986, 1993, 2009)
argues, various different standards might be used to measure
inequality, with the respect in which people are compared remaining
constant. The difference between a general concept and different
specific conceptions (Rawls 1971, p. 21 f.) of equality may explain
why some people claim 'equality' has no unified
meaning - or is even devoid of meaning. (Rae 1981, p. 127 f.,
132 f.)



For this reason, it helps to think of the idea of equality or
inequality, in the context of social justice, not as a single
principle, but as a complex group of principles forming the basic core
of today's egalitarianism. Different principles yield
different answers. Both equality and inequality are complex and
multifaceted concepts (Temkin 1993, chap. 2). In any real historical
context, it is clear that no single notion of equality can sweep the
field (Rae 1981, p. 132). Many egalitarians concede that much of our
discussion of the concept is vague, but they believe there is also a
common underlying strain of important moral concerns implicit in it
(Williams 1973). Above all, it serves to remind us of our common
humanity, despite various differences (cf. 2.3. below). In this sense,
egalitarianism is often thought of as a single, coherent normative
doctrine that embraces a variety of principles. Following the
introduction of different principles and theories of equality, the
discussion will return in the last section to the question how best to
define egalitarianism and its core value.


## 2. Principles of Equality and Justice



Equality in its prescriptive usage is closely linked to morality and
justice, and distributive justice in particular. Since antiquity
equality has been considered a constitutive feature of justice. (On
the history of the concept, cf. Albernethy 1959, Benn 1967, Brown
1988, Dann 1975, Thomson 1949.) People and movements throughout
history have used the language of justice to contest inequalities. But
what kind of role does equality play in a theory of justice?
Philosophers have sought to clarify this by defending a variety of
principles and conceptions of equality. This section introduces four
such principles, ranging from the highly general and uncontroversial
to the more specific and controversial. The next section reviews
various conceptions of the 'currency' of equality.
Different interpretations of the role of equality in a theory of
justice emerge according to which of the four principles and metrics
have been adopted. The first three principles of equality hold
generally and primarily for all actions upon others and affecting
others, and for their resulting circumstances. From the fourth
principle onward, i.e., starting with the presumption of equality, the
focus will be mainly on distributive justice and the evaluation of
distribution.


### 2.1 Formal Equality



When two persons have equal status in at least one normatively
relevant respect, they must be treated equally with regard in this
respect. This is the generally accepted *formal* equality
principle that Aristotle articulated in reference to Plato:
"treat like cases as like" (Aristotle, *Nicomachean
Ethics*, V.3. 1131a10-b15; *Politics*, III.9.1280 a8-15,
III. 12. 1282b18-23). The crucial question is which respects are
normatively relevant and which are not. Some authors see this formal
principle of equality as a specific application of a rule of
rationality: it is irrational, because inconsistent, to treat equal
cases unequally without sufficient reasons (Berlin 1955-56). But
others claim that what is at stake here is a moral principle of
justice, one reflecting the impartial and universalizable nature of
moral judgments. On this view, the postulate of formal equality
demands more than consistency with one's subjective preferences: the
equal or unequal treatment in question must be justifiable to the
relevantly affected parties, and this on the sole basis of a
situation's objective features.


### 2.2 Proportional Equality



According to Aristotle, there are two kinds of equality, numerical and
proportional (Aristotle, *Nicomachean Ethics*, 1130b-1132b; cf.
Plato, *Laws*, VI.757b-c). A way of treating others, or a
distribution arising from it, is equal *numerically* when it
treats all persons as indistinguishable, thus treating them
identically or granting them the same quantity of a good per capita.
That is not always just. In contrast, a way of treating others or a
distribution is *proportional* or relatively equal when it
treats all relevant persons in relation to their due. Just
*numerical* equality is a special case of proportional
equality. Numerical equality is only just under special circumstances,
namely when persons are equal in the relevant respects so that the
relevant proportions are equal. Proportional equality further
specifies formal equality; it is the more precise and comprehensive
formulation of formal equality. It indicates what produces an adequate
equality.



Proportional equality in the treatment and distribution of goods to
persons involves at least the following concepts or variables: Two or
more persons \((P\_1, P\_2)\) and two or more allocations of goods to
persons \((G)\) and \(X\) and \(Y\) as the quantity in which
individuals have the relevant normative quality \(E\). This can be
represented as an equation with fractions or as a ratio. If \(P1\) has
\(E\) in the amount of \(X\) and if \(P\_2\) has \(E\) in the amount
\(Y\), then \(P\_1\) is due \(G\) in the amount of \(X'\) and \(P\_2\) is
due \(G\) in the amount of \(Y'\), so that the ratio \(X/Y = X'/Y'\)
is valid. (For the formula to be usable, the potentially large variety
of factors involved have to be both quantifiable in principle and
commensurable, i.e., capable of synthesis into an aggregate
value.)



When factors speak for unequal treatment or distribution, because the
persons are unequal in relevant respects, the treatment or
distribution proportional to these factors is just. Unequal claims to
treatment or distribution must be considered proportionally: that is
the prerequisite for persons being considered equally.



This principle can also be incorporated into hierarchical,
inegalitarian theories. It indicates that equal output is demanded
with equal input. Aristocrats, perfectionists, and meritocrats all
believe that persons should be assessed according to their differing
deserts, understood in the broad sense of fulfillment of some relevant
criterion. Reward and punishment, benefits and burdens, should be
proportional to such deserts. Since this definition leaves open who is
due what, there can be great inequality when it comes to presumed
fundamental (natural) rights, deserts, and worth -- this is
apparent in both Plato and Aristotle.



Aristotle's idea of justice as proportional equality contains a
fundamental insight. The idea offers a framework for a rational
argument between egalitarian and non-egalitarian ideas of justice, its
focal point being the question of the basis for an adequate equality
(Hinsch 2003). Both sides accept justice as proportional equality.
Aristotle's analysis makes clear that the argument involves those
features that decide whether two persons are to be considered equal or
unequal in a distributive context.



On the formal level of pure conceptual explication, justice and
equality are linked through these formal and proportional principles.
Justice cannot be explained without these equality principles, which
themselves only receive their normative significance in their role as
principles of justice.



Formal and proportional equality is simply a conceptual schema. It
needs to be made precise - i.e., its open variables need to be
filled out. The formal postulate remains empty as long as it is
unclear when, or through what features, two or more persons or cases
should be considered equal. All debates over the proper conception of
justice - over who is due what - can be understood as
controversies over the question of which cases are equal and which
unequal (Aristotle, *Politics*, 1282b 22). For this reason,
equality theorists are correct in stressing that the claim that
persons are owed equality becomes informative only when one is told
what *kind* of equality they are owed (Nagel 1979; Rae 1981;
Sen 1992, p. 13). Every normative theory implies a certain notion of
equality. In order to outline their position, egalitarians must thus
take account of a specific (egalitarian) conception of equality. To do
so, they need to identify substantive principles of equality, which
are discussed below.


### 2.3 Moral Equality



Until the eighteenth century, it was assumed that human beings are
unequal by nature. This postulate collapsed with the advent of the
idea of natural right, which assumed a natural order in which all
human beings were equal. Against Plato and Aristotle, the classical
formula for justice according to which an action is just when it
offers each individual his or her due took on a substantively
egalitarian meaning in the course of time: everyone deserved the same
dignity and respect. This is now the widely held conception of
substantive, universal, moral equality. It developed among the Stoics,
who emphasized the natural equality of all rational beings, and in
early New Testament Christianity, which envisioned that all humans
were equal before God, although this principle was not always adhered
to in the later history of the church. This important idea was also
taken up both in the Talmud and in Islam, where it was grounded in
both Greek and Hebraic elements. In the modern period, starting in the
seventeenth century, the dominant idea was of natural equality in the
tradition of natural law and social contract theory. Hobbes (1651)
postulated that in their natural condition, individuals possess equal
rights, because over time they have the same capacity to do each other
harm. Locke (1690) argued that all human beings have the same natural
right to both (self-)ownership and freedom. Rousseau (1755) declared
social inequality to be the result of a decline from the natural
equality that characterized our harmonious state of nature, a decline
catalyzed by the human urge for perfection, property and possessions
(Dahrendorf 1962). For Rousseau (1755, 1762), the resulting inequality
and rule of violence can only be overcome by binding individual
subjectivity to a common civil existence and popular sovereignty. In
Kant's moral philosophy (1785), the categorical imperative formulates
the equality postulate of universal human worth. His transcendental
and philosophical reflections on autonomy and self-legislation lead to
a recognition of the same freedom for all rational beings as the sole
principle of human rights (Kant 1797, p. 230). Such Enlightenment
ideas stimulated the great modern social movements and revolutions,
and were taken up in modern constitutions and declarations of human
rights. During the French Revolution, equality, along with freedom and
fraternity, became a basis of the *Declaration des droits de
l'homme et du citoyen* of 1789.



