Ability and Volitional Incapacity

The conditional analysis of ability faces familiar counterexamples involving cases of volitional incapacity. An interesting response to the problem of volitional incapacity is to try to explain away the responses elicited by such counterexamples by distinguishing between what we are able to do and what we are able to bring ourselves to do. We argue that this error-theoretic response fails. Either it succeeds in solving the problem of volitional incapacity at the cost of making the conditional analysis vulnerable to obvious counterexamples to its necessity. Or, it avoids the counterexamples to its necessity but fails to solve the problem of volitional incapacity

Justice and Feasibility: A Dynamic Approach

It is common in political theory and practice to challenge normatively ambitious proposals by saying that their fulfillment is not feasible. But there has been insufficient conceptual exploration of what feasibility is, and very little substantive inquiry into why and how it matters for thinking about social justice. This paper provides one of the first systematic treatments of these issues, and proposes a dynamic approach to the relation between justice and feasibility that illuminates the importance of political imagination and dynamic duties to expand agents’ power to fulfill ambitious principles of justice

Basic Positive Duties of Justice and Narveson's Libertarian Challenge

Are positive duties to help others in need mere informal duties of virtue or can they also be enforceable duties of justice? In this paper I defend the claim that some positive duties (which I call basic positive duties) can be duties of justice against one of the most important prin- cipled objections to it. This is the libertarian challenge, according to which only negative duties to avoid harming others can be duties of justice, whereas positive duties (basic or nonbasic) must be seen, at best, as informal moral requirements or recommendations. I focus on the contractarian version of the libertarian challenge as recently presented by Jan Narveson. I claim that Narveson’s contractarian construal of libertarianism is not only intuitively weak, but is also subject to decisive internal problems. I argue, in particular, that it does not pro- vide a clear rationale for distinguishing between informal duties of virtue and enforceable duties of justice, that it can neither successfully justify libertarianism’s protection of negative rights nor its denial of positive ones, and that it fails to undermine the claim that basic positive duties are duties of global justice

Cohen on Socialism, Equality and Community

In this article I discuss G. A. Cohen’s account of the principles animating the socialist ideal. In his book Why Not Socialism? Cohen argues that socialism is based on two principles of radical equality of opportunity and community. Although I am quite sympathetic to Cohen’s contribution, I identify what I take to be some problems in it and suggest ways to overcome them. I challenge Cohen’s claim that although the principle of radical equality of opportunity is a principle of justice, the principle of community is only a wider moral requirement. I argue that to fully account for the role and weight of considerations of community within the socialist ideal, and to justify the limitations on liberty that they would impose in practice, we have reason to see some of them as more stringent demands of justice. More specifically, I propose a construal of some of the demands of community as focused on sufficientarian concerns with basic needs and on requirements to protect equal political status and self-respect, and explain how, so construed, the demands of community relate to demands of equality of economic opportunity and to the protection of personal and political liberty. Dans cet article, je discute le point de vue de G.A. Cohen sur les principes qui animent l ‘idéal socialiste. Dans son livre ‘Pourquoi Pas Le Socialisme?’ Cohen maintient que le socialisme est basé sur les deux principes d’égalité radicale de l’opportunité et de la communauté. Même si je partage assez largement cette conception, j’en identifie quelques problèmes de mon point de vue et suggère quelque pistes pour les combler. Contre Cohen, je ne pense pas que le principe d’égalité radicale d’opportunité soit un principe de justice, alors que le principe de communauté serait seulement un impératif moral plus large. Je maintiens qu’afin de rendre compte pleinement du rôle et du poids des considérations sur la communauté dans l’idéal socialiste, et de justifier les limitations sur la liberté qu’elles imposeraient en pratique, nous avons raison de penser que certaines d’entre elles expriment des demandes fortes de justice . Plus spécifiquement, je propose de reformuler certaines demandes des communautés centrées sur des préoccupations d’autosuffisance relatives à des besoins fondamentaux et sur les conditions de protection de l’égalité politique et du respect de soi, et j’explique comment, sous cet angle, les demandes d’une communauté sont étroitement liées à des demandes d’égalité d’opportunité et de protection de la liberté personnelle et politique

The Socialist Principle “From Each According To Their Abilities, To Each According To Their Needs”

This paper offers an exploration of the socialist principle “From each according to their abilities, to each according to their needs.” The Abilities/Needs Principle is arguably the ethical heart of socialism but, surprisingly, has received almost no attention by political philosophers. I propose an interpretation of the principle and argue that it involves appealing ideas of solidarity, fair reciprocity, recognition of individual differences, and meaningful work. The paper proceeds as follows. First, I analyze Marx’s formulation of the Abilities/Needs Principle. Second, I identify the principle’s initial plausibility, but show that it faces serious problems that cannot be addressed without developing a fresh interpretation of it. Third, I provide an interpretation of the principle that highlights demands concerning opportunities for self-realization in work, positive duties of solidarity, sensitivity to individual differences, and mechanisms of fair reciprocity. Fourth, I discuss a possible institutional implementation of the Abilities/Needs Principle. Finally, I identify some normative puzzles about the transition from capitalism to socialism, and suggest how the Abilities/Needs Principle might gain motivational traction by mobilizing the powerful idea of human dignity

Justice and Beneficence

What is a duty of justice? And how is it different from a duty of beneficence? We need a clear account of the contrast. Unfortunately, there is no consensus in the philosophical literature as to how to characterize it. Different articulations of it have been provided, but it is hard to identify a common core that is invariant across them. In this paper, I propose an account of how to understand duties of justice, explain how it contrasts with several proposals as to how to distinguish justice and beneficence, respond to some objections and suggest further elaborations of it. The conceptual exploration pursued in this paper has practical stakes. A central aim is to propose and defend a capacious concept of justice that makes a direct discussion of important demands of justice (domestic and global) possible. Duties of justice can be positive besides negative, they can be imperfect as well as perfect, they can range over personal besides institutional contexts, they can include multiple associative reasons such us non-domination, non-exploitation and reciprocity, and they can even go beyond existing national, political, and economic associative frameworks to embrace strictly universal humanist concerns. We should reject ideological abridgments of the concept of justice that render these possibilities, and the important human interests and claims they may foster, invisible