Open Book Publishers

4. Autonomy-Based Reasons for Limitarianism

Danielle Zwarthoed (author)

Chapter of: Having Too Much: Philosophical Essays on Limitarianism(pp. 91–128)

Export Metadata

Raw

Metadata
Title	4. Autonomy-Based Reasons for Limitarianism
Contributor	Danielle Zwarthoed (author)
DOI	https://doi.org/10.11647/OBP.0338.04
Landing page	https://www.openbookpublishers.com/books/10.11647/obp.0338/chapters/10.11647/obp.0338.04
License	https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/
Copyright	Danielle Zwarthoed
Publisher	Open Book Publishers
Published on	2023-07-06
Long abstract	This paper aims to provide autonomy-based reasons in favour of limitarianism. Limitarianism affirms it is of primary moral importance that no one gets too much. The paper challenges the standard assumption that having more material resources always increases autonomy. It expounds five mechanisms through which having too much material wealth might undermine autonomy. If these hypotheses are true, a theory of justice guided by a concern for autonomy will support a limitarian distribution of wealth. Finally, the paper discusses two issues autonomy-based limitarianism would raise. First, insofar as coercion invades autonomy, do autonomy-based reasons legitimate coercive measures to secure a limitarian distribution of wealth? Second, is a limitarian ethos consistent with the incentive to produce enough wealth to secure distributive justice?
Page range	pp. 91–128
Print length	38 pages
Language	English (Original)

Locations
	Landing Page	Full text URL	Platform
PDF	https://www.openbookpublishers.com/books/10.11647/obp.0338/chapters/10.11647/obp.0338.04	Landing page	https://books.openbookpublishers.com/10.11647/obp.0338.04.pdf	Full text URL	Publisher Website
HTML	https://www.openbookpublishers.com/books/10.11647/obp.0338/chapters/10.11647/obp.0338.04	Landing page	https://books.openbookpublishers.com/10.11647/obp.0338/ch4.xhtml	Full text URL	Publisher Website

Contributors

Danielle Zwarthoed

(author)

Danielle Zwarthoed is a historian and philosopher. At the time of publishing her article that is included in this volume, she was a lecturer at the Chair Hoover at the Université Catholique de Louvain. She is currently pursuing a second PhD-degree at the EHESS in Paris.