The principle that holds that human beings, despite their differences,
are to be regarded as one another's equals, is often also called
'human equality' or 'basic equality' or
'equal worth' or 'human dignity' (William
1962, Vlastos 1962, Kateb 2014, Waldron 2017, Rosen 2018). Whether
these terms are synonyms is a matter of interpretation, but
"they cluster together to form a powerful body of
principle" (Waldron 2017, p. 3).



This fundamental idea of equal respect for all persons and of the
equal worth or equal dignity of all human beings (Vlastos 1962) is
widely accepted (Carter 2011, but see also Steinhoff 2015). In a
period in which there is not agreement across the members of a complex
society to any one metaphysical, religious, or traditional view
(Habermas 1983, p. 53, 1992, pp. 39-44), it appears impossible to
peacefully reach a general agreement on common political aims without
accepting that persons must be treated as equals. As a result, moral
equality constitutes the 'egalitarian plateau' for all
contemporary political theories (Kymlicka 1990, p. 5).



Fundamental equality means that persons are alike in important
relevant and specified respects alone, and not that they are all
generally the same or can be treated in the same way (Nagel 1991). In
a now commonly posed distinction, stemming from Dworkin (1977, p.
227), moral equality can be understood as prescribing treatment of
persons as equals, i.e., with equal concern and respect, and not the
often implausible principle of providing all persons with equal
treatment. Recognizing that human beings are all equally individual
does not mean treating them uniformly in any respects other than those
in which they clearly have a moral claim to be treated alike.



Disputes arise, of course, concerning what these claims amount to and
how they should be resolved. Philosophical debates are concerned with
the kind of equal treatment normatively required when we mutually
consider ourselves persons with equal dignity. The principle of moral
equality is too abstract and needs to be made concrete if we are to
arrive at a clear moral standard. Nevertheless, no conception of just
equality can be deduced from the notion of moral equality. Rather, we
find competing philosophical conceptions of equal treatment serving as
interpretations of moral equality. These need to be assessed according
to their degree of fidelity to the deeper ideal of moral equality
(Kymlicka 1990, p. 44).


### 2.4 Presumption of Equality



Many conceptions of equality operate along procedural lines involving
a *presumption of equality*. More materially concrete, ethical
approaches, as described in the next section below, are concerned with
distributive criteria - the presumption of equality, in
contrast, is a formal, procedural principle of construction located on
a higher formal and argumentative level. What is at stake here is the
question of the principle with which a material conception of justice
should be constructed, particularly once the approaches described
above prove inadequate. The presumption of equality is a prima facie
principle of equal distribution for all goods politically suited for
the process of public distribution. In the domain of political
justice, all members of a given community, taken together as a
collective body, have to decide centrally on the fair distribution of
social goods, as well as on the distribution's fair realization. Any
claim to a particular distribution, including any existing
distributive scheme, has to be impartially justified, i.e., no
ownership should be recognized without justification. Applied to this
political domain, the presumption of equality requires that everyone
should get an equal share in the distribution unless certain types of
differences are relevant and justify, through universally acceptable
reasons, unequal shares. (With different terms and arguments, this
principle is conceived as a presumption by Benn & Peters (1959,
111) and by Bedau (1967, 19); as a relevant reasons approach by
Williams (1973); as a conception of symmetry by Tugendhat (1993, 374;
1997, chap. 3); as default option by Hinsch (2002, chap. 5); for
criticism of the presumption of equality, cf. Westen (1990, chap.
10).) This presumption results in a principle of prima facie equal
distribution for all distributable goods. A strict principle of equal
distribution is not required, but it is morally necessary to justify
impartially any unequal distribution. The burden of proof lies on the
side of those who favor any form of unequal distribution. (For a
justification of the presumption in favor of equality s. Gosepath
2004, II.8.; Gosepath 2015.)



The presumption of equality provides an elegant procedure for
constructing a theory of distributive justice (Gosepath 2004). One has
only to analyze what can justify unequal treatment or unequal
distribution in different spheres. To put it briefly, the following
postulates of equality are at present generally considered morally
required.



Strict equality is called for in the legal sphere of civil freedoms,
since - putting aside limitation on freedom as punishment
- there is no justification for any exceptions. As follows from
the principle of formal equality, all citizens must have equal general
rights and duties, which are grounded in general laws that apply to
all. This is the postulate of legal equality. In addition, the
postulate of equal freedom is equally valid: every person should have
the same freedom to structure his or her life, and this in the most
far-reaching manner possible in a peaceful and appropriate social
order.



In the political sphere, the possibilities for political participation
should be equally distributed. All citizens have the same claim to
participation in forming public opinion, and in the distribution,
control, and exercise of political power. This is the postulate
- requiring equal opportunity - of equal political power
sharing. To ensure equal opportunity, social institutions have to be
designed in such a way that persons who are disadvantaged, e.g. have a
stutter or a low income, have an equal chance to make their views
known and to participate fully in the democratic process.



In the social sphere, equally gifted and motivated citizens must have
approximately the same chances to obtain offices and positions,
independent of their economic or social class and native endowments.
This is the postulate of fair equality of social opportunity. Any
unequal outcome must nevertheless result from equality of opportunity,
i.e., qualifications alone should be the determining factor, not
social background or influences of milieu.



The equality required in the economic sphere is complex, taking
account of several positions that - each according to the
presumption of equality - justify a turn away from equality. A
salient problem here is what constitutes justified exceptions to equal
distribution of goods, the main subfield in the debate over adequate
conceptions of distributive equality and its currency. The following
factors are usually considered eligible for justified unequal
treatment: (a) need or differing natural disadvantages (e.g.
disabilities); (b) existing rights or claims (e.g. private property);
(c) differences in the performance of special services (e.g. desert,
efforts, or sacrifices); (d) efficiency; and (e) compensation for
direct and indirect or structural discrimination (e.g. affirmative
action).



These factors play an essential, albeit varied, role in the following
alternative egalitarian theories of distributive justice. These offer
different accounts of what should be equalized in the economic sphere.
Most can be understood as applications of the presumption of equality
(whether they explicitly acknowledge it or not); only a few (like
strict equality, libertarianism, and sufficiency) are alternatives to
the presumption.


## 3. Conceptions of Distributive Equality: Equality of What?



Every effort to interpret the concept of equality and to apply the
principles of equality mentioned above demands a precise measure of
the parameters of equality. We need to know the dimensions within
which the striving for equality is morally relevant. What follows is a
brief review of the seven most prominent conceptions of distributive
equality, each offering a different answer to one question: in the
field of distributive justice, what should be equalized, or what
should be the parameter or "currency" of equality?


### 3.1 Simple Equality and Objections to Equality in General



*Simple* equality, meaning everyone being furnished with the
same material level of goods and services, represents a strict
position as far as distributive justice is concerned. It is generally
rejected as untenable.



