Table Of ContentJustice, Institutions, and Luck
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Justice, Institutions,
and Luck
The Site, Ground, and Scope
of Equality
Kok-Chor Tan
1
3
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For Amalia
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Preface and Acknowledgments
Thisbooksurveysandevaluatesthreecentralphilosophicaldebateswithin
distributive justice: Where is the site of distributive equality, that is, to
whatentitydodistributiveprinciplesprimarilyapply?Whatistheground
ofdistributiveequality,thatis,whydoesdistributiveequalitymatter?And
is the reach or scope of the ideal of distributive equality limited to the
confinesofthestateorisitglobal?
Myobjectiveistoprovideanoverviewofsomeofthemainarguments
andpositionsinthecontemporarydiscussionssurroundingthesequestions.
I cannot attempt to engage all the different positions at play in the vast
and still growing literature on these matters. Instead, I wish to identify
what I take to be the general forms of the most important positions and
arguments for the purpose of organizing and tidying an increasingly
crowded field. As a result some detailsmay be sacrificed, but the hope is
thatatidying-upofthephilosophicalterrainandtheidentificationofthe
keyissuesatstakeinthesedebateswillcompensateforthisshortcoming.
This critical survey will suggest that institutional egalitarianism provides
themostreasonableunderstandingofthesiteofequality;thatluckegalitari-
anism provides a plausible understanding of the grounds of equality; and
that the scope of equality is realizably global. To do this, the book will
attempt to clarify the basis of the institutional approach to equality, the
propercontoursofluckegalitarianism,andthecasefortheglobalreachof
egalitarian concerns in spite of equality’s institutional site. It will also
propose a way of understanding how the institutional site, the luck
egalitarian ground, and global scope of equality—even though engaged
withdifferentaspectsofequality—cancometogethertosupportapartic-
ularidealofdistributivejusticethatIwillcallinstitutionalluckegalitarianism.
Inthisregard,althoughthemaingoalofthisbookistoprovideacritical
introduction to some of the main questions on equality, I hope some of
theargumentsitadvancescancontributetothecontemporaryphilosoph-
ical literature on distributive justice and be of interest to readers already
engagedinthisdiscourse.
I enjoyed the benefit of discussing several parts of this book in various
stagesofitsdevelopmentwithstudentsindifferentadvancedundergraduate
viii PREFACEAND ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
andgraduateseminarssinceFall2005attheUniversityofPennsylvania.Iam
grateful for their criticismsand fortheir ownviews on thesubject. I owe
special thanks to the following (some of whom are now only former
students): Collin Anthony, Chris Melenovsky, Mark Navin, and Doug
Paletta.
Colleagues and friends at the University of Pennsylvania have been
supportiveandkindenoughtodiscussdifferentaspectsofthisbookwith
me.IamespeciallygratefultoSamuel Freemaninmanyways,including
for the frequent discussions on the topic of this book, and whose own
writingshaveprovidedoneofthesparksforthiswork.IalsothankKaren
Detlefsenforentertainingmythoughtsonthissubjectonmoreoccasions
than she would care to recall, and whose comments and feedback
provided valuable guidance at crucial points. Colleagues and friends in
the field at large have also offered comments and criticisms on different
sub-partsofthisworkatvariousoccasions.InparticularIthank:Richard
Arneson, Simon Caney, Deen Chatterjee, the late Jerry Cohen, Bruce
Landesman,CarolGould,AaronJames,AlistairMacleod,DarrelMoellen-
dorf,MargaretMoore,ChristineSypnowich,CindyStark,andBobTalisse.
Peter Momtchiloff of Oxford University Press generously supported
and encouraged this work from the beginning, and adroitly arranged for
invaluablefeedbackonboththeproposalandmanuscript.Ibenefitedfrom
differentreaders’commentsontheproposal,amongthemThomasPogge
and Andrea Sangiovanni. Two readers took the additional trouble of
offering careful criticisms and comments on the manuscript, and I hope
they will find the revisions prompted by their remarks on track. I am
certainlygratefulfortheirattention.Oneofthesereaders,nowrevealedto
me to be Peter Vallentyne, deserves special thanks for his detailed and
incisivesuggestionsandcriticismsthatheturnedaroundwithastonishing
rapidity.IhavenotaddressedallofPeter’sandtheotherreader’sconcerns
tomyfull satisfaction(andno doubtneither totheirs);butIhopeIhave
done enough to temper at least some of their more powerful challenges.
Many thanks also to Brenda Stones for her excellent copy-editing of
thescript.
Finally,andmostofall,thankstoKarenagainforhergoodpatienceand
encouragement,andtoAmaliaforprovidingthenecessarylifedistractions
thatputthingsintheirrightfulplace.
Chapter 6 includes passages from “Luck, Institutions, and Global Dis-
tributiveJustice,”TheEuropeanJournalofPoliticalTheory(July2011).Iam
PREFACEANDACKNOWLEDGMENTS ix
grateful for permission to reproduce parts of this paper here, and to the
editorsandreadersofthejournalforhelpfulcriticismsonthedraftofthis
paper.
Part I and Part II expand (with revisions in most cases) on some
argumentsfirstpresentedinthefollowingpapers:
“JusticeandPersonalPursuits,”TheJournalofPhilosophy101/7(2004).
“A Defense of Luck Egalitarianism,” The Journal of Philosophy 105/11
(2008).
I thank the editors and readers of The Journal of Philosophy for helpful
feedbackonthesepapers.
