Abstract
This paper explores the ways by which the theory of recognition, most particularly Honneth’s, can be utilized in the normative analysis of global poverty and inequality. Taking off from the idea that social justice is a relational virtue, the goal of which is the achievement of self-realization, the paper argues that global poverty possesses a subjective dimension. Often overlooked in global poverty studies and alleviation, such subjective dimension refers to the negative effects of poverty on the sense of self and identity of the global poor, including their loss of self-confidence, self-respect, and self-esteem. The paper, then, attempts to develop the notion of “global recognitive justice” by exploring the global analogues of the three principles of recognition namely love, respect, and esteem. In the final analysis, the paper argues that it is only through articulating the lived-experience of suffering can global poverty and inequality be properly understood as a case of social injustice.
This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.
Access this chapter
Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout
Purchases are for personal use only
Notes
- 1.
Interestingly, Stephen Massey (1983) makes a distinction between respecting oneself subjectively and respecting oneself according to a more objective standard, between valuing oneself simpliciter and properly valuing oneself. The objective view of self-respect can be traced back to Kant who teaches that a person should treat himself and other human beings as an end in himself or themselves, that is, he should act according to the moral law. On the other hand, the subjective view of self-respect is based on the person’s valuation of himself on the basis of his conception of what is worthy, on his beliefs and attitudes about what he considers as valuable. See Stephen Massey, “Is Self-Respect a Moral or Psychological Concept?”, Ethics 93, no. 2: 246–261.
- 2.
It cannot be denied, however, that there is a lack of consensus in the academic and policy literatures about what self-esteem is, thereby, hampering the supposed link between poverty and self-esteem. According to Emler (2001, 1), the division is between the idea that self-esteem is a generalized feeling about the self, on the one hand, and the view that self-esteem is the “sum of a set of judgments about one’s value, worthiness, and competence in various domains,” on the other hand.
- 3.
In a study by Bankston and Zhou (2002 among immigrant adolescents with Asian descent) in the US, it is interesting to note that, despite having reported the lowest level of self-esteem , they performed well academically in schools. This should be treated with caution, though. According to the study, parenting plays an important role in the way children of Asian immigrants perform in American schools dominated by whites. Parents tend to put more pressure on their children to perform well in the school. See Carl Bankston and Min Zhou (2002), Being Well vs. Doing Well: Self-Esteem and School Performance among Immigrants and Nonimmigrant Racial and Ethnic Groups,” International Migration Review 36: 389–415.
- 4.
Isn’t this universal love for humankind equivalent to respect since the basis of such globalized love is personhood? Not necessarily. The concept of “globalized” love is different from respect in that although both involve valuing others by virtue of their personhood, the former is not a mere intellectual commitment arising from a contemplation of an idea. The act of loving humanity, say loving the world’s poor, has a certain degree of attachment and concern for them not found in respect—the latter being characterized by a kind of emotional indifference (Wolff 2015, p. 190).
- 5.
See also Honneth’s article on how recognition applies to international relations, that is, between states. He makes references to collective self-respect brought about by recognition of one state including its cultural productions and historical achievements. It is not, however, entirely clear how can this be connected to human rights. See Axel Honneth, “Recognition between States: On the Moral Substrate of International Relations,” in The i in we: Studies in the theory of recognition (Cambridge: Polity Press, 2012).
References
Bandura, Albert. 1997. Self-Efficacy: The Exercise of Control. New York: Freeman.
Bankston, Carl, and Zhou Min. 2002. Being Well vs. Doing Well: Self-Esteem and School Performance Among Immigrants and Nonimmigrant Racial and Ethnic Groups. International Migration Review 36: 389–415. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1747-7379.2002.tb00086.x.
Batty, Elaine, and John Flint. 2015. Self-Esteem, Comparative Poverty and Neighborhoods, Research Paper No. 7. Living Through Change in Challenging Neighbourhoods: A Research Project Funded by the Joseph Rowntree Foundation. Sheffield: Centre for Regional Economic and Social Research Sheffield Hallam University. https://research.shu.ac.uk/cresr/living-through-change/documents/RP7_SelfEsteem.pdf. Accessed 10 Oct 2018.
Beitz, Charles R. 1999. Political Theory and International Relations with New Afterword by the Author. Princeton: Princeton University Press.
Bolnick, Joel. 2008. Development as Reform and Counter-Reform: Paths Travelled by Slum/Shack dwellers International. In Can NGOs Make a Difference?: The Challenge of Development Alternatives, ed. Anthony Bebbington, 316–333. London/New York: Zed Books.
Cayabyab, Marc Jason. 2014, May 31. Hongkong Textbook Depicts Filipinos as ‘Domestic Helper’. http://globalnation.inquirer.net/105471/hong-kong-textbook-depicts-filipinos-as-domestic-helpers. Accessed 12 July 2018.