Hence, with the possible exception of Babeuf (1796) and Shaw (1928),
no prominent author or movement has demanded strict equality. Since
egalitarianism has come to be widely associated with the demand for
economic equality, and this in turn with communistic or socialistic
ideas, it is important to stress that neither communism nor socialism
- despite their protest against poverty and exploitation and
their demand for social security for all citizens - calls for
absolute economic equality. The orthodox Marxist view of economic
equality was expounded in the *Critique of the Gotha Program*
(1875). Marx here rejects the idea of legal equality, on three
grounds. First, he indicates, equality draws on a limited number of
morally relevant perspectives and neglects others, thus having unequal
effects. In Marx's view, the economic structure is the most
fundamental basis for the historical development of society, and is
thus the point of reference for explaining its features. Second,
theories of justice have concentrated excessively on distribution
instead of the basic questions of production. Third, a future
communist society needs no law and no justice, since social conflicts
will have vanished.



As an idea, *simple* equality fails because of problems that
are raised in regards to equality in general. It is useful to review
these problems, as they require resolution in any plausible approach
to equality.



(i) We need adequate indices for the measurement of the equality of
the goods to be distributed. Through what concepts should equality and
inequality be understood? It is thus clear that equality of material
goods can lead to unequal satisfaction. Money constitutes a typical,
though inadequate, index; at the very least, equal opportunity has to
be conceived in other terms.



(ii) The time span needs to be indicated for realizing the desired
model of equal distribution (McKerlie 1989, Sikora 1989). Should we
seek to equalize the goods in question over complete individual
lifetimes, or should we seek to ensure that various life segments are
as equally provisioned as possible?



(iii) Equality distorts incentives promoting achievement in the
economic field, and the administrative costs of redistribution produce
wasteful inefficiencies (Okun 1975). Equality and efficiency need to
be balanced. Often, Pareto-optimality is demanded in this respect,
usually by economists. A social condition is Pareto-optimal or
Pareto-efficient when it is not possible to shift to another condition
judged better by at least one person and worse by none (Sen 1970,
chap. 2, 2\*). A widely discussed alternative to the Pareto principle
is the Kaldor-Hicks welfare criterion. This stipulates that a rise in
social welfare is always present when the benefits accruing through
the distribution of value in a society exceed the corresponding costs.
A change thus becomes desirable when the winners in such a change
could compensate the losers for their losses, and still retain a
substantial profit. In contrast to the Pareto-criterion, the
Kaldor-Hicks criterion contains a compensation rule (Kaldor 1939). For
purposes of economic analysis, such theoretical models of optimal
efficiency make a great deal of sense. However, the analysis is always
made relative to a starting situation that can itself be unjust and
unequal. A society can thus be (close to) Pareto-optimality -
i.e., no one can increase his or her material goods or freedoms
without diminishing those of someone else - while also
displaying enormous inequalities in the distribution of the same goods
and freedoms. For this reason, egalitarians claim that it may be
necessary to reduce Pareto-optimality for the sake of justice, if
there is no more egalitarian distribution that is also Pareto-optimal.
In the eyes of their critics, equality of whatever kind should not
lead to some people having to make do with less, when this equalizing
down does not benefit any of those who are in a worse position.



(iv) *Moral objections*: A strict and mechanical equal
distribution between all individuals does not sufficiently take into
account the differences among individuals and their situations. In
essence, since individuals desire different things, why should
everyone receive the same goods? Intuitively, for example, we can
recognize that a sick person has other claims than a healthy person,
and furnishing each with the same goods would be mistaken. With simple
equality, personal freedoms are unacceptably limited and distinctive
individual qualities insufficiently acknowledged; in this way they are
in fact unequally regarded. Furthermore, persons not only have a moral
right to their own needs being considered, but a right and a duty to
take responsibility for their own decisions and the resulting
consequences.



Working against the identification of distributive justice with simple
equality, a basic postulate of many present-day egalitarians
is as follows: human beings are themselves responsible for certain
inequalities resulting from their free decisions; aside from minimum
aid in emergencies, they deserve no recompense for such inequalities
(but cf. relational egalatarians, discussed in Section
 4).
On the other hand, they are due compensation for inequalities that are
not the result of self-chosen options. For egalitarians, the world is
morally better when *equality of life conditions* prevail. This
is an amorphous ideal demanding further clarification. Why is such
equality an ideal, and what precise currency of equality does it
involve?



By the same token, most egalitarians do not advocate an equality of
outcome, but different kinds of equality of opportunity, due to their
emphasis on a pair of morally central points: that individuals are
responsible for their decisions, and that the only things to be
considered objects of equality are those which serve the real
interests of individuals. The opportunities to be equalized between
people can be opportunities for well-being (i.e. objective welfare),
or for preference satisfaction (i.e., subjective welfare), or for
resources. It is not equality of objective or subjective well-being or
resources themselves that should be equalized, but an equal
opportunity to gain the well-being or resources one aspires to. Such
equality depends on their being a realm of options for each individual
equal to the options enjoyed by all other persons, in the sense of the
same prospects for fulfillment of preferences or the possession of
resources. The opportunity must consist of possibilities one can
really take advantage of. Equal opportunity prevails when human beings
effectively enjoy equal realms of possibility.



(v) Simple equality is very often associated with equality of results
(although these are two distinct concepts). However, to strive only
for equality of results is problematic. To illustrate the point, let
us briefly limit the discussion to a single action and the event or
state of affairs resulting from it. Arguably, actions should not be
judged solely by the moral quality of their results, as important as
this may be. One must also consider the way in which the events or
circumstances to be evaluated have come about. Generally speaking, a
moral judgement requires not only the assessment of the results of the
action in question (the consequentialist aspect) but, first and
foremost, the assessment of the intention of the actor (the
deontological aspect). The source and its moral quality influence the
moral judgement of the results (Pogge 1999, sect. V). For example, if
you strike me, your blow will hurt me; the pain I feel may be
considered bad in itself, but the moral status of your blow will also
depend on whether you were (morally) allowed such a gesture (perhaps
through parental status, although that is controversial) or even
obliged to execute it (e.g. as a police officer preventing me from
doing harm to others), or whether it was in fact prohibited but not
prevented. What is true of individual actions (or their omission) has
to be true *mutatis mutandis* of social institutions and
circumstances like distributions resulting from collective social
actions (or their omission). Social institutions should therefore be
assessed not only on the basis of information about how they affect
individual quality of life. A society in which people starve on the
streets is certainly marked by inequality; nevertheless, its moral
quality, i.e., whether the society is just or unjust with regard to
this problem, also depends on the suffering's causes. Does the society
allow starvation as an unintended but tolerable side effect of what
its members see as a just distributive scheme? Indeed, does it even
defend the suffering as a necessary means, as with forms of Social
Darwinism? Or has the society taken measures against starvation which
have turned out to be insufficient? In the latter case, whether the
society has taken such steps for reasons of political morality or
efficiency again makes a moral difference. Hence even for
egalitarians, equality of results is too narrow and one-sided a
focus.



(vi) Finally, there is a danger of (strict) equality leading to
uniformity, rather than to a respect for pluralism and democracy
(Cohen 1989; Arneson 1993). In the contemporary debate, this complaint
has been mainly articulated in feminist and multiculturalist theory. A
central tenet of feminist theory is that gender has been and remains a
historically variable and internally differentiated relation of
domination. The same holds for so-called racial and ethnic
differences, which are often still conceived of as marking different
values. The different groups involved here rightly object to their
discrimination, marginalization, and domination, and an appeal to
equality of status thus seems a solution. However, as feminists and
multiculturalists have pointed out, equality, as usually understood
and practiced, is constituted in part by a denial and ranking of
differences; as a result it seems less useful as an antidote to
relations of domination. "Equality" can often mean the
assimilation to a pre-existing and problematic 'male' or
'white' or 'middle class' norm. In short,
domination and a fortiori inequality often arises out of an inability
to appreciate and nurture differences, not out of a failure to see
everyone as the same. To recognize these differences should however
not lead to an essentialism grounded in sexual or cultural
characteristics. There is a crucial debate between those who insist
that sexual, racial, and ethnic differences should become irrelevant,
on the one hand, and those believing that such differences, even
though culturally relevant, should not furnish a basis for inequality:
that one should rather find mechanisms for securing equality, despite
valued differences. Neither of these strategies involves rejecting
equality. The dispute is about how equality is to be attained
(McKinnon 1989, Taylor 1992).



