Dworkin on Equality, Autonomy and Authenticity

Abstract

Ronald Dworkin has written extensively on equality, an idea that is at the center of his legal and political theory. Yet there have been few attempts to explain his idea of equality systematically, and none that have examined how the concept of equality unifies his use of various other central categories. This article offers and defends a particular interpretation of Dworkin’s concern for fundamental equality. It proposes that his concern lies not with the equality of persons in the sense of the equality of personal worth, but rather with the equality of authentic personal autonomy. In the final analysis he is dismissive of the idea of the fundamental equality of personal worth. This critical analysis is extended to a series of interrelated ideas in the Dworkinian canon: sanctity of life, dignity, critical interests, rights (including human rights) and personhood. It is found that equality of personal autonomy and not equality of persons as such best fits with and explains his integrated approach to these other concepts. The final section questions the coherency of Dworkin’s appropriation of the human rights idiom in light of this primary thesis. Valuing equality of personal autonomy while denying equality of personal worth has very serious implications for the integrity of Dworkin’s human rights project. Interpreting Dworkin’s views on these matters is made somewhat complicated by his tendency to appropriate familiar concepts, alter them through the application of a novel gloss, and present them as entirely consistent with their more mainstream form.