Flourishing and Welfare

Abstract

This chapter argues that the moral end of property is human flourishing, a concept which the author uses in a neo-Aristotelian sense. The bulk of the chapter is devoted to an analysis of the concept of human flourishing. It stresses three points: First, human flourishing, although overlapping at times with the concept of welfare, is fundamentally different from welfare. Second, human flourishing is a value-plural concept, encompassing multiple and incommensurable moral values; hence property has multiple ends. Third, property’s pluralistic moral foundation does not mean that rationality and consistency must be sacrificed when property’s various ends come into conflict. Value pluralism is reconcilable with both rational choice and rule-of-law values such as consistency. The human flourishing theory is a consequentialist theory, but in measuring human flourishing, its primary focus is on capabilities rather than resources, and thus the theory draws upon the capabilities approach of Amartya Sen and Martha Nussbaum.