Proposing a connection between equality and pluralism, Michael
Walzer's theory (1983) aims at what he calls "complex
equality". According to Walzer, relevant reasons can only speak
in favor of distributing specific types of goods in specific spheres,
not in several or all spheres. Against a theory of simple equality
promoting equal distribution of dominant goods, which underestimates
the complexity of the criteria at work in each given sphere, the
dominance of particular goods needs to be ended. For instance,
purchasing power in the political sphere through means derived from
the economic sphere (i.e., money) must be prevented. Walzer's theory
of complex equality is not actually aimed at equality per se, but at
the separation of spheres of justice; the theory's designation is
misleading. Any theory of equality should, however, as per Walzer,
avoid monistic conceptions and recognize instead the complexity of
life and the plurality of criteria for justice.



The preceding considerations yield the following desideratum: instead
of *simple* equality, a more *complex* equality needs to
be conceptualized. That concept should resolve the problems discussed
above through a distinction of various classes of goods, a separation
of spheres, and a differentiation of relevant criteria.


### 3.2 Libertarianism



*Libertarianism* and *economic liberalism* represent
minimalist positions in relation to distributive justice. Citing
Locke, they both postulate an original right to freedom and property,
thus arguing against redistribution and social rights and for the free
market (Nozick 1974; Hayek 1960). They assert an opposition between
equality and freedom: the individual (natural) right to freedom can be
limited only for the sake of foreign and domestic peace. For this
reason, libertarians consider maintaining public order the state's
only legitimate duty. They assert a natural right to self-ownership
(the philosophical term for "ownership of oneself" -
i.e., one's will, body, work, etc.) that entitles everybody to
hitherto unowned bits of the external world by means of mixing their
labor with it. All individuals can thus claim property if
"enough and as good" is left over for others (Locke's
proviso). Correspondingly, they defend market freedoms and oppose the
use of redistributive taxation schemes for the sake of egalitarian
social justice. A principal objection to libertarian theory is that
its interpretation of the Lockean proviso - nobody's situation
should be worsened through an initial acquisition of property -
leads to an excessively weak requirement and is thus unacceptable
(Kymlicka 1990, pp.108-117). However, with a broader and more adequate
interpretation of what it means for one a situation to be worse than
another, it is much more difficult to justify private appropriation
and, *a fortiori*, all further ownership rights. If the proviso
recognizes the full range of interests and alternatives that
self-owners have, then it will not generate unrestricted rights over
unequal amounts of resources. Another objection is that precisely if
one's own free accomplishment is what is meant to count, as the
libertarians argue, success should not depend strictly on luck,
extraordinary natural gifts, inherited property, and status. In other
words, *equal opportunity* also needs to at least be present as
a counterbalance, ensuring that the fate of human beings is determined
by their decisions and not by unavoidable social circumstances. Equal
opportunity thus seems to be the frequently vague minimal formula at
work in every egalitarian conception of distributive justice. Many
egalitarians, however, wish for more - namely, an *equality
of (at least basic) life conditions*.



In any event, with a shift away from a strictly negative idea of
freedom, economic liberalism can indeed itself point the way to more
social and economic equality. For with such a shift, what is at stake
is not only assuring an equal right to self-defense, but also
furnishing everyone more or less the same chance to actually make use
of the right to freedom (e.g. Van Parijs 1995, Steiner 1994, Otsuka
2005). In other words, certain basic goods need to be furnished to
assure the equitable or "fair value of the basic
liberties" (Rawls 1993, pp. 356-63).


### 3.3 Utilitarianism



It is possible to interpret utilitarianism as concretizing moral
equality - and this in a way meant to offer the same
consideration to the interests of all human beings (Kymlicka 1990, pp.
31f., Hare 1981, p. 26, Sen 1992, pp. 13f.). From the utilitarian
perspective, since everyone counts as one and no one as more than one
(Bentham), the interests of all should be treated equally without
consideration of contents of interest or an individual's material
situation. For utilitarianism, this means that all enlightened
personal interests have to be fairly aggregated. The morally proper
action is the one that maximizes utility (Hare 1984). This conception
of equal treatment has been criticized as inadequate by many opponents
of utilitarianism. At least in utilitarianism's classical form -
so the critique reads - the hoped for moral equality is flawed,
because all desires are taken up by the utilitarian calculation,
including "selfish" and "external" preferences
(Dworkin 1977, p. 234) that are meant to all have equal weight, even
when they diminish the 'rights' and intentions of others.
This conflicts with our everyday understanding of equal treatment.
What is here at play is an argument involving "offensive"
and "expensive" taste: a person cannot expect others to
sustain his or her desires at the expense of their own (Kymlicka 1990,
p. 40 f.). Rather, according to generally shared conviction, equal
treatment consistently requires a basis of equal rights and resources
that cannot be taken away from one person, whatever the desire of
others. In line with Rawls (1971, pp. 31, 564, cf. 450), many hold
that justice entails according no value to interests insofar as they
conflict with justice. According to this view, unjustified preferences
will not distort the mutual claims people have on each other. Equal
treatment has to consist of everyone being able to claim a fair
portion, and not in all interests having the same weight in disposal
over my portion. Utilitarians cannot admit any restrictions on
interests based on morals or justice. As long as utilitarian theory
lacks a concept of justice and fair allocation, it must fail in its
goal of treating everyone as equals. As Rawls (1971, pp. 27) also
famously argues, utilitarianism that involves neglecting the
separateness of persons does not contain a proper interpretation of
moral equality as equal respect for each individual.


### 3.4 Equality of Welfare



The concept of welfare equality is motivated by an intuition that when
it comes to political ethics, what is at stake is individual
well-being. The central criterion for justice must consequently be
equalizing the level of welfare. But taking welfare as what is to be
equalized leads to difficulties resembling those of utilitarianism. If
one contentiously identifies subjective welfare with preference
satisfaction, it seems implausible to count all individual preferences
as equal, some - such as the desire to do others wrong -
being inadmissible on grounds of justice (the offensive taste
argument). Any welfare-centered concept of equality grants people with
refined and expensive taste more resources - something
distinctly at odds with our moral intuitions (the expensive taste
argument) (Dworkin 1981a). However, satisfaction in the fulfillment of
desires cannot serve as a standard, since we wish for more than a
simple feeling of happiness. A more viable standard for welfare
comparisons would seem to be success in the fulfillment of
preferences. A fair evaluation of such success cannot be purely
subjective, but requires a standard of what should or could have been
achieved. This itself involves an assumption regarding just
distribution, so it cannot stand as an independent criterion for
justice. Another serious problem with any welfare-centered concept of
equality is that it cannot take account of either desert (Feinberg
1970) or personal responsibility for one's own well-being, to the
extent this is possible and reasonable.


### 3.5 Equality of Resources



Represented above all by both Rawls and Dworkin, resource equality
avoids such problems (Rawls 1971; Dworkin 1981b). It holds individuals
responsible for their decisions and actions, but not for circumstances
beyond their control, such as race, sex, skin-color, intelligence, and
social position, thus excluding these as distributive criteria. Equal
opportunity is insufficient because it does not compensate for unequal
innate gifts. What applies for social circumstances should also apply
for such gifts, as both are purely arbitrary from a moral point of
view.



