Interacting with Global Rights

Once Nagel accepts the political position, he runs into the problem of liberal states interacting with non-liberal states. Analyzing this relationship, he disagrees with Rawls’ conception. Rawls argued that, because nations must respect peoples, liberal nations must be tolerant of peoples that meet the minimum condition of decency. Rawls justifies this by attributing a moral nature and a moral right of equality to peoples, and gives these precedence over liberal values in the international sphere. Under this conception, a nation would lose the respect of other nations, and their moral claims, if they did not respect the human rights of its subjects.

Nagel takes issue with this. Under Rawls conception, nations would have to respect societies that were undemocratic and oppressive, as long as they met the minimum requirement. Nagel specifically mentions a theocratic society that does not prosecute minorities and observes due process, but does not allow for elections. He does not agree that such a nation deserves the respect of others. Although he recognizes that it may be more impractical, Nagel sees no moral issue with liberal societies supporting the transformation of non-liberal societies. In fact, because he believes that our respect for other nations is actually respect for the human rights of their members, allowing us to push for the protection of their human rights.

Nagels belief that our interactions with other nations should be based on the universalization of human rights is difficult to accept, give his position in the political conception. If Nagel believes that states’ respect for each other is based on the idea of human rights, rather than on the power of the sovereign, then the bar for international justice must be much lower. Much of Nagel’s paper is based on showing how we cannot have international justice because there is not sufficient structure in place to call our international economy an authority. If he now believes that human rights, not authority structures, are the basis for interactions, it is much easier to show that there is a strong relationship between internationally trading countries.

An Objection from Moral Arbitrariness

In discussing Rawls’ “moral presumption against arbitrary inequalities” (127) on the bottom of page 127 and on page 128, Nagel explicitly says that Rawls does not make the following objection:

“there is something prima facie objectionable to anyone’s having lower life prospects at birth than anyone else just because of a difference between the two of them, such as the wealth of their parents or their nationality, over which neither of them had any control” (127-8).

I want to pick up where Nagel thinks that Rawls leaves off, and challenge Nagel’s political conception of justice by raising this unconditional objection to morally arbitrary factors.

Nagel admits that “We do not deserve to have been born into a particular society any more than we deserve to have been born into a particular family” (128). However, Nagel’s political conception of justice quite clearly differentiates between these two equally arbitrary considerations; according to Nagel, those born into poor families should get the benefit of their society’s system of justice, while those born into poor societies have no claim to the benefit of any kind of global justice. What Nagel must (and does) do is justify this distinction between these two different morally arbitrary factors.

He gives the following explanation: “I believe [this distinction] comes from a special involvement of agency or the will that is inseparable from membership in a political society. Not the will to become or remain a member, for most people have no choice in that regard, but the engagement of the will that is essential to life inside a society, in the dual role each member plays both as one of the society’s subjects and as one of those in whose name its authority is exercised” (128).

This is the reason for Nagel’s distinction, and this distinction seems to be at the core of Nagel’s argument. Regardless of the fact that most people have no choice about which society they are born into, the fact that they engage in their society and associate with each other both as subjects of society and participants in the general will endows them with the right to socioeconomic justice from their society.

But because it is morally arbitrary that some people end up in societies that are able and thus obligated to provide positive, distributive justice, shouldn’t the goal be to eliminate this component of luck by providing this justice to as many individuals (across as many societies) as possible? I think that irrespective of the content of positive, substantive justice guaranteed by society, we need to ensure that this justice is enjoyed by as many people in the world as possible, because what society they are born into is simply a matter of luck. And, returning to the objection from the beginning of this post, there is something unconditionally morally objectionable about arbitrary factors determining peoples’ life prospects.

Although Nagel seems to think that he has justified his political conception of justice by appealing to the unique dual engagement required by society, I am not convinced that he has defended himself from this objection because at the end of the day, who ends up able to engage in a society that secures substantive justice for its subjects is still a matter of luck.                  

