Contractualism and Social Risk

Abstract

Contemporary nonconsequentialism is a family of views united less by a positive doctrine than by skepticism toward central tenets of consequentialist ethical thought. One such tenet, which is embraced by most consequentialists but opposed by many nonconsequentialists, is the notion of interpersonal aggregation. Ethical theories, like classical utilitarianism, that defend interpersonal aggregation hold that in evaluating an action, we should sum the benefits and losses it imposes on different people to obtain an aggregate quantity; this represents the overall goodness of the action’s consequences. The rightness or wrongness of the action depends not on how it affects each individual, but on the net balance of benefits over losses. Aggregative reasoning of this kind often yields counterintuitive implications, especially in cases where it enjoins us to let a few people suffer