According to Rawls, human beings should have the same initial
expectations of "basic goods," i.e., all-purpose goods;
this in no way precludes ending up with different quantities of such
goods or resources, as a result of personal economic decisions and
actions. When prime importance is accorded an assurance of equal basic
freedoms and rights, inequalities are just when they fulfill two
provisos: on the one hand, they have to be linked to offices and
positions open to everyone under conditions of fair equality of
opportunity; on the other hand, they have to reflect the famous
'difference principle' in offering the greatest possible
advantage to the least advantaged members of society (Rawls 1993, p. 5
f.; 1971, SS 13). Otherwise, the economic order requires revision.
Due to the argument of the moral arbitrariness of talents, the
commonly accepted criteria for merit (like productivity, working
hours, effort) are clearly relativized. The difference principle only
allows the talented to earn more to the extent this raises the lowest
incomes. According to Rawls, with regard to the basic structure of
society, the difference principle should be opted for under a
self-chosen "veil of ignorance" regarding personal and
historical circumstances and similar factors: the principle offers a
general assurance of not totally succumbing to the hazards of a free
market situation; and everyone does better than with inevitably
inefficient total equal distribution, whose level of well-being is
below that of those worst off under the difference principle.



Since Rawls' *Theory of Justice* is the classical focal point
of present-day political philosophy, it is worth noting the different
ways his theory claims to be egalitarian. First, Rawls upholds a
natural basis for equal human worth: a minimal capacity for having a
conception of the good and a sense of justice. Second, through the
device of the "veil of ignorance," people are conceived as
equals in the "original position." Third, the idea of
sharing this "original position" presupposes the parties
having political equality, as equal participants in the process of
choosing the principles by which they would be governed. Fourth, Rawls
proposes fair equality of opportunity. Fifth, he maintains that all
desert must be institutionally defined, depending on the goals of the
society. No one deserves his or her talents or circumstances, which
are products of the natural lottery. Finally, the difference principle
tends toward equalizing holdings. However, it is important to keep in
mind, as Scheffler (2003) has pointed out, that the main focus of
Rawls' theory is justice as such; it is only secondarily about an
egalitarian conception of justice. In addition, since the primary
subject is the basic structure, pure procedural justice has priority
over distributive or allocative justice Equality is not the only or
single value for Rawls.



Dworkin's equality of resources (1981b), on the other hand, is
concerned with equality as such. His theory stakes a claim to being
even more 'ambition- and endowment-insensitive' than
Rawls' theory. Unequal distribution of resources is considered fair
only when it results from the decisions and intentional actions of
those concerned. Dworkin proposes a hypothetical auction in which
everyone can accumulate bundles of resources through equal means of
payment, so that in the end no one is jealous of another's bundle (the
envy test). The auction-procedure also offers a way to precisely
measure equality of resources: the measure of resources devoted to a
person's life is defined by the importance of the resources to others
(Dworkin 1981b, p. 290). In the free market, how the distribution then
develops depends on an individual's ambitions. The inequalities that
thus emerge are justified, since one has to take responsibility for
how one's choices turn out (i.e., one's "option luck") in
the realm of personal responsibility. In contrast, unjustified
inequalities based on different innate provisions and gifts, as well
as on brute luck, should be compensated for through a fictive
differentiated insurance system: its premiums are established behind
Dworkin's own "veil of ignorance," in order to then be
distributed in real life to everyone and collected in taxes. For
Dworkin, this is the key to the natural lottery being balanced fairly,
preventing a "slavery of the talented" through excessive
redistribution.


### 3.6 Responsibility and Luck-Egalitarianism



Only some egalitarians hold inequality to be bad per se. Most of
today's egalitarians are pluralistic, recognizing other values besides
equality. So called luck-egalitarians regard the moral significance of
choice and responsibility as one of the most important values besides
equality (for an overview over the debate see Lippert-Rasmussen 2015).
They hold that it is bad - unjust or unfair - for some to
be worse off than others through no fault or choice of their own
(Temkin 1993, 13) and therefore strive to eliminate involuntary
disadvantages, for which the sufferer cannot be held responsible
(Cohen 1989, 916).



The principle of responsibility provides a central normative vantage
point for deciding on which grounds one might justify which
inequality. The *positive* formulation of the responsibility
principle requires an assumption of personal responsibility and holds
that inequalities which are the result of self-chosen options are
just. (See above all Dworkin, 1981b, p. 311; contra: Anderson, 1999.)
Unequal portions of social goods are thus fair when they result from
the decisions and intentional actions of those concerned. Individuals
must accept responsibility for the costs of their decisions. Persons
are themselves responsible for certain inequalities that result from
their voluntary decisions, and they deserve no compensation for such
inequalities, aside from minimal provisions in cases of dire need (see
below). In its *negative formulation*, the responsibility
principle holds that inequalities which are not the result of
self-chosen options are to be rejected as unjust; persons
disadvantaged in this way deserve compensation. That which one can do
nothing about, or for which one is not responsible, cannot constitute
a relevant criterion. Still, the initial assumption remains an
ascription of responsibility, and each individual case requires close
scrutiny: one is responsible and accountable unless there is an
adequate reason for being considered otherwise (but cf. Stemplowska
2013 for a different interpretation)..



If advantages or disadvantages that are due to arbitrary and unearned
differences are unfair, this holds for social circumstances as well as
natural endowments. The reasons favoring an exclusion of features like
skin-color, size, sex, and place of origin as primarily discriminative
apply equally to other natural human qualities, like intelligence,
appearance, physical strength, and so forth. The kind and the extent
of one's natural abilities are due to a lottery of nature; considered
from a moral standpoint, their distribution is purely arbitrary
(Rawls, 1971, SS 48). To sum up: natural and social endowment must
not count, and personal intentions and voluntary decisions should
count. Thus, a given social order is just when it equalizes as much as
possible, and in a normatively tenable way, all personal disadvantages
for which an individual is not responsible, and accords individuals
the capacity to bear the consequences of their decisions and actions,
as befits their capacity for autonomy.



Objections to all versions of "brute-luck egalitarianism"
come from two sides. Some authors criticize its in their view
unjustified or excessively radical rejection of merit: The
luck-egalitarian thesis of desert only being justifiably acknowledged
if it involves desert "all the way down" (Nozick 1974, p.
225) not only destroys the classical, everyday principle of desert,
since everything has a basis that we ourselves have not created. In
the eyes of such critics, along with the merit-principle this argument
also destroys our personal identity, since we can no longer accredit
ourselves with our own capacities and accomplishments. (Cf. the texts
in Pojman & McLeod 1998, Olsaretti 2003.) Other authors consider
the criterion for responsibility to be too strong, indeed inhuman (or
"harsh") in its consequences, since human beings
responsible for their own misery would (supposedly) be left alone with
their misery (Anderson 1999, also MacLeod 1998, Scheffler 2003, Wolff
1998, Fleurbaey 1995, Voigt 2007, Eyal 2017, Olsaretti 2009,
Stemplowska 2009). However, pluralistic egalitarians should be able
to argue that there are special cases, in which people are so badly
off that they should be helped, even if they got into the miserable
situation through their own fault. But even when people are in
terrible situations, which did not arise through their own fault
('bad brute luck') - for instance, when they are
disabled from birth - and egalitarians therefore have reasons to
help them, these reasons are supposedly stigmatizing, since in these
cases the principles of distribution would be based on pity. In these
cases, political institutions have to take certain decisions -
for example, in which category a particular case of distress should be
placed - and gather relevant information on their
citizens. Against such a procedure, one could object that it subjects
the citizens to the tutelage of the state and harms their private
sphere (Anderson 1999, also Hayek 1960: 85-102).


