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Egalitarianism: Is Leximin the Only Option?

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  • Tungodden, Bertil

Abstract

The most influential egalitarian perspective is undoubtedly Rawls's (1971, 1993), which assigns absolute priority to the least advantaged in society (the difference principle). However, many have claimed that even though an egalitarian perspective should imply some priority to the worst off, the Rawlsian perspective is too demanding. One response to this criticism is to argue in favour of an egalitarian perspective that never assigns absolute priority to the worse off, but which still includes limited priority to those members of society in distributive conflicts. A different response to the demandingness criticism is to agree that the worse off should not always be given absolute priority, but to argue that there are some cases where they should be. In this paper, we elaborate on this view, and look at the possibility of deviating from the leximin approach within this category of egalitarian principles.

Suggested Citation

  • Tungodden, Bertil, 2000. "Egalitarianism: Is Leximin the Only Option?," Economics and Philosophy, Cambridge University Press, vol. 16(2), pages 229-245, October.
    • Handle: RePEc:cup:ecnphi:v:16:y:2000:i:02:p:229-245_00
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    Cited by:

    1. Nicolas Gravel & Brice Magdalou & Patrick Moyes, 2019. "Inequality measurement with an ordinal and continuous variable," Social Choice and Welfare, Springer;The Society for Social Choice and Welfare, vol. 52(3), pages 453-475, March.
    2. Roland Iwan Luttens & Erwin Ooghe, 2007. "Is it Fair to ‘Make Work Pay’?," Economica, London School of Economics and Political Science, vol. 74(296), pages 599-626, November.
    3. Nicolas Gravel & Brice Magdalou & Patrick Moyes, 2021. "Ranking distributions of an ordinal variable," Economic Theory, Springer;Society for the Advancement of Economic Theory (SAET), vol. 71(1), pages 33-80, February.
    4. Sakamoto, Norihito, 2020. "Equity Principles and Interpersonal Comparison of Well-being: Old and New Joint Characterizations of Generalized Leximin, Rank-dependent Utilitarian, and Leximin Rules," RCNE Discussion Paper Series 7, Research Center for Normative Economics, Institute of Economic Research, Hitotsubashi University.
    5. Nicolas Gravel & Brice Magdalou & Patrick Moyes, 2017. "Hammond’s Equity Principle and the Measurement of Ordinal Inequalities," AMSE Working Papers 1703, Aix-Marseille School of Economics, France.
    6. Michele Lombardi & Kaname Miyagishima & Roberto Veneziani, 2016. "Liberal Egalitarianism and the Harm Principle," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 126(597), pages 2173-2196, November.
    7. Kristof Bosmans, 2007. "Comparing degrees of inequality aversion," Social Choice and Welfare, Springer;The Society for Social Choice and Welfare, vol. 29(3), pages 405-428, October.
    8. LUTTENS, Roland Iwan & OOGHE, Erwin, 2006. "Is it fair to ‘make work pay’ ?," LIDAM Discussion Papers CORE 2006026, Université catholique de Louvain, Center for Operations Research and Econometrics (CORE).
    9. Marc Fleurbaey, 2005. "The Pazner-Schmeidler social ordering: A defense," Review of Economic Design, Springer;Society for Economic Design, vol. 9(2), pages 145-166, April.
    10. Kristof Bosmans & Erwin Ooghe, 2013. "A characterization of maximin," Economic Theory Bulletin, Springer;Society for the Advancement of Economic Theory (SAET), vol. 1(2), pages 151-156, November.
    11. Philippe Mongin & Marcus Pivato, 2021. "Rawls’s difference principle and maximin rule of allocation: a new analysis," Economic Theory, Springer;Society for the Advancement of Economic Theory (SAET), vol. 71(4), pages 1499-1525, June.

    More about this item

    JEL classification:

    • D63 - Microeconomics - - Welfare Economics - - - Equity, Justice, Inequality, and Other Normative Criteria and Measurement
    • D71 - Microeconomics - - Analysis of Collective Decision-Making - - - Social Choice; Clubs; Committees; Associations
    • D31 - Microeconomics - - Distribution - - - Personal Income and Wealth Distribution
    • I32 - Health, Education, and Welfare - - Welfare, Well-Being, and Poverty - - - Measurement and Analysis of Poverty

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