More counterarguments regarding colonialism

According to Nagel, justice is strictly political, not moral in nature. Justice is only possible under one sovereign ruler that both represents its citizens and enforces decisions made by its citizens. Nagel argues that only once there is an associative link between individuals solidified by institutions, as is the case between citizens of a society, can there be any claims to socioeconomic justice. Because there is no world regime, and Nagel furthermore does not believe a world regime is feasible, justice between individuals of different states is impossible. Therefore, while “everyone may have a right to live in a just society…we do not have an obligation to live in a just society with everyone. The right to justice is the right that the society one lives in be justly governed” (132).

I want to bring up the point I made in my last blot post regarding the neglect of taking into account the effects of colonialism and imperialism, as I do not believe Nagel defeats this counterargument.  Nagel claims that global justice is not possible because citizens in different societies owe nothing to one another on moral grounds, as there are no associative links between citizens of different states. I would like to push back on this claim. Many countries experiencing great growth and wealth did so on the backs of poor nations. Moreover, wealthy countries colonized other territories and effectively added the citizens of these territories under their sovereignty. Those areas that were colonized were then left to their own devices after withstanding corruption and extraction from more powerful nations are often the countries that currently experience extreme poverty. Nagel’s account of global justice does not address the fact that sovereignty was at one point extended to these countries currently experiencing extreme poverty. And, more importantly, nor does it address the developed nations' role in this devastation of other countries, which is, in effect, an associative link between the citizens of the developed countries and the citizens of the poorest nations in the world.  Citizens in developed countries were able to prosper, and are still able to prosper, to the detriment of the citizens in previously colonized areas. I am curious to see what Nagel’s response to this counterargument would be. Would he consider the effects of colonialism and post-colonialism to provide associative links between individuals? If not, how would Nagel justify colonialism and its consequences?

While Nagel’s argument contemplates the role of obligation, whereas Sen’s argument overlooks this important point, to me, he comes up with an unsatisfactory answer that perpetuates the world order status quo.

Size Matters

I want to comment on the scales of morality Nagel has presented.

Early on, Nagel states that "the link between justice and sovereignty is something common to a wide range of conceptions of justice: they all depend on the coordinated conduct of large numbers of people, which cannot be achieved without law backed up by a monopoly of force" (115). He goes on to say that this force must be "assured" by some sort of "external incentive provided by the sovereign" (115). Importantly, he argues, that at "least among sizable populations, [this assurance] cannot be provided by voluntary conventions supported solely by the mutual recognition of a common interest" (115). That is, once a society becomes large enough, people are too disconnected to possess the strong ties which hold small communities together. Naturally, then, it is more important for the sovereign of a large state to coercively enforce justice in lieu of the powerful social norms found in smaller communities. This logic reminded me of Montesquieu when he was describing the conditions for a republic. Montesquieu argued that in large republic, the "public good is sacrificed to a thousand private views," and therefore a smaller republic is best for sustaining the social norms necessary for its survival. Oftentimes, these are the norms necessary for enforcing or encouraging beneficent actions and behavior. To illustrate this point more concretely, imagine you are walking down the street and see a small child drowning in a puddle. To save the child would be an act of beneficence, not of justice (if we adopted a Smithian view). Now imagine this scenario 1) in a small, tight-knit community and 2) in a crowded, busy city. While the child could be saved in either case, it seems far more likely that the child will be left to drown in the city. Numbers matter. Seemingly, there is a relationship between population size and our capacity to empathize.  It kind of reminds me of the Great Gatsby quote when Daisy says: “And I like large parties. They’re so intimate. At small parties there isn’t any privacy.” At large parties, it's easy to withdraw yourself, find your small niche of friends, and ignore the vast majority of people; at small parties, you can't -- you're almost forced to participate and accord to the norms of the party. Similarly, the small child will more likely drown at the large party without the same level of social accountability. But why does size matter? Why is it that the same person who saves the child in Montana will utterly ignore him splashing around in New York? Is it pluralistic ignorance, believing that someone else will save the child?

