Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- List of Abbreviations for Rawls’s texts
- Introduction
- A
- B
- C
- D
- E
- F
- G
- H
- I
- J
- K
- L
- 109 Law of Peoples
- 110 Law, system of
- 111 Least-advantaged position
- 112 Legitimacy
- 113 Legitimate expectations
- 114 Leibniz, G. W.
- 115 Leisure
- 116 Lexical priority: liberty, opportunity, wealth
- 117 Liberal conception of justice
- 118 Liberal people
- 119 Liberalism as comprehensive doctrine
- 120 Liberalism, comprehensive vs. political
- 121 Libertarianism
- 122 Liberty, equal worth of
- 123 Liberty of conscience
- 124 Locke, John
- 125 Love
- 126 Luck egalitarianism
- M
- N
- O
- P
- R
- S
- T
- U
- W
- Bibliography
- Index
126 - Luck egalitarianism
from L
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 05 February 2015
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- List of Abbreviations for Rawls’s texts
- Introduction
- A
- B
- C
- D
- E
- F
- G
- H
- I
- J
- K
- L
- 109 Law of Peoples
- 110 Law, system of
- 111 Least-advantaged position
- 112 Legitimacy
- 113 Legitimate expectations
- 114 Leibniz, G. W.
- 115 Leisure
- 116 Lexical priority: liberty, opportunity, wealth
- 117 Liberal conception of justice
- 118 Liberal people
- 119 Liberalism as comprehensive doctrine
- 120 Liberalism, comprehensive vs. political
- 121 Libertarianism
- 122 Liberty, equal worth of
- 123 Liberty of conscience
- 124 Locke, John
- 125 Love
- 126 Luck egalitarianism
- M
- N
- O
- P
- R
- S
- T
- U
- W
- Bibliography
- Index
Summary
The term luck egalitarianism was originally coined by Elizabeth Anderson in her “What Is the Point of Equality?” (1999). Luck egalitarianism, she writes, is “the view that the fundamental aim of equality is to compensate people for undeserved bad luck – being born with poor native endowments, bad parents, and disagreeable personalities, suffering from accidents and illness, and so forth.” As a result, luck egalitarianism is focused on eliminating “the impact of brute luck from human affairs” (Anderson 1999, 288). More generally, the focus on involuntary inequalities is the commitment of authors Anderson described as luck egalitarian: principally G. A. Cohen and Ronald Dworkin, but also Richard Arneson, Eric Rakowski, as well as John Roemer (a list to which we might add Larry Temkin). Involuntary inequalities are those that do not appropriately reflect the choices of those who suffer them. A distinction is thus established between inequalities which are a result of choices agents are responsible for and inequalities which are the result of bad brute luck. Justice demands that the impact on people of the latter form of inequalities be eliminated, or at least lessened. Luck egalitarians believe that equality is one of our essential political values; and a proper understanding of this value states that it is bad that some, through no fault or choice of theirs, are worse off than others. (Contrast the Rawlsian claim that inequalities are unjust if they do not benefit the least well off.)
- Type
- Chapter
- Information
- The Cambridge Rawls Lexicon , pp. 471 - 478Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 2014