References

Angelescu, Laura. 2014. Rich People, an Overview. In Alex C. Michalos (Ed.), Encyclopedia of Quality of Life and Well-Being Research (pp. 5566–5569). Dordrecht: Springer, Netherlands. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-007-0753-5_2521
Atkinson, Anthony B., Piketty, Thomas & Saez, Emmanuel. 2011. Top Incomes in the Long Run of History. Journal of Economic Literature, 49, 3–71. https://doi.org/10.1257/jel.49.1.3
Benson, Paul. 2005. Taking Ownership: Authority and Voice in Autonomous Agency. In Joel Anderson & John Christman (Eds.), Autonomy and the Challenges to Liberalism (pp. 101–126). https://doi.org/10.1017/CBO9780511610325.007
Blanchflower, David G. & Oswald, Andrew J. 2004. Well-being over time in Britain and the USA. Journal of Public Economics, 88, 1359–1386. https://doi.org/10.1016/S0047-2727(02)00168-8
Bourdieu, Pierre. 1979. La distinction. Critique sociale du jugement. Paris: Éditions de Minuit.
Bourdieu, Pierre. 1984. Questions de sociologie. Paris: Editions de Minuit.
Brickman, Philip, Coates, Dan & Janoff-Bulman, Ronnie. 1978. Lottery winners and accident victims: Is happiness relative? Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 36, 917–927. https://doi.org/10.1037/0022-3514.36.8.917
Casal, Paula. 2007. Why sufficiency is not enough. Ethics, 117, 296–336. https://doi.org/10.1086/510692
Christman, J. 1987. Autonomy: a defense of the split-level self. The Southern Journal of Philosophy, 23, 281–293. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.2041-6962.1987.tb01623.x
Crouch, Colin. 2003. Commercialization or citizenship: the case of education. In Commercialization or Citizenship: Education Policy and the Future of Public Services. Fabian Society, London.
Csikszentmihalyi, Mihaly. 1999. If We Are So Rich, Why Aren’t We Happy? American Psychologist, 54, 821–827. https://doi.org/10.1037/0003-066X.54.10.821
Cummins, Robert A. 2000. Personal Income and Subjective Well-being: A Review. Journal of Happiness Studies, 1, 133–158. https://doi.org/10.1023/A:1010079728426
Currie, Janet & Gahvari, Firouz. 2008. Transfers in Cash and In-Kind: Theory Meets the Data. Journal of Economic Literature, 46, 333–383. https://doi.org/10.1257/jel.46.2.333
Dart, Tom. 2014. Texas Teenager Suffering “affluenza” Avoids Jail for Second Time. In The Guardian, 6 February 2014, https://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/feb/06/texas-teenager-affluenza-escapes-jail-second-time
Diener, Edward. 2000. Subjective Well-Being: The Science of Happiness and a Proposal for a National Index, American Psychologist, 55, 34–43.
Diener, Edward & Biswas-Diener, Robert. 2002. Will Money Increase Subjective Well-Being? Social Indicators Research, 57, 119–169. https://doi.org/10.1023/A:1014411319119
Diener, Edward & Oishi, Shigehiro. 2000. Money and happiness: Income and subjective well-being across nations. In Edward Diener & Suh, Eunkook M. (Eds.), Culture and subjective well-being (pp. 185–218). Cambridge: MIT Press.
Diener, Edward, Horwitz, Jeff & Emmons, Robert A. 1985. Happiness of the Very Wealthy. Social Indicators Research, 16, 263–274. https://doi.org/10.1007/BF00415126
Dworkin, Gerald. 1988. The Theory and Practice of Autonomy. Cambridge University Press.
Easterlin, Richard A. 1973. Does Money Buy Happiness? The Public Interest, 30, 3–10.
Easterlin, Richard A. 1995. Will raising the incomes of all increase the happiness of all? Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, 27, 35–47. https://doi.org/10.1016/0167-2681(95)00003-BEasterlin 2001
Eckenroth, Danielle. 2015. Wealthy Justice: The Role Wealth Plays in Sentencing and in the Affluenza Defense Notes. New England Journal on Criminal and Civil Confinement, 41, 443–462.
Elster, Jon. 1982. Sour grapes—utilitarianism and the genesis of wants. In Amartya K. Sen & Bernard Williams (Eds.), Utilitarianism and Beyond (pp. 219–238). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. https://doi.org/10.1017/CBO9780511611964.013
Festinger, Leon. 1962. Cognitive Dissonance. Scientific American, 207, 93–106. https://doi.org/10.1038/scientificamerican1062-93
Frank, Robert H. 1999. Luxury fever: why money fails to satisfy in an era of excess. New York: Free Press.
Frankfurt, Harry G. 1988. The Importance of What We Care About: Philosophical Essays. Cambridge University Press. https://doi.org/10.1017/CBO9780511818172
Frey, Bruno S. & Stutzer, Alois. 2002. What Can Economists Learn from Happiness Research? Journal of Economic Literature, 40, 402–435. https://doi.org/10.1257/002205102320161320
Fricker, Miranda. 2007. Epistemic Injustice: Power and the Ethics of Knowing. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Friedman, Marilyn A. 1986. Autonomy and the Split-Level Self. The Southern Journal of Philosophy, 24, 19–35. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.2041-6962.1986.tb00434.x
Gosseries, Alex. 2011. Qu’est-Ce Que Le Suffisantisme? Philosophiques, 38, 465–491. https://doi.org/10.7202/1007460ar