### 3.7 Equality of Opportunity for Welfare or Advantage



Approaches based on equality of opportunity can be read as revisions
of both welfarism and resourcism. Ranged against welfarism and
designed to avoid its pitfalls, they incorporate the powerful ideas of
choice and responsibility into various, improved forms of
egalitarianism. Such approaches are meant to equalize outcomes
resulting from causes beyond a person's control (i.e., beyond
circumstances or endowment), but to allow differential outcomes that
result from autonomous choice or ambition. But the approaches are also
aimed at maintaining the insight that individual preferences have to
count, as the sole basis for a necessary linkage back to the
individual perspective: otherwise, there is an overlooking of the
person's value. In Arneson's (1989, 1990) concept of *equal
opportunity for welfare*, the preferences determining the measure
of individual well-being are meant to be conceived hypothetically
- i.e., a person would decide on them after a process of ideal
reflection. In order to correspond to the morally central vantage of
personal responsibility, what should be equalized are not enlightened
preferences themselves, but rather real opportunities to achieve or
receive a good, to the extent that it is aspired to. G.A. Cohen's
(1989, p. 916 f.) broader conception of *equality of access to
advantage* attempts to integrate the perspectives of welfare
equality and resource equality through the overriding concept of
advantage. For Cohen, there are two grounds for egalitarian
compensation. Egalitarians will be moved to furnish a paralyzed person
with a compensatory wheelchair independently of the person's welfare
level. This egalitarian response to disability overrides equality of
(opportunity to) welfare. Egalitarians also favor compensation for
phenomena such as pain, independent of any loss of capacity -
for instance by paying for expensive medicine. But, Cohen claims, any
justification for such compensation has to invoke the idea of equality
of opportunity to welfare. He thus views both aspects, resources and
welfare, as necessary and irreducible. Much of Roemer's (1998) more
technical argument is devoted to constructing the scale to calibrate
the extent to which something is the result of circumstances. An
incurred adverse consequence is the result of circumstances, not
choice, precisely to the extent that it is a consequence that persons
of one or another specific type can be expected to incur.


### 3.8 Capabilities Approaches



Theories that limit themselves to the equal distribution of basic
means, in the hope of doing justice to the different goals of all
human beings, are often criticized as fetishistic, because they focus
on means as opposed to what individuals gain with these means (Sen
1980). The value that goods have for someone depends on objective
possibilities, the natural environment, and individual capacities.
Hence, in contrast to the resourcist approach, Amartya Sen proposes
orientating distribution around "capabilities to achieve
functionings," i.e., the various things that a person manages to
do orbe in leading a life (Sen 1992). In other words, evaluating
individual well-being has to be tied to a capability for achieving and
maintaining various precious conditions and "functionings"
constitutive of a person's being, such as adequate nourishment, good
health, the ability to move about freely or to appear in public
without shame. The real freedom to acquire well-being is also
important here, a freedom represented in the capability to oneself
choose forms of achievement and the combination of
"functionings." For Sen, capabilities are thus the measure
of an *equality of capabilities* human beings enjoy to lead
their lives. A problem consistently raised with capability approaches
is the ability to weigh capabilities in order to arrive at a metric
for equality. The problem is intensified by the fact that various
moral perspectives are blended in the concept of capability (Cohen
1993, p. 17-26, Williams 1987). Martha Nussbaum (1992, 2000) has
linked the capability approach to an Aristotelian, essentialistic,
"thick" theory of the good - a theory meant to be,
as she puts it, "vague," incomplete, and open-ended enough
to leave place for individual and cultural variation. On the basis of
such a "thick" conception of necessary and universal
elements of a good life, certain capabilities and functionings can be
designated as foundational. In this manner, Nussbaum can endow the
capability approach with a precision that furnishes an index of
interpersonal comparison, but at the risk of not being neutral enough
regarding the plurality of personal conceptions of the good, a
neutrality normally required by most liberals (most importantly Rawls
1993; but see Robeyns 2009 for a different take on the comparison with
Rawls). For further discussion, see the entry on the
 capability approach.


## 4. Relational Equality



Since the late 1990s, social relations egalitarianism has appeared in
philosophical discourse as an increasingly important competitor to
distribuitivist accounts of justice, especially its luck egalitarian
versions (cf. Lippert-Rassmussen 2018). Proponents of social relations
egalitarianism include Anderson (1999), Miller (1997), Scanlon (1996,
2018), Scheffler (2003, 2005, 2015), Wolff (1998, 2010) and Young
(1990). Negatively, they are united in a rejection of the view that
justice is a matter of eliminating differential luck. Positively, they
claim that society is just if, and only if, individuals within it
relate to one another as equals. Accordingly, the site of justice
(i.e. that to which principles of justice apply) is society, not
distributions. Relational Egalitarianism has a certain overlap with
many theories of recognition and non-domination. Certain status
differences are at the core of their objections, like those
stigmatizing differences in status, whereby the badly off are caused
to experience themselves as inferior, and are treated as inferiors, or
when inequalities create objectionable relations of
power(Honneth/Fraser 2003) and domination (Pettit 2001).



What does it mean that (and when do) individuals within a society
relate to one another as equals? Racial discrimination, for example,
is a paradigmatic instance of this condition?s violation. But once we
move beyond a handful of such examples things become much less
clear.



These claims to social and political equality exclude all unequal,
hierarchical forms of social relationships, in which some people
dominate, exploit, marginalize, demean, and inflict violence upon
others:



> 
> As a social ideal, it holds that a human society must be conceived of
> as a cooperative arrangement among equals, each of whom enjoys the
> same social standing. As a political ideal, it highlights the claims
> that citizens are entitled to make on one another by virtue of their
> status as citizens, without any need for a moralized accounting of the
> details of their particular circumstances. (Scheffler 2003, p. 22)
> 



However, forms of differentiation that do not violate moral equality
(see above) are not per se excluded from social equality, if they are
compatible with the recognition of the equal social status of
concerned parties, as with differences relating to merit, need, and,
if appropriate, race, gender, and social background (as in cases of
affirmative action or fair punishment).



> 
> Where there is social equality, people feel that each member of the
> community enjoys an equal standing with all the rest that overrides
> their unequal ratings along particular dimensions. (Miller, 1997, p.
> 232)
> 



Thus the question has to be answered whether - and if so, why
- other dimensions, such as a person's natural talents,
creativity, intelligence, innovative skills or entrepreneurial
ability, can be the basis for legitimate inequalities.



Relational egalitarians need a certain conception of what an equal
standing in society amounts to and implies in terms of rights and
goods. One way to offer such an account would be to rely (like
Anderson 1999) on the capabilities approach (SS3.8) and
sufficitarianism (SS6.2.): In a democratic community that
preserves the free and equal status of persons, at least three sets of
conditions have to be fulfilled.



First, certain political conditions are necessary to allow citizens to
participate as equals in democratic deliberation. These include, among
others, the capabilities to vote, hold office, assemble, petition the
government, speak freely, and move about freely (Rawls 1999, p.53).
The principle of democratic equality (as asked for by Anderson 1999)
requires us to eliminate social hierarchies that prevent a
democratically organized society, a society in which we cooperate and
decide upon state action as equals. Persons morally owe each other the
capabilities and conditions to live as equals in a democratic
community (Christiano 2008, Kolodny 2014). Democracy can be
interpreted as realizing public equality in collective
decision-making.



Second, to participate as an equal in civil society, certain civil
conditions must obtain. These include the conditions that make it
robustly likely that injustices such as marginalization,
powerlessness, cultural imperialism (Anderson 1999 with reference to
Young 1990), or domination (Pettit 2001) can be to avoided. Third,
certain social conditions and personal capabilities have to obtain
that enable people to enjoy equal standing in society. Citizens need,
in this regard, adequate nutrition, shelter, clothing, education, and
medical care. This last point leads into the debate over whether a
relational egalitarian conception of social justice yields intrinsic
and instrumental reasons of justice to care about distributive
inequality in socially produced goods, despite its emphasis on just
social relationships and not the distribution of goods per se
(Schemmel 2011, Elford 2017).


## 5. Equality Among Whom?



Justice is primarily related to individual actions. Individual persons
are the primary bearers of responsibility (the key principle of
ethical individualism). This raises two controversial issues in the
contemporary debate.