But now I want to understand what a true, global order would look like. To some extent, Montesquieu's question was answered with a federal republic -- that is, you combine the best of both worlds (empire and republic) under a federal system which balanced the interests of small communities with the collective interests. Would a federal system work on a global stage? Or would a European Union union work better? The United Nations currently functions similarly to the government in the U.S. under the Articles of Confederation -- that is, it can do some things, but it is extremely limited by its priority to respect the sovereignty of nations (as Nagel covers), its reluctance to use force (not to mention the ridiculous politics embedded in the veto powers on the Security Council) and it's reliance on the voluntary funding from nations. I think Nagel rightly asserts that Human Rights at a socioeconomic level can only be achieved through some sort of global order that is created in an illegitimate way. The question is, how would that order be organized? Would we modify the U.N.? Would it add to the level of federalism such that our global power would become the supreme law of all lands? Could the constitution of this new order be founded on Amartya Sen's 'development as freedom'? Regardless, it would be necessary to overcome the issues inherent in governing 7 billion people - how do you make people care? Even if there was a global order, how do you overcome the degradation of association between members due to sheer scale? Perhaps technology can flatten the world and bring us together, entice our empathetic senses, and unite us into a global order.    

part 2 in the series of feels: 4 am feels

I apologize in advance for perhaps being incoherent. It is very early in the morning.

Cristina touched on this in her blog post, but I wanted to illuminate another aspect of the quotation that she references:

“In a democracy, people tend to get what they demand, and more crucially, do not typically get what they do not demand” (156).

My question is: what happens when people do not know what they should/would demand?

At first glance, the idea that people will not know what is best for them seems paternalistic. I am not arguing, however, that the government or certain groups of people know better than them in virtue of their position in society, but rather that they might know better in virtue of their level of education. Furthermore, if citizens did not possess the necessary tools (literacy, a basic level of education), could this not undermine their ability to engage in a “fuller [emphasis mine] practice of democracy” (154)?

If we think about the issues that Americans currently grapple with vs. the ideas we used to grapple with, it seems that there has been a positive progression of ideas in some domains. For one, most people think that slavery and segregation are both morally reprehensible. Why have our values changed and why do we now value both freedom and equal freedom? People fought hard to fight for these rights. Once protections were codified into law, certainly the general ethos of institutions changed and thus society changed. In addition to this, however, I think that education plays a very significant role in the evolution of our values (from generation to generation and within an individual’s lifetime) and our increased emphasis on equality.

What about the statistics that show that those who receive college degrees are more likely to be Democrats? If there is some causal relation and if education could change our values and beliefs, how can there be genuine political participation in a society with vast inequalities of educational levels of achievement? What would Sen think? How would we go about improving educational capabilities without infringing on political capabilities in a society that does not value education?

What if education is the problem?

Just for kicks, I want to challenge some of the fundamental assumptions that Sen is advocating for and the possible side effects of his reasoning.

1. Education

Time and time again, Sen advocates for more education. Yet, he never specifies what he means by education. Certainly, it's not within the scope of his book to outline an entire education model -- but this is not what I want to argue. Rather, I want to discuss what Sen means by education. I presume, Sen is talking about institutionalized, formal education. Pulling from Ivan Illich's book Deschooling Society:

"Many students, especially those who are poor, intuitively know what the schools do for them. They school them to confuse process and substance. Once these become blurred, a new logic is assumed: the more treatment there is, the better are the results; or, escalation leads to success. The pupil is thereby 'schooled' to confuse teaching with learning, grade advancement with the ability to say something new. His imagination is 'schooled' to accept service in place of value. Medical treatment is mistaken for health care, social work for improvement of community life, police protection for safety, military poise for national security, the rat race for productive work. Health, learning, dignity, independence, and creative endeavor are defined as little more than the performance of the institutions which claim to server these ends, and their improvement is made to depend on allocating more resources to the management of hospitals, schools, and other agencies in question" (1).