Hume, David. 1751. An Enquiry Concerning the Principles of Morals. London: Printed for A. Millar.
Khader, Serene. J. 2011. Adaptive Preferences and Women’s Empowerment. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Kollmuss, Anja & Agyeman, Julian. 2002. Mind the Gap: Why Do People Act Environmentally and What Are the Barriers to pro-Environmental Behavior? Environmental Education Research, 8, 239–260, https://doi.org/10.1080/13504620220145401
Mackenzie, Catriona. 2014. Three Dimensions of Autonomy. In Andrea Veltman & Mark Piper (Eds.), Autonomy, Oppression, and Gender (pp. 15–41). New York: Oxford University Press. https://doi.org/10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199969104.003.0002
Maurin, Éric. 2009. La peur du déclassement: une sociologie des récessions. Paris: Seuil.
McLeod, Carolyn. 2002. Self-trust and reproductive autonomy. Cambridge: MIT Press.
Mirrlees, James A. 1971. An Exploration in the Theory of Optimum Income Taxation. The Review of Economic Studies, 38, 175–208. https://doi.org/10.2307/2296779
Monin, Benoît. 2008. Cognitive Dissonance. In W.A. Darity (Ed.), International Encyclopedia of the Social Sciences. (pp. 599–601) Farmington Hill, MA: Macmillan.
Morton, Jennifer M. 2011. Toward an Ecological Theory of the Norms of Practical Deliberation. European Journal of Philosophy, 19, 561–584. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1468-0378.2010.00400.x
Musgrave, Richard Abel. 1959. The theory of public finance: a study in public economy. New York: McGraw-Hill.
Myers, David G. 2000. The Funds, Friends, and Faith of Happy People. The American Psychologist, 55, 56–67. https://doi.org/10.1037/0003-066X.55.1.56
Nozick, Robert. 1974. Anarchy, State and Utopia. New York: Basic Books.
Nussbaum, Martha C. 2000. Women and Human Development: The Capabilities Approach. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Oshana, Marina. 2006. Personal Autonomy in Society. Aldershot, Hants, England; Burlington, VT: Ashgate.
Pinçon, Michel & Pinçon-Charlot, Monique. 2016. Sociologie de la bourgeoisie. Paris: La Découverte.
Rawls, John. 1999. A Theory of Justice, Revised Edition. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Rawls, John. 2001. Justice as Fairness: A Restatement. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.
Raz, Joseph. 1986. The Morality of Freedom. Oxford: Clarendon Press.
Robeyns, Ingrid. 2011. The Capability Approach. In Edward N. Zalta (Ed.), The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy. https://plato.stanford.edu/archives/win2016/entries/capability-approach/.
Robeyns, Ingrid. 2017. Having Too Much. In J. Knight & M. Schwartzberg (Eds.), NOMOS LVII: Wealth. Yearbook of the American Society for Political and Legal Philosophy (pp. 1–44). New York: New York University Press. https://doi.org/10.18574/9781479849291-003
Robeyns, Ingrid. 2018. Where do people put the riches-line [Blog post]. Retrieved from: http://crookedtimber.org/2018/01/06/where-do-people-put-the-riches-line/.
Sen, Amartya. 1985. Commodities and Capabilities. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Slemrod, Joel. 2006. The Consequences of Taxation. Social Philosophy & Policy, 23, 73–87. https://doi.org/10.1017/S0265052506060171
Spears, Dean. 2014. Decision costs and price sensitivity: Field experimental evidence from India. Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, 97, 169–184. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jebo.2013.06.012
Thurow, Lester C. 1976. Government Expenditures: Cash or In-Kind Aid? Philosophy & Public Affairs, 5, 361–381.
Waldron, Jeremy. 1988. Autonomy and Perfectionism in Raz’s Morality of Freedom Symposium: The Works of Joseph Raz. Southern California Law Review, 62, 1097–1152.
Westlund, Andrea C. 2009. Rethinking Relational Autonomy. Hypatia, 24, 26–49. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1527-2001.2009.01056.x
White, Stuart. 2010. A Modest Proposal? Basic Capital vs. Higher Education Subsidies. British Journal of Politics & International Relations, 12, 37–55. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1467-856X.2009.00392.x

Export Metadata

This paper aims to provide autonomy-based reasons in favour of limitarianism. Limitarianism affirms it is of primary moral importance that no one gets too much. The paper challenges the standard assumption that having more material resources always increases autonomy. It expounds five mechanisms through which having too much material wealth might undermine autonomy. If these hypotheses are true, a theory of justice guided by a concern for autonomy will support a limitarian distribution of wealth. Finally, the paper discusses two issues autonomy-based limitarianism would raise. First, insofar as coercion invades autonomy, do autonomy-based reasons legitimate coercive measures to secure a limitarian distribution of wealth? Second, is a limitarian ethos consistent with the incentive to produce enough wealth to secure distributive justice?