Abstract
This article presents two rejoinders to Frankfurt’s arguments against egalitarianism. In developing the first, I introduce a novel relational view of justice: relational sufficiency. This is the view that justice requires us to relate to one another as people with sufficient, but not necessarily equal, standing. I argue that if Frankfurt’s objections to distributive equality are sound, so are analogous objections to relational equality. However, in a range of cases involving comparative justice (punishment, equal pay, and family relations) we should be relational egalitarians, not relational sufficientarians, and that we must therefore reject Frankfurt’s objections to distributive equality. The second rejoinder takes the form of a demonstration that all of Frankfurt’s objections to distributive equality (and relational equality) are unsound. In effect, the article rehabilitates the ideal of distributive equality in the face of Frankfurt’s objections.
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Notes
This is an approximation because distributive sufficientarianism can be fleshed out in different ways (e.g., it can take a telic or a deontic form and can involve just one or several thresholds), and because some self-proclaimed sufficientarians reject the stated claim (e.g., Shields 2012). It is common to distinguish between the negative sufficientarian claim and the positive sufficientarian claim. The former says that there is a sufficiency threshold such that, for any pair of individuals above it, their relative distributive positions are irrelevant justice-wise. The latter says that there is a sufficiency threshold such that for any pair of individuals, X and Y, where X is below the threshold and Y above it, benefits to X take priority over benefits to Y (Benbaji 2005; Crisp 2003; Frankfurt 2015; Huseby 2010). These complications are certainly important, but only to questions other than those I will be asking here.
Showing that there is such a thing as relational sufficiency also renders some of the premises of the analogous Frankfurtian arguments against relational equality more plausible. In the light of the possibility of relational sufficientarianism, they do not motivate a rejection of any a relational component to justice as such.
It is open to relational egalitarians and distributive sufficientarians to claim that the avoidance of (large) distributive inequalities has non-fundamental moral significance because they tend to undermine the egalitarian character of social relations or result in more people falling below the threshold of sufficiency (Frankfurt 2015: x, 16‒17, 66; Scheffler 2015: 33, 34). Similarly, relational sufficientarians can claim that (large) relational inequality (causally, but not constitutively) undermines relational sufficiency, and thus for instrumental reasons we need to embrace relational equality (Anderson 1999; Scheffler 2003a, b, 2005; Schemmel 2011, 2012; Wolff 1998).
Plato’s view that a just society is one in which philosophers rule and the rest obey while fulfilling their subordinate tasks is a classic example of a relational, anti-egalitarian view of justice.
The fact that Scheffler’s deliberative constraint only pertains to “strong interests” suggests that he thinks there is nothing objectionable, from the point of view of relational equality, about a relationship in which the parties treat the weak interests of one party as having greater deliberative weight than the trivial interests of another. One might think that it would be a vice if, say, friends were preoccupied with whether their weak interests were taken equally into account; and given the heteronomous nature of the ideal of equality on Scheffler’s view, this might suggest that it is no part of a relational, egalitarian ideal that friends, etc., treat their such interests as equally constraining.
To the extent that relating as sufficients entails relating as equals as a constitutive part, it would be disingenuous to promote relational sufficientarianism as an alternative to relational equality in the way that distributive sufficiency is typically offered as an alternative to distributive egalitarianism.
One of Frankfurt’s (2015: 3, 35) negative arguments is the leveling down objection. I do not discuss this here partly because while I think the leveling down objection defeats neither distributive nor relational egalitarianism, the literature on that objection is huge and cannot be adequately covered here; partly because relational egalitarianism is vulnerable to a form of leveling down objection if distributive equality is (Lippert-Rasmussen 2018: 10). If this last point is right, the scope of the translatability principle can be broadened to include that argument.
“Evil” is the term used by Nagel (1991: 28) to describe undeserved inequalities. The Beverly Hills objection implicitly contains a positive argument for sufficiency appealing to the premise that the best explanation of the shape of the moral concern to which egalitarians appeal is that justice is a matter of distributive sufficiency. In effect, I respond to this positive argument in Sect. 5a). Similar points are true of Sects. 5b and d) below.