The entire book actually speaks to several interesting aspects of Sen's argument:

(1) The difference between means and ends
 • Send views income as a means to more important ends (health, literacy, etc.)

Sen states that freedom is both an end and a means to other ends (like health). Yet, what if the means you use to achieve that end actually undermine an important aspect of agency. That is, education is a powerful tool -- it shapes identities, funnels ideas, and manipulates thought. If we are to take Illich's argument above seriously, it seems, institutionalized education actually leaves us with a disturbing logic that conflates process with substance. What if the solution Sen proposes actually leaves individuals with the belief that "more treatment" means "more results." Sen would criticize this argument if we were talking about income, but he would not if it came to education or literacy (separating "education" as an institution from the actual development of intellectual capabilities). Self-education is thrown out the window in favor of societal education; individuality is exchanged for a cultural funnel. Importantly, we shape development, under the umbrella of "freedom," as nothing more than the development of a taste for consumption: consume more education, more health care, more, more -- not more learning, health, etc -- more institutions. At this point, the cycle of consumption has become perfected. Those who once were liberated by these institutions become enslaved to them; without them, the can not be learned, healthy etc. The relative standards have changed. To not consume is to lose the rat race.

(2) Relative Deprivation that Sen talks about on page 96 and elsewhere

Sen talks about relative deprivation and the effects it can have. This seems like a positional arms race -- absolute position barely matters, relative position is what matters the most! Thus, especially if the above logic of consumption holds, the more institutions we create to consume -- or the more we consume in general, the more the gap between the haves and have nots grow. At this point, deprivation becomes a never ending game -- so long as inequality exists, deprivation exists. Like a Ponzi scheme, consumption requires more and more players to sustain itself. Perhaps this explains the final critique:

(3) Savages, victims, saviors complex (I think this phrase was coined by a Harvard publication)

The underlying premise of the human rights movement is the idea that there are: savages, victims, and saviors. It is the job of the saviors to save millions of innocent victims form the barbaric savages of some other world. How do the saviors save them? Show them how much material goods they are lacking. Show them how relatively awful they are living. Then bring them the institutions which require indefinite consumption.

(4) 6th Extinction

According to Jared Diamond, a professor of geography at the University of California, Los Angeles, and author of “Collapse” and “Guns, Germs and Steel,” the world is approaching a "6th extinction:"

He outlines the levels of consumption here:

"The average rates at which people consume resources like oil and metals, and produce wastes like plastics and greenhouse gases, are about 32 times higher in North America, Western Europe, Japan and Australia than they are in the developing world. That factor of 32 has big consequences. ... People in the third world are aware of this difference in per capita consumption, although most of them couldn’t specify that it’s by a factor of 32. When they believe their chances of catching up to be hopeless, they sometimes get frustrated and angry, and some become terrorists, or tolerate or support terrorists. ... People who consume little want to enjoy the high-consumption lifestyle. Governments of developing countries make an increase in living standards a primary goal of national policy."

"If India as well as China were to catch up, world consumption rates would triple. If the whole developing world were suddenly to catch up, world rates would increase elevenfold. It would be as if the world population ballooned to 72 billion people (retaining present consumption rates).

"Some optimists claim that we could support a world with nine billion people. But I haven’t met anyone crazy enough to claim that we could support 72 billion. Yet we often promise developing countries that if they will only adopt good policies — for example, institute honest government and a free-market economy — they, too, will be able to enjoy a first-world lifestyle. This promise is impossible, a cruel hoax: we are having difficulty supporting a first-world lifestyle even now for only one billion people."

Essentially, even though what Sen argues for sounds reasonable, can we really support it in the way he is advocating? I don't think we have to reject his argument for interconnectedness or his emphasis on freedom, but I think there is a missing component of what we want to achieve. Global consumption and standard of living at a U.S. level? Or, if we are to truly be free, to we have to break the shackles which enslave us -- of consumption, of the logic of more and more treatment, of development as more.

