Luck, Institutions, and Global Distributive Justice

Luck egalitarianism provides one powerful way of defending global egalitarianism. The basic luck egalitarian idea that persons ought not to be disadvantaged compared to others on account of his or her bad luck seems to extend naturally to the global arena, where random factors such as persons’ place of birth and the natural distribution of the world’s resources do affect differentially their life chances. Yet luck egalitarianism as an ideal, as well as its global application, has come under severe criticisms in recent debate. My aim in this article is to restore plausibility to the luck egalitarian idea, and to suggest how it could then provide a plausible grounding for global egalitarianism. To do this, I will propose a more modest but also more defensible conception of luck egalitarianism that can also strengthen the case for global distributive justic

Sufficiency, Equality and the Consequences of Global Coercion

In some discussions on global distributive justice, it is argued that the factthat the state exercises coercive authority over its own citizens explains whythe state has egalitarian distributive obligations to its own but not to otherindividuals in the world at large. Two recent works make the case that the globalorder is indeed coercive in a morally significant way for generating certainglobal distributive obligations. Nicole Hassoun argues that the coercivecharacter of the global order gives rise to global duties of humanitarian aid.Laura Valentini argues that the existence of global coercion triggers globaldistributive duties more demanding than mere humanitarianism, but notnecessarily as demanding as cosmopolitan egalitarian duties. This reviewessay suggests that Hassoun’s and Valentini’s depictions of the global orderas coercive entitle them to the stronger conclusion that there are globalegalitarian duties

Taming Human Nature? Reflections on Xunzi and Hobbes

It is a common practice to compare Thomas Hobbes with the ancient Chinese philosopher, Xunzi. Indeed, for the student who is acquainted with Hobbes and Western Philosophy but unfamiliar with Ancient Chinese philosophy, accessing Xunzi through the lens of Hobbes can help provide a tractable entry point into a different philosophical tradition. This is because, like Hobbes, Xunzi takes human nature to be bad and envisions a state of nature that, on account of human badness, is chaotic and violent. And like Hobbes, Xunzi justifies the establishment of political authority because it brings order and peace in place of chaos and violence. But the common starting points of these philosophers should not obscure some very significant differences that come to the fore on further comparison. While Hobbes believes that a powerful political authority with strong laws can maintain a well-ordered society in spite of bad human nature, Xunzi believes that a well-ordered society must also require some reformation of human nature. Thus in addition to effective laws, a truly stable and harmonious political society must also encourage the practice of rituals across the different areas of human life through which human nature is corrected. This difference with Hobbes furthermore invites a more general question with respect to human nature and political society. Is the end of political society that of securing peace and cooperation among people (regardless of their nature), or is it ultimately that of moral self-cultivation?

The Boundary of Justice and The Justice of Boundaries

Two classes of arguments are often deployed by the anti-global egalitarians against attempts to universalize the demands of distributive equality. One are arguments attempting to show that global egalitarians have misconstrued the reasons for why equality matters domestically, and hence have wrongly extended these reasons to the global arena. These arguments hold that the boundary of distributive justice is effectively coextensive with the boundaries of state. The other are arguments that attempt to show that membership in political societies generates special duties among members that may outweigh the demands of global egalitarianism. These arguments appeal to the ethical significance of state boundaries and membership. In my defense of global egalitarianism, I reject both the attempts to limit the boundary of justice and the attempts to give state boundaries special moral significance and priority. In particular, I will argue that the boundary of justice cannot coincide with the boundaries of states when the justice of the boundaries is at issu

Exploring Universal Rights: A Symposium

A review of: Which Rights Should Be Universal? by William J. Talbott. New York, NY: Oxford University Press, 2005. 232pp

An ethical framework for global vaccine allocation

In this article, we propose the Fair Priority Model for COVID-19 vaccine distribution, and emphasize three fundamental values we believe should be considered when distributing a COVID-19 vaccine among countries: Benefiting people and limiting harm, prioritizing the disadvantaged, and equal moral concern for all individuals. The Priority Model addresses these values by focusing on mitigating three types of harms caused by COVID-19: death and permanent organ damage, indirect health consequences, such as health care system strain and stress, as well as economic destruction. It proposes proceeding in three phases: the first addresses premature death, the second long-term health issues and economic harms, and the third aims to contain viral transmission fully and restore pre-pandemic activity. To those who may deem an ethical framework irrelevant because of the belief that many countries will pursue "vaccine nationalism," we argue such a framework still has broad relevance. Reasonable national partiality would permit countries to focus on vaccine distribution within their borders up until the rate of transmission is below 1, at which point there would not be sufficient vaccine-preventable harm to justify retaining a vaccine. When a government reaches the limit of national partiality, it should release vaccines for other countries. We also argue against two other recent proposals. Distributing a vaccine proportional to a country's population mistakenly assumes that equality requires treating differently situated countries identically. Prioritizing countries according to the number of front-line health care workers, the proportion of the population over 65, and the number of people with comorbidities within each country may exacerbate disadvantage and end up giving the vaccine in large part to wealthy nations