Global justice, positional goods, and international political inequality

Abstract

In Global Justice and Avant-Garde Political Agency , Lea Ypi sets out a challenging model for theorizing global justice. Such a theory should be robustly critical*and egalitarian*rather than swallowing sour grapes by adapting its ideals to what appears to be politically possible. But it should also offer concrete prescriptions capable of guiding reform of the actual*deeply unjust*world in which we live. It should learn from concrete political struggles and from those on the receiving end of global injustice, and also deliver principles capable of commanding support in a world of powerful nation-states. Thus one goal of the book, we might say, is to reconnect the philosophy of global justice with the politics of global justice*to persuade theorists, more specifically, to bridge the divide between theory and activism on global justice issues. (Published: 4 July 2013) Citation: Ethics & Global Politics, Vol. 6 , No. 2, 2013, pp. 109116. http://dx.doi.org/10.3402/egp.v6i2.21313