Prioritarianism, Levelling Down and Welfare Diffusion

I have earlier argued that, like egalitarianism, prioritarianism is exposed to the levelling down objection—which I do not find serious—but also that it faces related, more serious objections that egalitarianism avoids. In this paper I reply to Thomas Porter’s attempt to rebut this argument. I also...

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Autor principal: Persson, Ingmar (Autor)
Tipo de documento: Electrónico Artículo
Lenguaje:Inglés
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Publicado: Springer Science + Business Media B. V 2011
En: Ethical theory and moral practice
Año: 2011, Volumen: 14, Número: 3, Páginas: 307-311
Otras palabras clave:B Prioritarianism
B Porter
B Levelling down objection
B Egalitarianism
B Parfit
Acceso en línea: Volltext (JSTOR)
Volltext (lizenzpflichtig)
Descripción
Sumario:I have earlier argued that, like egalitarianism, prioritarianism is exposed to the levelling down objection—which I do not find serious—but also that it faces related, more serious objections that egalitarianism avoids. In this paper I reply to Thomas Porter’s attempt to rebut this argument. I also trace the more serious objections to prioritarianism to the fact that it implies the desirability of welfare diffusion, i.e. that it is better all things considered if a quantity of welfare is distributed over as many recipients as possible, so that each recipient gets a minimal benefit, and that the outcome would still be in one respect better, even if the quantity of welfare was reduced. In contrast to egalitarianism, prioritarianism therefore implies that it is in one respect better if an equality, or a solitary individual, is located at lower rather than a higher level of welfare.
ISSN:1572-8447
Obras secundarias:Enthalten in: Ethical theory and moral practice
Persistent identifiers:DOI: 10.1007/s10677-010-9242-y