Frankfurt must accept that having more than enough would actually be good for us. Assume the contrary and suppose that all of us have enough. It follows that there cannot be any inequality between us in terms of prudential value, and accordingly that the putative cases offered by Frankfurt of morally irrelevant inequality above the threshold are incoherent.
The positive version of the contentment objection says that sufficientarianism gives the best explanation of (8).
This question applies analogously to the relationship between the members of a political community.
In saying this, this person need not think that her life would be better per se if she lived in such a community, since presumably one might “sensibly and appropriately” care about things other than the quality of one’s life.
Frankfurt’s target in the relevant passage is the ideal of economic equality. However, his challenge extrapolates to other ideals of equality such as welfare egalitarianism.
The positive version of this argument appeals to the putative fact that egalitarians are truly concerned that people have enough, etc.
In some contexts, people truly care about relational equality, as opposed to relational sufficiency (see the counterexample to Frankfurt I present in Sect. 4). I do not need to deny this in order to make my present point, since similarly, and despite Frankfurt’s claims to the contrary, some people truly care, in some contexts, about distributive equality.
Given his adoption of the view that one is rationally permitted not to want more when one is rationally content with what one has, it is somewhat surprising that Frankfurt lists the fulfillment of potentials as a relevant concern (Frankfurt 2015: 74). If I would have been satisfied with what I have realized were it not for my huge unrealized potentials, would that not amount to alienation in Frankfurt’s sense?
Frankfurt (2015: 68) presents the objection as one with teeth against all “modes of equality”.
One can appeal to values other than the value of relating as equals (e.g., to equality of opportunity in the case of equal pay for equal work) to partially account for one or more of the three intuitions to which I appeal below. However, the value of relating as equals at least partly explains why we think relational sufficiency is not enough.
I am uncommitted about the nature of that complaint, e.g., on the issue of whether it motivates that members of the first group are being punished too leniently too. Also, the complaint is consistent with the view that neither any right to equal treatment nor any right to equal respect is violated in cases, where it is simply a matter of sheer coincidence or non-biased incompetence that one offender is punished less severely than another who committed exactly the same wrong and who receives exactly the punishment that one deserves, non-comparatively speaking, for that offense, i.e., it is not because of racial or gender differences between the two. It is also consistent with the view that in such cases also rights to equal treatment and equal respect are violated. I set cases of sheer coincidence and non-biased incompetence aside to focus on cases of comparative injustice, where rights to equal treatment and equal respect clearly are violated. I thank an anonymous reviewer for making me realize the need for these clarifications.
This case may also confirm that Frankfurt’s account of respect is flawed. After all, it is natural to say that the harsher punishment of members of the first group is disrespectful to them. Perhaps, like desert, respect comes in both comparative and non-comparative versions. To disrespect someone in a comparative sense, it is enough to treat them disadvantageously relative to others in the absence of relevant facts about them and the others justifying such differential treatment (Casal 2007: 302‒303).
And, as in the parable of the workers, they want unequal pay for unequal work (so that when, for example, women perform more onerous work than men do, they are paid more).
Would feminists object to unequal pay for equal work that is due, say, to the idiosyncratic biases of individual employers in the absence of gender hierarchy? I think that in the name of fairness they should—even if the objection would be less serious than it is within a gender hierarchy.
While Nagel’s immediate concern is distributive equality, his underlying concern is arguably that individuals stand in such relation to one another that they can justify their comparative distributive positions to one another, and this seems to be a relational concern.
My argument does not rule out the prospect that in some contexts (e.g., friendship) relational sufficiency is enough. Nor does it exclude the possibility that the best complete account of relational justice has egalitarian as well as sufficientarian components.
The arguments offered in Sect. 4 renders 4*—i.e., “Relational inequalities between sufficients are not morally urgent”—similarly vulnerable. Even if some relational inequalities are not “morally urgent”, surely, other relational inequalities between sufficients are, e.g., relatively large sexist wage differences.
