When equality needs no justification

Phillips, Anne (2024) When equality needs no justification. In: Floris, Giacomo and Kirby, Nikolas, (eds.) How Can We Be Equals? Basic Equality: Its Meaning, Explanation, and Scope. Oxford University Press, Oxford, UK, 221 - 238. ISBN 9780192871480

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Abstract

Proclamations about our natural equality have commonly coexisted with multiple exclusions by gender, class, and race. This seeming paradox reflects the influence of what I describe as property-based justifications for equality, for when supposed facts about our shared human nature become the basis for equality claims, this simultaneously creates alibis for deeming many people natural inferiors. Contemporary accounts of equality remain too much within that original mould, pursuing a logic of justification that is still bound to the exclusionary practices of the past. When pursued, more specifically, in the language of moral equality, they offer an account of the progress of equality that overstates the current acceptance of basic or ‘moral’ equality while understating the extent to which the status of equal depends on reducing material inequalities. The language of moral equality further encourages a slippage into precisely the kind of moral differentiation and judgement that it is intended to avoid.

Item Type:	Book Section
Official URL:	https://global.oup.com/academic/product/how-can-we...
Additional Information:	© 2024 Oxford University Press
Divisions:	Government
Subjects:	J Political Science H Social Sciences
Date Deposited:	19 Aug 2024 15:48
Last Modified:	11 Dec 2024 18:15
URI:	http://eprints.lse.ac.uk/id/eprint/124609

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