Ethics

Numéro 3 (1): 2005

Articles

Colin MACLEOD

Economic Incentives and Liberal Equality

ABSTRACT

In order to assess to the degree to which the provision of economic incentives can result in justified inequalities, we need to distinguish between compensatory incentive payments and non-compensatory incentive payments. From a liberal egalitarian perspective, economic inequalities traceable to the provision of compensatory incentive payments are generally justifiable. However, economic inequalities created by the provision of non-compensatory incentive payments are more problematic. I argue that in non-ideal circumstances justice may permit and even require the provision of non-compensatory incentives despite the fact that those who receive non-compensatory payments are not entitled to them. In some circumstances, justice may require us to accede to unreasonable demands for incentive payments by hard bargainers. This leads to a kind of paradox: from a systemic point of view, non-compensatory incentive payments can be justified even though those who receive them have no just claim to them.

Alex VOORHOEVE

Incentives and Principles for Individuals in Rawls’s Theory of Justice

ABSTRACT

Philippe van Parijs (2003) has argued that an egalitarian ethos cannot be part of a postPolitical Liberalism Rawlsian view of justice, because the demands of political justice are confined to principles for institutions of the basic structure alone. This paper argues, by contrast, that certain principles for individual conduct—including a principle requiring relatively advantaged individuals to sometimes make their economic choices with the aim of maximising the prospects of the least advantaged—are an integral part of a Rawlsian political conception of justice. It concludes that incentive payments will have a clearly limited role in a Rawlsian theory of justice.

Essais et Commentaires

Stéphane LUCHINI
Miriam TESCHL

Is There Personal Identity in Economics? A discussion of John B. Davis The Theory of the Individual in Economics: Identity and Values

ABSTRACT

John B. Davis explores the question of what the economic individual is. He bases his considerations of orthodox economics on the assumption that these theories implicitly rely on a conception of the individual that has its origin in Locke’s idea of the self as subjective inwardness. Economic history then is the attempt to deal with Locke’s inherent problems that this view involved. If neoclassical economics still has aspects of human psychology, mainstream economics dropped the subjective concept of the individual out of their considerations. However, Davis demonstrates that even the neoclassical concept of the individual fails to pass the existence test of individual identity. The latter is an idea developed in analogy to philosophers’ concern about personal identity and examines if the individual can be distinguished among different individuals and if he or she can be reidentified as the selfsame individual through time. The failure of the theory of the individual in orthodox economics led Davis to develop a concept of a socially embedded individual in accordance with heterodox accounts of economics. He submits this conception to the same test of individual identity. It appears that the socially embedded individual can be said to hold an identity in specific circumstances.

Interview / Entrevue

Comptes rendus / Book Reviews

Numéro 3 (2): 2006

Articles

Amina BÉJI-BECHEUR
Faouzi BENSEBAA

Companies’ practices and social responsibility: cases of companies in the French tourist sector”

ABSTRACT

This article examines the firms’practices in the French tourist sector. By confronting the concepts defined in the literature on the social responsibility and what really happens in companies, the current research shows that the studied firms implement a minimal social responsibility which remains well below the expectation level of some stakeholders. This situation is explained by several factors, namely structural. Finally, the paper suggests ways to improve the concept of social responsibility.

KEYWORDS

Corporate social responsibility – Stakeholder theory – Tourism

Polly VIZARD

«Pogge -vs- Sen on Global Poverty and Human Rights”

ABSTRACT

This Paper is part of a broader project examining the ways in which Amartya Sen’s “capability approach” provides a framework for thinking about global poverty as a denial or a violation of basic human rights. The Paper compares the “capability approach” as a basis for thinking about global poverty and human rights with the alternative framework developed by Thomas Pogge. Both the “capability approach” and Pogge’s theory of “severe poverty as a violation of negative duties” support the idea of “freedom from severe poverty as a basic human right”. However, there are important differences. The Paper examines the limitations of Pogge’s “apparent minimalism” and establishes the ways in which Sen’s treatment of the “capability approach” and human rights moves beyond a “minimalist normative position” whilst avoiding Pogge’s charge of “implausibility”.

Sandrine BERGES

“Religion and Clothing: the Capabilities Approach Considered”

ABSTRACT

Proponents of the capabilities approach claim that it should be used to give guidance for the implementation of good constitutional laws. This suggests that it also gives us grounds to support attempts to create or protect constitutions based on something like the capabilities approach. The Turkish Republic claims that in order to protect secularism and the equal status of women, it needs to keep certain Islamic practices away from the public domain. The wearing of the headscarf has been singled out as such a practice, and the Turkish Republic has therefore legislated against headscarf wearing in schools, universities, and government buildings. In consequence many women are forced to choose between religion over education and politics in a way that curtails central human capabilities. Nussbaum claims that the best way to help states resolve the dilemma presented by the conflict between religious choice and other central capabilities is to refer to principles embodied in to the US Religious Freedom Restoration Act 1993, which states that a law can burden a person’s exercise of religion only when the burden is a furtherance of a compelling state interest. In this paper I consider how this advice partly vindicates the Turkish case and how the solution it yields is in many ways more satisfactory than that of more traditional approaches in political philosophy.

Interview / Entrevenue

POLÍTICA DE CONFIABILIDAD

ETHICS, ECONOMICS & COMMON GOODS, vol. 19, No. 1, enero-junio 2022, es una publicación semestral editada por la Universidad Popular Autónoma del Estado de Puebla A.C., calle 21 Sur 1103, Col. Santiago, C.P. 72410, Puebla, Puebla. Tel. (222) 2299400,  https://ethicsand-economics.com/callspapers@ethics-and-economics.com.

Editor responsable: Manuel Alejandro Gutiérrez González. Reserva de Derechos al Uso Exclusivo No. 04-2022071213543400-102, ISSN en trámite, ambos otorgados por el Instituto Nacional del Derecho de Autor. Responsable de la última actualización de este número, Universidad Tecnológica de Querétaro, TSU María Guadalupe García Guerrero, Av. Pie de la Cuesta 2501, col. Nacional, fecha de última modificación, 30 de julio de 2022.

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