At this point it might be suggested that, surely, there is some weaker version of premise (4) which this line of reasoning does not defeat, e.g. (4**) “There are some distributive inequalities between sufficiently well-off people that are not morally urgent.” While (4**) is true, it will not serve the Beverly Hills objection’s purpose of defeating distributive equality. Distributive egalitarians can agree that, say, the fact that Bill Gates has $10 more than Warren Buffet is not “morally urgent”.
A similar point applies to the analogous Frankfurtian objection to relational equality in the light of the similarly conditional view about relational justice: “Relational inequality is unjust if, and only if, at least some of those between whom it obtains are below the relational sufficiency threshold”.
The same ambiguity pertaining to whether the interest in question is prudential or moral applies to (8*): “If everyone is rationally permitted not to have an interest in others relating to them as if they have a higher standing, then there is no injustice”. Accordingly, the challenge I develop below applies to the analogous Frankfurtian contentment objection against relational equality.
It is possible that we give greater weight to people with an active interest because we take this as a proxy for their interest being stronger.
(13) appears in the analogous Frankfurtian alienation objection against relational equality too.
One could also make the supplementary tu quoque objection that, from a prudential point of view, Frankfurt’s sufficientarianism is deficient to the extent that it requires me to accept sacrifices for the sake of others who are below the sufficiency threshold and whose well-being in no way impinges on the sort of life I “sensibly and appropriately seek” for myself (Frankfurt 2015: 11). In short, Frankfurt’s objection is an objection to justice as such.
Compare Elster (1983: esp. 123‒124) on adaptive preferences and rationalization.
Considerations in the same ballpark suggest that the analogous premises in the objection from actual concerns against relational equality—i.e., “(15*) Egalitarians are not concerned about whether others relate to them as (exact) equals, and they would not want their children to be so concerned either” and “(16*) The best explanation of (15*) is that justice is not a matter of relational equality”—are dubious too. For instance, anger at the injustice of how others are being treated as superiors might take up much thought, even if one is being treated as a sufficient and, thus, provide a better explanation of (15*) than that asserted in (16*).
Premise (21), like premise (19) which I assess below, appears in the Frankfurtian objection from self-assessment against relational equality too. Accordingly, the critique developed below applies to this argument too.
A similar strategy works against (23*): “To treat people with respect is to treat them on the basis of relevant facts about them, and in all of those cases where there is a putative duty to relate as moral (and social) equals the same relevant facts obtain in relation to different individuals.”.
An intrinsic fact about a person is a fact about that person that is independent of facts about other persons, etc. Extrinsic facts about a person are facts about that person that depend on facts about other persons, etc. It is an intrinsic fact about me that I am 5 feet 10 inches tall, and an extrinsic fact that I am an older brother.
The same claim applies to (25*): “If, in all of those cases where there is a putative duty to treat people equally the duty to treat people with respect implies treating them equally, then there is no fundamental duty to relate as moral (and social) equals.” An additional worry about premise (25) and (25*) is that our duty to treat people equally or as moral and (social) equals, respectively, might be overdetermined.
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Acknowledgements
Previous versions of this paper were presented at LUISS, Rome February 10, 2019; University of Southern Denmark March 9, 2019; University of Tromsø, April 3, 2019; UCSD May 25, 2019; and University of Copenhagen, June 18, 2019. I thank Frank Abumere, Matthew Adler, Richard Arneson, David Axelsen, Ian Carter, Paula Casal, Thomas Christiano, Magnus Skytterholm Egan, Andreas Føllesdal, Anca Gheaus, Nils Holtug, Carl Knight, Frederica Liveriero, Sune Lægaard, Lasse Nielsen, Michael Otsuka, Tom Parr, Viki Pedersen, Gianfranco Pellegrino, Gina Schouten, Shlomi Segall, Liam Shields, Seana Shiffrin, Lucas Stanczyk, H. Orri Stefánsson, Øjvind Stokke, Attila Tanyi, Steve Wall, Danny Weltman, Nicholas Vrousalis, Andrew Williams and two anonymous Journal of Ethics reviewers for helpful comments. I am particularly indebted to Kathryn Joyce.
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Lippert-Rasmussen, K. Relational Sufficientarianism and Frankfurt’s Objections to Equality. J Ethics 25, 81–106 (2021). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10892-020-09344-0
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10892-020-09344-0