Walzer's Theory Research Articles

Intrinsic Goods and Distributive Justice in Education

AbstractWhat is the relationship between the fair distribution of goods in general, and the intrinsic, or distinctive, value of educational goods in particular? In this article, Christopher Martin and Tal Gilead argue that clarifying this relationship has significant importance for educational justice, and they aim to accomplish this by focusing on questions of resource allocation. In particular, the authors draw on Michael Walzer's theory of “spherical” justice in order to argue that intrinsic goods are important enough that they should be of normative concern for any theory of educational justice. That is to say, a conception of educational justice that takes distributive relationships seriously should account for how the nonpositional values of education are served by resource allocation, and not only socioeconomic or other positional goods. However, Martin and Gilead also claim that such a pluralist theory of educational justice should not open the door to educational policies and practices that are plainly “antiegalitarian.” They address this concern by proffering a distinction between, and criteria for adjudicating, legitimate and illegitimate judgments of justice that aim to protect or promote intrinsic educational goods.

Secular theology and noble sacrifice: the ethics of Michael Walzer's just war theory

AbstractThe last decade has witnessed an attempt to solidify debate on war around the dichotomy of just war and holy war. In this dichotomy, the just war has increasingly been depicted as the progressive secularised opposite to holy war's antiquated religious fundamentalism. While wars argued for under the just war banner have been extensively critiqued and protested against, the rights based language of just war theory has largely escaped critical evaluation. Michael Walzer has emerged as a pivotal figure in just war theory's modern, secular rebirth within the discipline of International Relations. Walzer's theory argues the language of just war theory provides an effective means for us to engage with the moral reality of war. Drawing upon the work of Jacques Derrida this article investigates the construction of Walzer's moral language and its ethical implications. The first section focuses on Walzer's moral language; its structure, inconsistencies, and theological underpinnings. The second section addresses how Walzer employs this language to justify the sacrifice of combatants in defence of non-combatants. The central arguments presented in this article are that Walzer's theory is inconsistent in itself, and that the sacrifices initiated by this language constitute the unjustified sacrifice of just war theory's own ethical principles.

‘Migrants in a Feverland’: State Obligations towards the Environmentally Displaced

This paper considers whether states have a duty to accept those who cross borders to escape environmental disasters associated with climate change. It then examines how such a responsibility might be distributed, focusing on the predicament of the citizens of small island states expected to be inundated by rising sea levels. In assessing states' responsibility to admit these individuals, I draw on Walzer's theory of mutual aid, demonstrating that even under this narrow conception of states' obligations, a duty to accept displaced islanders can be established. However, the proximity principle is ill-suited to determining which states should shoulder responsibility in this situation. Drawing on Miller's account of remedial responsibility and his ‘connection theory,’ I suggest that the obligation to accept ‘environmental refugees’ should be shouldered principally by affluent states that share significant degrees of causal and moral responsibility for climate change, and also have particularly strong capacities to assist the displaced.

A QUESTION OF JUSTICE: ASSESSING NURSE MIGRATION FROM A PHILOSOPHICAL PERSPECTIVE

The intensified nurse migration leads to severe problems for the health care systems in many developing countries. Using the Philippines as an example, this paper will address the question of global nurse migration from a philosophical perspective. John Rawls' liberal and Michael Walzer's communitarian theory of justice will be examined in view of the ethical problem of nurse migration. In line with Rawls' A Theory of Justice, nurse migration undermines the ability of the people in developing countries to make use of their basic rights and liberties. Walzer's communitarian assessment of nurse migration, on the other hand, will stress the shared 'thin' morality, as well as the shared history between the 'donating' and receiving countries. This paper argues that the commonality of a shared history and common values implies the moral obligation to ensure a fairer distribution of nurses.

Should We Trust Intellectuals?

This article explores the problem of the political responsibilities of intellectuals and philosophers through an appraisal of Michael Walzer's work on the idea of “connected criticism.” The author elaborates the main elements of this theory, shows how it approaches various thinkers, like Herbert Marcuse and Jean-Paul Sartre, and shows where it fits into American intellectual life, particularly the intellectual history of Dissent Magazine and the democratic Left. Walzer's idea of a connected social critic contrasts to Sartre's idea of an “engaged critic.” The article also examines Walzer's theory in light of some of the arguments made by “commonsense” moral philosophy, such as those of Irving Howe, John Rawls, Theodor Adorno, and Leo Strauss. Cohen defines Walzer's theory as part of a social democratic approach that also can serve in part as an antidote to intellectual hubris. Finally, this article presents a critique of Edward Said's understanding of intellectuals in his Representations of the Intellectual. The author argues that Said's book misrepresents Turgenev's novel Fathers and Sons. Cohen suggests that there are radical differences between Said's description of this novel's central character, Bazarov, and the world in which he lives, and those created by Turgenev. Said's approach is evaluated in relation to the notion of connected criticism and some criticisms of connected criticism are offered.

Michael Walzer's Justification of Humanitarian Intervention: Communitarian? Cosmopolitan? Adequate?

In this article Walzer's theory of the (in)justice of humanitarian intervention is analysed, with a focus on the issue of iusta causa. More specifically, Walzer's theory is interpreted as providing both a more or less "communitarian" justification and a more or less "cosmopolitan" justification of military intervention for humanitarian purposes. It is argued that his "shock the conscience of mankind" argument, although a possible solution to the ambiguity as a result of his "absence of fit" argument, gives rise to an inquiry into the limits, foundation and adequacy of this criterion.