One could regard the norms of distributive equality as applying to
groups rather than individuals. It is often groups that rightfully
raise the issue of an inequality between themselves and the rest of
society, as with women and racial and ethnic groups. The question
arises of whether inequality among such groups should be considered
morally objectionable in itself, or whether even in the case of
groups, the underlying concern should be how individuals (as members
of such groups) fare in comparative terms. If there is a worry about
inequalities between groups of individuals, why does this not
translate into a worry about inequalities between members of the
group?



A further question concerns whether the norms of distributive equality
(whatever they are) apply to all individuals, regardless of where (and
when) they live. Or rather, do they only hold for members of
communities within states and nations? Most theories of equality deal
exclusively with distributive equality among people in a single
society. There does not, however, seem to be any rationale for that
limitation. Can the group of the entitled be restricted prior to the
examination of concrete claims? Many theories seem to imply this,
especially when they connect distributive justice or the goods to be
distributed with social cooperation or production. For those who
contribute nothing to cooperation, such as the disabled, children, or
future generations, would have to be denied a claim to a fair share.
The circle of persons who are to be the recipients of distribution
would thus be restricted from the outset. Other theories are less
restrictive, insofar as they do not link distribution to actual social
collaboration, yet nonetheless do restrict it, insofar as they bind it
to the status of citizenship. In this view, distributive justice is
limited to the individuals within a society. Those outside the
community have no entitlement to social justice. Unequal distribution
among states and the social situations of people outside the
particular society could not, in this view, be a problem of social
distributive justice (Nagel 2005). Yet here too, the universal
morality of equal respect and the principle of equal distribution
demand that all persons consider one another as prima facie equally
entitled to the goods, unless reasons for an unequal distribution can
be advanced. It may be that in the process of justification, reasons
will emerge for privileging those who were particularly involved in
the production of a good, but there is no prima facie reason to
exclude from the outset other persons, such as those from other
countries, from the process of distribution and justification (Pogge
2002). That may seem most intuitively plausible in the case of natural
resources (e.g. oil) that someone discovers by chance on or beneath
the surface of his or her property. Why should such resources belong
to the person who discovers them, or on whose property they are
located? Nevertheless, in the eyes of many if not most people, global
justice, i.e., extending egalitarian distributive justice globally,
demands too much from individuals and their states (Miller 1998; but
cf. Caney 2005). Alternatively, one might argue that there are other
'special relations' between members of one society that do
not exist between members of different societies. Nationalism is an
example for such a (controversial) thesis that may provide a case for
a kind of local equality (Miller 1995). For further discussion,
see the entry on 
 global justice.



Another issue is the relationship between generations. Does the
present generation have an egalitarian obligation towards future
generations regarding equal living conditions? One argument in favor
of this conclusion might be that people should not end up unequally
well off as a result of morally arbitrary factors. However, the issue
of justice between generation is notoriously complex (Temkin
1992). For further discussion, see the entry on 
 intergenerational justice.


## 6. The Value of Equality: Why Equality?



Does equality play a major role in a theory of justice, and if so,
what is this role? A conception of justice is *egalitarian*
when it views equality as a fundamental goal of justice. Temkin has
put it as follows:



> 
> ... an egalitarian is any person who attaches *some* value
> to equality *itself* (that is, any person that cares *at
> all* about equality, over and above the extent it promotes other
> ideals). So, equality needn't be the only value, or even the ideal she
> values most... . Egalitarians have the deep and (for them)
> compelling view that it is a bad thing - unjust and unfair
> - for some to be worse off than others through no fault of their
> own. (Temkin 1986, p. 100, cf. 1993, p. 7)
> 



In general, the focus of the modern egalitarian effort to realize
equality is on the possibility of a good life, i.e., on an equality of
life prospects and life circumstances - interpreted in various
ways according to various positions in the "equality of
what" debate (see above).


### 6.1. Kinds of Egalitarianism



It is apparent that there are three sorts of egalitarianism: intrinsic,
instrumental and constitutive. (For a twofold distinction cf. Parfit
1997, Temkin 1993, p. 11, McKerlie, 1996, p. 275.)



*Intrinsic* egalitarians view equality as a good in itself. As
pure egalitarians, they are concerned solely with equality, most of
them with equality of social circumstances, according to which it is
intrinsically bad if some people are worse off than others through no
fault of their own. But it is in fact the case that people do not
always consider inequality a moral evil. Intrinsic egalitarians
regarde quality as desirable even when the equalization would be of no
use to any of the affected parties, such as when equality can only be
produced through depressing the level of well being of everyone's
life. But something can only have an intrinsic value when it is good
for at least one person, when it makes one life better in some way or
another.



The following "*leveling-down*" objection indicates
that doing away within equality in fact ought to produce better
circumstances; it is otherwise unclear why equality should be desired.
(For such an objection, cf. Nozick 1974, p. 229, Raz 1986, chap. 9, p.
227, 235, Temkin 1993, pp. 247-8.) Sometimes inequality can only be
ended by depriving those who are better off of their resources,
rendering them as poorly off as everyone else. (For anyone looking for
a drastic literary example, Kurt Vonnegut's 1950 science-fiction story
*Harrison Bergeron* is recommended.) This would have to be an
acceptable approach according to the intrinsic conception. But would
it be morally good if, in a group consisting of both blind and sighted
persons, those with sight were rendered blind because the blind could
not be offered sight? That would be morally perverse. Doing away with
inequality by bringing everyone down contains - so the objection
goes - nothing good. Such leveling-down objections would of
course only be valid if there were indeed no better and equally
egalitarian alternatives available, but there are nearly always such
alternatives: e.g. those who can see should have to help the blind,
financially or otherwise. When there are no alternatives, in order to
avoid such objections, intrinsic egalitarianism cannot be strict, but
needs to be *pluralistic*. Then intrinsic egalitarians could
say there is something good about the change, namely greater equality,
although they would concede that much is bad about it. Pluralistic
egalitarians do not have equality as their only goal; they also admit
other values and principles, above all the principle of welfare,
according to which it is better when people are doing better. In
addition, pluralistic egalitarianism should be *moderate*
enough to not always grant equality victory in the case of conflict
between equality and welfare. Instead, they must accept reductions in
equality for the sake of a higher quality of life for all (as with
Rawls' difference principle).



At present, many egalitarians are ready to concede that equality in
the sense of equality of life circumstances has no compelling value in
itself, but that, in a framework of liberal concepts of justice, its
meaning emerges in pursuit of other ideals, like universal freedom,
the full development of human capacities and the human personality,
the mitigation of suffering and defeat of domination and
stigmatization, the stable coherence of modern and freely constituted
societies, and so forth (Scanlon 1996, 2018). For those who are worse
off, unequal circumstances often mean considerable (relative)
disadvantages and many (absolute) evils; as a rule, these (relative)
disadvantages and (absolute) evils are the source of our moral
condemnation of unequal circumstances. But this does not mean that
inequality as such is an evil. Hence, the argument goes, fundamental
moral ideals other than equality stand behind our aspiring for
equality. To reject inequality on such grounds is to favor equality
either as a byproduct or as a means, and not as a goal or intrinsic
value. In its treatment of equality as a derived virtue, the sort of
egalitarianism - if the term is actually suitable - here
at play is *instrumental*.



As indicated, there is also a third, more suitable approach to the
equality ideal: a *constitutive* egalitarianism. According to
this approach, to the aspiration to equality is rooted in other moral
grounds, namely because certain inequalities are unjust. Equality has
value, but this is an extrinsic value, since it derives from another,
higher moral principle of equal dignity and respect. But it is not
instrumental for this reason, i.e., it is not only valued on account
of moral equality, but also on its own account. (For the distinction
between the origin of a value and the kind of value it is, cf.
Korsgaard 1996.) Equality stands in relation to justice as does a part
to a whole. The requirement of justification is based on moral
equality, and in certain contexts, successful justification leads to
the above-named principles of equality, i.e., formal, proportional
equality and the presumption of equality. Thus, according to
constitutive egalitarianism, these principles and the resulting
equality are required by justice, and by the same token constitute
social justice.