The full piece is here:
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/01/02/opinion/02diamond.html?ex=1356930000&en=07a742d70360f175&ei=5124&partner=permalink&exprod=permalink&_r=0

Rejecting the Tradition of Human Labor

In Chapter 10, Sen briefly touches on the threats of globalization when considering the preservation of cultures and tradition. He mentions that short-run safety nets have to be included in any economic adjustment to ensure that "the form of globalization is less destructive of employment and traditional livelihood, and to achieve gradual transition... there also have to be opportunities for retraining and acquiring of new skills, in addition to providing social safety nets for those whose interests are harmed..." (240). He then goes on to describe how this process can be applied when lost traditions also become a part of the mix, and how societies often need to make a choice between tradition and economic prosperity.

Sen's argument categorizes the replacement of labor and the loss of tradition as two fundamentally different phenomenons. Thinking much further ahead, I began to consider the decision-making process that would have to take place when the two become much more closely related. It is irrational to think that the Sen's theme of retraining employees whose livelihoods are at risk will always be feasible. Technology will soon reach a point when even "safe" white-collar professions can be replicated by machines. Keep in mind that technology for advanced processes driving automobiles don't need to be perfect - they just need to be better than humans (who are incredibly awful at driving). To further provide support for this argument, I encourage all of you to watch this thought-provoking Youtube video by CGPGrey:

In it, Grey explains that the current pace of technological advancement will force us as a human race to ask a critical question - what are we going to do when a large section of the population is simply unemployable?  Or, following Sen's argument, what are we going to do when we have to make the choice between the convenience of economic adjustment or the tradition of human labor?

The Question of "Asian" Values

Throughout the readings, I was heavily inclined to write a blog post about how Sen's arguments in chapter 6 were extremely similar to Brettschneider's. Really no surprise there. However, upon reading chapter 10, I felt somewhat disappointed by Sen's defense against the "Asian" values and wanted to know if others felt the same. In this chapter, Sen outlines three main critiques to the systematic implementation of human rights. One of these he calls the cultural critique. While presenting this critique, it seems that it would be a serious contender in challenging the idea of human rights through such questions as "what if some cultures do not regard rights as particularly valuable, compared to other prepossessing virtues or qualities?" (228). This was a question that was brought up in seminar on Tuesday as well.
Sen then proceeds to say that "perhaps the most prominent of these is based on the idea of the alleged skepticism of Asian values toward human rights" (228). Furthermore, he devotes several pages to attempt to illustrate how there really are no strictly "Asian" values because of the diversity in people in Asia as well as the ideas throughout the countries, and even those that we typically view as Asian views, such as Confucianism, are not necessarily anti-human rights. On its own, I believe this to be a successful defeat of the idea of Asian values as an obstacle in the way of human rights. And yet, I think that the question of what if some cultures do not value human rights has been left unanswered.
All that Sen has done here, in my eyes, is point out that this is not really as big of a problem as we think it is. We are coincidentally lucky that none of the cultures that we are examining are fundamentally opposed to human rights. And through globalization and the sharing of ideas, this threat will become smaller and smaller. This is all well and good, but what if the threat unexpectedly raises its head? What if we do come across a country or culture, no matter how small, that is fundamentally opposed to human rights? What answer has Sen given us to still assert the universality of human rights against this culture's will?

Sen's Unique Approach to Development and the Importance of Discussion

I want to expand on the potential issues I see in Sen's theory of development as freedom. Sen claims that "a proper understanding of what economic needs are--their content and their force--requires discussion and exchange" (153). Furthermore, he claims that certain cultural norms and traditions should be addressed through some sort of cost-benefit analysis, where it is important that this "rational assessment of such choices is the ability of the people to participate in public discussions on the subject" (242). Over again, Sen emphasizes the importance of the freedom of the citizens, including the disadvantaged (economically, politically, socially..etc.), to speak out and contest their current ways of life.