Chopp, Rebecca. 1986. The Praxis of Suffering. Maryknoll: Orbis.
Davidson, Rosemary. 2009. More Than Just Coping: The Antecedents and Dynamics of Resilience in a Qualitative Longitudinal Study. Social Polity and Society 8 (1): 115–125. https://doi.org/10.1017/S1474746408004636.
Deng, Francis M., and Larry Minear. 1992. The Challenges of Famine Relief: Emergency Operations in the Sudan. Washington, DC: Brookings Institution.
Denier, Yvonne. 2007. Efficiency, Justice and Care: Philosophical Reflections on Scarcity in Health Care. Dordrecht: Springer.
Deranty, Jean-Philippe. 2004. Injustice, Violence, and Social Struggle: The Critical Potential of Axel Honneth’s Theory of Recognition. Critical Horizons 5 (1): 297–322. https://doi.org/10.1163/1568516042653549.
Deveaux, Monique. 2015. The Global Poor as Agents of Justice. Journal of Moral Philosophy 12 (2): 125–150. https://doi.org/10.1163/17455243-4681029.
———. 2016. Beyond Redistributive Paradigm: What Philosophers Can Learn from Poor-Led Politics. In Ethical Issues in Poverty Alleviation, Studies in Global Justice, ed. Helmut P. Gaisbauer, Gottfired Schweigger, and Clemes Sedmark, vol. 4, 225–245. Cham: Springer.
Dewey, John. 1980. Art as Experience. New York: Perigee Books.
Escobar, Arturo. 1995. Encountering Development: The Making and Unmaking of the Third World. Princeton: Princeton University Press.
Emler, Nicholas. 2001. Self-esteem: The Costs and Causes of Self-worth. London: Joseph Rowntree Foundation.
Fell, Ben, and Miles Hewstone. 2015. Psychological Perspectives on poverty. York: Joseph Rowntree Foundation/University of Oxford.
Fraser, Nancy. 2003. Social Justice in the Age of identity Politics: Redistribution, recognition, and Participation. In Redistribution or Recognition: A Politico-Philosophical Exchange. Trans. Joel Golb, James Ingram, and Christiane Wilke, 7–111. London/New York: Verso.
Gudeman, Stephen. 1986. Economics as Culture: Models and Metaphors of Livelihood. London: Routledge and Keagan Paul.
———. 2001. The Anthropology of Economy. Oxford: Blackwell Publishers.
Hayden, Patrick, and Kate Schick, eds. 2016. Recognition and Global Politics: Critical Encounters Between State and World. Manchester: Manchester University Press.
Heins, Volker. 2008. Realizing Honneth: Redistribution, Recognition, and Global Justice. Journal of Global Ethics 4 (2): 141–153. https://doi.org/10.1080/17449620802194025.
Honneth, Axel. 1995. The Struggle for Recognition: The Moral Grammar of Social Conflicts. Trans. Joel Anderson. Cambridge: Polity Press.
———. 2003. Redistribution as Recognition. In Redistribution or Recognition: A Politico-Philosophical Exchange, ed. Nancy Fraser and Axel Honneth, 110–197. London/New York: Verso.
———. 2004. Recognition and Justice: Outline of a Plural Theory of Justice. Acta Sociologica 47 (4): 351–364. https://doi.org/10.1177/0001699304048668.
———. 2007. Disrespect: The Normative Foundations of Critical Theory. Cambridge: Polity Press.
———. 2010. Work and Recognition: A Redefinition. In The Philosophy of Recognition: Historical and Contemporary Perspectives, ed. Hans-Christoph am Busch and Christopher Zurn, 223–239. New York/Plymouth: Lexington Books.
———. 2012. The I in We: Studies in the Theory of Recognition. Cambridge: Polity Press.
Honneth, Axel, and Joel Anderson. 2005. Autonomy, Vulnerability, Recognition and Justice. In Autonomy and the Challenges to Liberalism, ed. John Christman and Joel Anderson, 127–149. Cambridge: Polity Press.
Ikäheimo, Heikki. 2007. Recognizing Persons. In Dimensions of Personhood, ed. Arti Laitinen and Heikki Ikäheimo, 224–247. Exeter: Imprint Academic.
———. 2012. Globalizing Love: On the Nature and Scope of love as form of Recognition. Res Publica 18 (1): 11–24. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11158-012-9182-6.
Kildal, Nanna. 1998. The Social Bases of Self-Respect: A Normative Discussion of Politics Against Unemployment. Thesis Eleven 54: 63–77. https://doi.org/10.1177/0725513698054000006.
Lazzeri, Christian. 2010. Redistribution and Recognition: Rethinking N. Fraser’s Dualistic Model. Critical Horizons: A Journal of Philosophy and Social Theory 10 (3): 328–334. https://doi.org/10.1558/crit.v10i3.307.
