분배적 평등의 실현형태와 그 평등화의 척도

This paper aims at pursuing a plausible theory of distributive justice based on equality by analyzing several competing theories of egalitarian justice. Each competing theory of equality, namely, equality of welfare, equality of resources, or equality of basic capabilities has its own distinctive justification and its particular collateral form of distributional equality. Equality of welfare espoused by utilitarians is to equalize people in welfare. Equality of resources vindicated by John Rawls and more deeply sophisticated by Ronald Dworkin is treating people equal by equalizing people in possessing resources as a means to access to welfare. Equality of basic capabilities developed by Amatya Sen and refined by Martha Nussbaum is equalizing people in basic functions and capabilities necessary for access to well-being. Although the idea that everybody should be equal in welfare is initially attractive but incurably problematic. Equality of welfare has defect because with respect to welfare to be equalized we will soon encounter that there are too many variety of meaning of welfare to plausibly equalize people in welfare. Also another objection to equality of welfare is that it mandates provision for expensive tastes: the objection is that it is unfair to impose the cost of satisfying a given person’s expensive taste on other people. Equality of basic capabilities has been criticized because it will soon be expanded to include higher level of capabilities, which entails in fusing with the realm of welfare. Equality of resources is regarded as a most powerful explication of the means to equalizing people. But nonetheless equality of resources also has been subject to criticism by G. A. Cohen and Richard Arneson under the slogan of equality of opportunity for welfare. Equality of resources is also criticized from the camp of Sen and Nussbaum since it tends to focus on the material satisfaction on the one hand but on the other hand it neglects a humanistic aspect for people truly in need of the sense of freedom trough the functioning and capabilities. However, on the whole theories of equality of resources can be regarded as an idea of equality which explains best both the principle of liberal choice and personal responsibility. Equality of resources is a means to realize the idea of liberal equality. Notwithstanding this merit on the part of equality of resources, equality of basic functioning capabilities should be taken into serious consideration in order to complement the deficiency of equality of resources. Equality of basic functioning capabilities play a role to provide a humanistic face by adding a basic functioning and basic capabilities which can not be fully realized only by the material satisfaction under the equality of resources. Thus my contention in this paper is that distributional equality would be better realized by the means of equality of resources with a condition that at the threshold level of decent standard of living the basic needs of the least advantaged people should be satisfied by employing the basic capabilities approach.