What should egalitarians believe if they really are egalitarian? A reply to Martin O’Neill

Brown, Alexander (2014) What should egalitarians believe if they really are egalitarian? A reply to Martin O’Neill. European Journal of Political Theory, 13 (4). pp. 453-469. ISSN 1741-2730

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Abstract

In his article, ‘What Should Egalitarians Believe?’, Martin O’Neill argues, amongst other things, that egalitarians should reject both Telic and Deontic Egalitarianism and that they should adopt in their place a version of Non-Intrinsic Egalitarianism, specifically, the Pluralist Non-Intrinsic Egalitarian View. The central purpose of my article is to challenge O’Neill’s assumption that he can defend each of the various propositions that make up his position simultaneously. I do this with two arguments. First, I argue that in order to justify why egalitarians should adopt a version of Non-Intrinsic Egalitarianism, O’Neill is bound to rely on forms of egalitarianism that are either Telic or Deontic, and so he is no longer able to affirm that egalitarians should reject both Telic and Deontic Egalitarianism. Second, I argue that by allowing the inclusion of non-egalitarian reasons into the Pluralist Non-Intrinsic Egalitarian View, O’Neill opens the floodgates to an indefinite number of other non-egalitarian reasons, such that it is scarcely credible that the Pluralist Non-Intrinsic Egalitarian View really is an egalitarian view after all.

Item Type:	Article
Uncontrolled Keywords:	egalitarianism,justice,o'neill,parfit,pluralism
Faculty \ School:	Faculty of Arts and Humanities > School of Politics, Philosophy, Language and Communication Studies (former - to 2024)
UEA Research Groups:	Faculty of Arts and Humanities > Research Groups > Policy & Politics Faculty of Arts and Humanities > Research Groups > Political, Social and International Studies
Depositing User:	Pure Connector
Date Deposited:	09 Oct 2014 16:20
Last Modified:	25 Sep 2024 11:28
URI:	https://ueaeprints.uea.ac.uk/id/eprint/50178
DOI:	10.1177/1474885113506710

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