Lister, Ruth. 2004. Poverty. Cambridge: Polity Press.
Margalit, Avisai. 1996. The Decent Society. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.
Menon, Gayatri. 2013. Citizens and ‘Squatters’: The Contested Subject of Public Policy in Neoliberal Mumbai. Ethics and Social Welfare 7 (2): 155–169. https://doi.org/10.1080/17496535.2013.779007.
Mignolo, Walter. 2009. Dispensable and Bare Lives: Coloniality and the Hidden Political/Economic Agenda of Modernity. Human Architecture: Journal of the Sociology of Knowledge 7 (2): 69–88.
Narayan, Deepa, et al. 2000a. Voices of the Poor, Can Anyone Hear Us? Vol. 1. Oxford: Oxford University Press and World Bank.
———. 2000b. Voices of the Poor, Crying out for Change. Vol. 2. Oxford: Oxford University Press and World Bank.
Nussbaum, Martha. 1995. Poetic Justice: The Literary Imagination and Public Life. Boston: Beacon Press.
———. 2006. Frontiers of Justice: Disability, Nationality, and Species Membership. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.
Pogge, Thomas. 2002. World Poverty and Human Rights: Cosmopolitan Responsibilities and Reforms. Cambridge: Polity Press.
Rahman, and Rollock. 2011. Acculturation, Competence and Mental Health Among South Asian Students in the United States. Journal of Multicultural Counselling and Development 32 (3): 130–142. https://doi.org/10.1002/j.2161-1912.2004.tb00366.x.
Raluto, Reynaldo. 2012. The Constant Struggle to Become a Church of the Poor: Fifty Years after Vatican II. Tambara 29: 37–56.
Rawls, John. 1999a. A Theory of Justice. Rev ed. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.
———. 1999b. The Law of Peoples with ‘the Idea of Public Reason Revisited’. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.
Reyles, Diego Zavaleta. 2007. The Ability to go About Without Shame: A Proposal for Internationally Comparable Indicators of Shame and Humiliation. Oxford Development Studies 35 (4): 405–430. https://doi.org/10.1080/13600810701701905.
Rosser, Yvette. 1999. Stereotypes in Schooling: Negative Pressures in the American Educational System. https://www.infinityfoundation.com/mandala/s_es/s_es_rosse_school_frameset.htm. Accessed 12 July 2018.
Sabini, John, and Maury Silver. 1997. In Defense of Shame: Shame in the Context of Guilt and Embarrassment. Journal for the Theory of Social Behaviour 27 (1): 1–15.
Schweiger, Gottfried. 2014. Recognition Theory and Global Poverty. Journal of Global Ethics 10 (3): 267–273. https://doi.org/10.1080/17449626.2014.969439.
Sen, Amartya. 1999. Development as Freedom. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Shiva, Vandana. 2005. New Emperors, Old Clothes. https://theecologist.org/2005/jul/01/new-emperors-old-clothes. Accessed 3 July 2018.
Massey, Stephen J. 1983. Is Self-Respect a Moral or a Psychological Concept? Ethics 93 (2): 246–261. https://doi.org/https://doi.org/10.1086/292432
Taylor, Charles. 1994. Politics of Recognition. In Multiculturalism: Examining the Politics of Recognition, ed. intro Amy Guttman, 25–74. New Jersey: Princeton University Press.
Tangney, June Price, and Ronda R. Dearing. 2002. Shame and Guilt. New York/London: The Guilford Press.
United Nations Development Program (UNDP). 2005. Human Development Report 2005. New York: Oxford University Press.
———. 2014. Human Development Report 2014. New York: Oxford University Press.
Velleman, J. David. 1999. Love as a Moral Emotion. Ethics 109 (2): 338–374. https://doi.org/10.1086/233898.
Walker, Robert. 2014. The Shame of Poverty. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Winnicot, Donald. 1965. The Maturational Process and the Facilitating Environment: Studies in the Theory of Emotional Development. New York: International Universities Press.
Wolff, Susan. 2015. The Variety of Values: Essays on Morality, Meaning and Love. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Young, Iris Marion. 1990. Justice and the Politics of Difference. New Jersey: Princeton University Press.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Editor information
Editors and Affiliations
Rights and permissions
Copyright information
© 2020 Springer Nature Switzerland AG
About this chapter
Cite this chapter
Pilapil, R.D. (2020). Suffering Poverty: Towards a Global Recognitive Justice. In: Schweiger, G. (eds) Poverty, Inequality and the Critical Theory of Recognition. Philosophy and Poverty, vol 3. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-45795-2_8
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-45795-2_8
Published:
Publisher Name: Springer, Cham
Print ISBN: 978-3-030-45794-5
Online ISBN: 978-3-030-45795-2
eBook Packages: Religion and PhilosophyPhilosophy and Religion (R0)