Two points of issue:
1) Sen seems to overlook the systems and institutions in place that are intentionally perpetuated to silence the voices of the disadvantaged, the "unfree". Can the disadvantaged (i.e. women, the poor, children, the disabled, the religious minorities, the political minorities) feasibly have their voices "heard" even if political freedoms were granted to all? The freedoms required to have the disadvantaged voices' heard seem to hinge on political freedom. Yet, to have political freedom granted to the disadvantaged means that they are considered as intrinsically valuable in a society. In this sense, the lifting of certain social stigmas (erasing certain unfreedom as perpetuated through adverse social norms) is a precondition to political freedom, and, on the flip side, political freedom is needed to eliminate certain social constraints. I see this as a circular argument. Granted, Sen's response to my counterargument might be that both political freedom and freedom from social constraints are needed to "develop". Yet the interrelated and dependent connections between these freedoms seem troubling to me from a practical standpoint--how do you push for social freedom without the necessary political freedom and push for political freedom without necessary social freedom? Does one necessarily come before the other?

2) Moreover, Sen overlooks the system of all systems used to perpetuate inequality--that of colonialism and its permeating effects. Sen's approach places development in the hands of the citizens in a developing country--it is up to them to have the conversations necessary to eliminate certain unfreedoms and realize other freedoms (perhaps the developed countries can assist in these conversations). This sentiment strikes me as placing the burden of development on the citizens of a developing country, in particular the disadvantaged citizens of the developing country. He disregards the role of the West (the developed) in creating these unfreedoms (either directly or indirectly by setting up systems of oppression and corruption and political, economic, and social instability). If it is ultimately up to the developing to pursue development, despite the West being at fault for the predicaments of the developing. According to Sen, what is the proper role of the West to play in development? Perhaps Sen sees the West as playing a minor role in this process as he proposes discussion and exchange as means to realizing freedoms and erasing unfreedoms. Yet, if the West had something to do with the predicament of the developing, specifically the disadvantaged in these countries, one could argue that the developed should be held accountable for these actions and take steps towards remedying the adverse situations in developing countries.

Sen, Respect for Other Cultures, and the Power of Money

            In the tenth chapter of Development as Freedom, Sen talks about what it means to allow cross-cultural influence: “My point is not at all to argue against the unique importance of each culture, but rather to plead in favor of the need for some sophistication in understanding cross-cultural influences as well as our basic capability to enjoy products of other cultures and other lands.” (244) This quote made me think about a different quote he used earlier in the same chapter, when he wrote, “the sun does not set on the empire of Coca-Cola or MTV.” (240) In particular, it made me think about one of the largest purveyors of Coca-Cola, McDonalds, on whose empire, the sun certainly never sets. Sen asks us to respect the autonomy of each culture to decide what aspects of other cultures it will or will not accept into its own. But what to do with the prevailing power of money? If the way we should help countries develop moving forward is to allow them to decide their own fates democratically, what happens to the ones where McDonalds and other large, Western corporations have already entered? Are the former values of these cultures an unfortunate, already-gone past? Do they then vote to exterminate the McDonalds and Nikes of the world from their midst, only to leave their economy in shambles (likely for generations) until they can get back to the way they want to do things? Sen also wrote: “Ways of life can be preserved if the society decides to do just that, and it is a question of balancing the costs of such preservation with the value that the society attaches to the objects and the lifestyles preserved.” (241) This would seem to indicate that he would think, in the aforementioned case, that the country could choose to extricate the corporations, but do so at its own cost. Sen, I think, would conveniently say that there are other variables than money, but it seems to be a powerful one in the world in which we live. That decision, between some wealth (albeit very minimal) and none (in addition to a long road back to economic viability), is a terrible and difficult one to have to make.