It is important to further distinguish two levels of egalitarianism
and non-egalitarianism, respectively. On a first level, a constitutive
egalitarian presumes that every explication of the moral standpoint is
incomplete without terms such as 'equal,'
'similarly,' etc. In contrast, a non-egalitarianism
operating on the same level considers such terms misplaced or
redundant. On a second level, when it comes to concretizing and
specifying conceptions of justice, a constitutive egalitarian gives
equality substantive weight. On this level, more and less egalitarian
positions can be found, according to the chosen currency of equality
(the criteria by which just equality is measured) and according to the
reasons for unequal distributions (exemptions of the presumption of
equality) that the respective theories regard as well grounded.
Egalitarianism on the second level thus relates to the kind, quality
and quantity of things to be equalized. Because of such variables, a
clear-cut definition of second level egalitarianism cannot be
formulated. In contrast, non-egalitarians on this second level
advocate a non-relational entitlement theory of justice.


### 6.2 Equality vs. Priority or Sufficiency



Alongside the often-raised objections against equality mentioned in
the section on "simple equality" (3.1. above) there is a
different and more fundamental critique formulated by first level
non-egalitarians: that equality does not have a foundational role in
the grounding of claims to justice. While the older version of a
critique of egalitarianism comes mainly from the conservative end of
the political spectrum, thus arguing in general against
"patterned principles of justice" (Nozick 1974, esp. pp.
156-157), the critique's newer version also often can be heard in
progressive circles (Walzer 1983, Raz 1986, chap. 9, Frankfurt 1987,
1997, Parfit 1997, Anderson 1999). This first-level critique of
equality poses the basic question of why justice should in fact be
conceived relationally and (what is here the same) comparatively.
Referring back to Joel Feinberg's (1974) distinction between
comparative and non-comparative justice, non-egalitarians object to
the moral requirement to treat people as equals, and the many demands
for justice emerging from it. They argue that neither the postulate
nor these demands involve comparative principles, let alone any
equality principles. They reproach first-level egalitarians for a
confusion between "equality" and "universals."
As the non-egalitarians see things, within many principles of justice
- at least the especially important ones - the
equality-terminology is redundant. Equality is thus merely a byproduct
of the general fulfillment of actually non-comparative standards of
justice: something obscured through the unnecessary insertion of an
expression of equality (Raz 1986, p. 227f.). At least the central
standards of dignified human life are not relational but
"absolute." As Harry Frankfurt puts it: "It is
whether people have good lives, and not how their lives compare with
the lives of others" (Frankfurt 1997, p. 6). And again:
"The fundamental error of egalitarianism lies in supposing that
it is morally important whether one person has less than another
regardless of how much either of them has" (Frankfurt 1987, p.
34).



From the non-egalitarian perspective, what is really at stake in
helping those worse off and improving their lot is *humanitarian
concern*, a desire to alleviate suffering. Such concern is not
understood as egalitarian, as it is not focused on the difference
between the better off and the worse off as such (whatever the applied
standard), but on improving the situation of the latter. Their
distress constitutes the actual moral foundation. The wealth of those
better off only furnishes a means that has to be transferred for the
sake of mitigating the distress, as long as other, morally negative
consequences do not emerge in the process. The strength of the impetus
for more equality lies in the urgency of the claims of those worse
off, not in the extent of the inequality. For this reason, instead of
equality the non-egalitarian critics favor one or another
*entitlement theory of justice*, such as Nozick's (1974)
libertarianism (cf. 3.2. above) and Frankfurt's (1987) *doctrine of
sufficiency*, according to which "What is important from the
moral point of view is not that everyone should have *the same*
but that each should have enough. If everyone had *enough*, it
would be of no moral consequence whether some had more than
others" (Frankfurt 1987, p. 21).



Parfit's (1997) *priority view* accordingly calls for a focus
on improving the situation of society's weaker and poorer members, and
indeed all the more urgently the worse off they are, even if they can
be less helped than others in the process. Parfit (1995) distinguishes
between egalitarianism and prioritarianism. According to
prioritarians, benefiting people is more important the worse off those
people are. This prioritising will often increase equality, but they
are two distinct values, since in an important respect equality is a
relational value while priority is not. However, egalitarians and
prioritarians share an important feature, in that both hold that the
best possible distribution of a fixed sum of goods is an equal one. It
is thus a matter of debate whether prioritarianism is a sort of
egalitarianism or a (decent) inegalitarianism. In any case,
entitlement-based non-egalitarian arguments can practically result in
an equality of outcome as far-reaching as egalitarian theories. Hence
the fulfillment of an absolute or non-comparative standard for
everyone (e.g. to the effect that nobody should starve) frequently
results in a certain equality of outcome, where such a standard
comprises not only a decent but a good life. Consequently, the debate
here centers on the basis - is it equality or something else?
- and not so much on the outcome - are persons or groups
more or less equal, according to a chosen metric? Possibly, the
difference lies even deeper, in their respective conceptions of
morality in general.



Egalitarians can respond to the anti-egalitarian critique by conceding
that it is the nature of some (however certainly far from all)
essential norms of morality and justice to be concerned primarily with
the adequate fulfillment of the separate claims of individuals.
However, whether a claim can itself be considered suitable can be
ascertained only by asking whether it can be agreed on by all those
affected in hypothetical conditions of freedom and equality. (See,
e.g., Casal 2007 for a deeper discussion and critique of the doctrine
of sufficiency.) This justificatory procedure is more necessary if it
is less evident that what is at stake is actually suffering, distress,
or an objective need. In the view of the constitutive egalitarians,
all the judgments of distributive justice should be approached
relationally, by asking which distributive scheme all concerned
parties can universally and reciprocally agree to. As described at
some length in the pertinent section above, many egalitarians argue
that a presumption in favor of equality follows from this
justification requirement. In the eyes of such egalitarians, this is
all one needs for the justification and determination of the
constitutive value of equality.



Secondly, even if - for the sake of argument - the
question is left open as to whether demands for distribution according
to objective needs (e.g. alleviating hunger) involve non-comparative
entitlement-claims, it is nonetheless always necessary to resolve the
question of what needy individuals are owed. And this is tied in a
basic way to the question of what persons owe one another in
comparable or worse situations, and how scarce resources (money,
goods, time, energy) must be invested in light of the sum total of our
obligations. While the claim on our aid may well appear
non-relational, determining the kind and extent of the aid must always
be relational, at least in circumstances of scarcity (and resources
are always scarce). Claims are either "satiable" (Raz
1986, p. 235) - i.e., an upper limit or sufficiency level can be
indicated, after which each person's claim to X has been fulfilled
- or they are not. For insatiable claims, to stipulate any level
at which one is or ought to be sufficiently satisfied is arbitrary. If
the standards of sufficiency are defined as a bare minimum, why should
persons be content with that minimum? Why should the manner in which
welfare and resources are distributed above the poverty level not also
be a question of justice? If, by contrast, we are concerned solely
with claims that are in principle "satiable," such claims
having a reasonable definition of sufficiency, then these standards of
sufficiency will most likely be very high. In Frankfurt's definition,
for example, sufficiency is reached only when persons are satisfied
and no longer actively strive for more. Since people find themselves
ourselves operating, in practice, in circumstances far beneath such a
high sufficiency level, they (of course) live under conditions of
(moderate) scarcity. Then the above mentioned argument holds as well
- namely, that in order to determine to what extent it is to be
fulfilled, each claim has to be judged in relation to the claims of
all others and all available resources. In addition, the moral urgency
of lifting people above dire poverty cannot be invoked to demonstrate
the moral urgency of everyone having enough. In both forms of scarcity
- i.e., with satiable and insatiable claims - the social
right or claim to goods cannot be conceived as something absolute or
non-comparative. Egalitarians may thus conclude that distributive
justice is always comparative. This would suggest that distributive
equality, especially equality of life-conditions, should play a
fundamental role in any adequate theory of justice in particular, and
of morality in general.