Exclusion, Internalization, Harm

The article outlines a way in which internally pluralistic political communities might deal justly with apparently harmful gender-specific practices. It begins by demonstrating the inability of Walzer's recent theory of thin minimalism to integrate concerns for gender equality and cultural recognition. By focusing on the case of widow immolation in India, I show that an important problem lies in Walzer's failure to demonstrate that this is a `hard case'. This is due to his inability to identify two types of harm in this practice; namely, harmful exclusion and harmful internalization. On the basis of these harms, I redefine widow immolation as a `contrastive hard case'. Deriving from the recent work of Tully and Nussbaum, this reconceptualization is more attractive than Walzer's account, since it provides a culturally sensitive defence of minority women's capacity to contest the entailments of their religious beliefs in public.

Complex equality

Equality has become a highly controversial concept within feminism, not least because standard egalitarian accounts have been accused of neglecting both difference and also issues of real concern to feminists, such as the structure of the `domestic' sphere, contexts of power, and responsibility for domestic work. Michael Walzer's theory of `complex equality' promises a commitment to equality that deploys a much broader analytical focus, and yet is sensitive to difference. As such, it merits attention from feminists. In this article, I will begin to investigate the possibilities offered by this theory, by examining the positions it can generate on issues of domestic work and decision-making power. It will be my contention that Walzer's own position on these issues is a little abbreviated, but that a distinctive and worthwhile account can be developed merely by applying arguments he has advanced elsewhere.

A Walzerian Theory of Exploitation

What sorts of transactions should count as exploitative? Marxian theory has tended to monopolize analysis of the phenomenon, but this paper offers an alternative account of exploitation derived from Michael Walzer's theory of distributive justice. That theory lends itself to restatement as a theory of exploitation because the principal distributive injustice complex equality aims to combat is dominance, which consists in taking advantage of one resource in order to gain others with which the first has no intrinsic connection. This is fundamentally a concept of exploitation. Having reformulated complex equality as a general theory of exploitation, I then contrast it with its liberal and Marxian rivals. Both are shown to be species of simple equality. As a result, they often render incorrect judgments about whether a given transaction should be deemed exploitative.

Prostitution, Simony, and Fees for Service: Walzer's Theory of Justice and a Defense of Communally Funded Information against the Tyranny of the Marketplace

The practice of charging fees for service in American libraries remains controversial, primarily because notions at the foundation of this issue lack a thorough and coherent theoretical framework within which they can be understood and properly related. By employing a theory of justice developed by Michael Walzer--one that argues for distributing goods on the basis of principles inherent in their shared meanings--to reframe the concepts at the root of the fee issue, I argue that information should be distributed in ways that are in keeping with its meaning in contemporary American culture. Within the United States, information is understood to be a good in the sphere of basic welfare and security, and, therefore (following Walzer's theory), it should be distributed on the basis of the principle appropriate to the meaning of goods in that sphere--communal provision (within limits) based on need and not on the basis of the distributive principle appropriate to the marketplace--money.

Michael Walzer, Industrial Democracy, and Complex Equality

T he most pervasive injustice identified by Michael Walzer in Spheres of Justice concerns the distribution of power at work. If complex equality is the standard of distributive justice, Walzer argues, then employees are entitled to select their managers-but this is obviously the experience of the vast majority in our economy today. While the extent of voice accorded to labor does vary significantly in different types of organizations, most businesses (excluding the self-employed) are authoritarian in some degree. Management is chosen by labor, and labor obeys rules and orders in which it has little or no say. Employees are subjects, citizens, and this subordinate status is said to be inconsistent with the democratic ethos of our political culture. An unusual feature of this injustice in the context of Walzer's theory is that it afflicts merely the poor and vulnerable, as do the many other injustices he identifies. Exploitation of guest workers, lack of adequate health care or free time, the imposition of negative goods like dirty work, and so forth are the lot of the disadvantaged in our society, the middle or upper classes.' The injustice of workplace authoritarianism, by contrast, extends across a much broader range of income groups, including many whose circumstances might otherwise be deemed rather comfortable. What is more, this injustice does appear to be recognized by the great majority of its victims. The authoritarianism of managers is a salient political issue today, and while employees do complain about tyrannical abuses of managerial power, most do seem to object to the power itself or to the principle of unequal distribution. Walzer's critics are aware of these peculiarities, and insofar as his argument for industrial democracy has elicited comment from them, it is cited as evidence for the futility of basing social criticism on the shared understandings of a community. According to Michael Rustin, Walzer's arguments about the distribution of power at work are not convincing as logical impli-

A Taxonomy of Normative and Empirically Oriented Theories of Distributive Justice

The study proposes a taxonomy that maps and organizes various normative (“ought”) and empirically oriented (“is”) theories of distributive justice, with the aim of examining possible relations between these two research traditions. The taxonomy distinguishes between theories according to two shared dimensions of content: (a) microjustice versus macrojustice principles and (b) the unidimensional versus multidimensional character of these principles. The combination of these dimensions yields four groups of theories of distributive justice: unidimensional macro (the utilitarian approach); multidimensional macro (Rawls' theory of justice); unidimensional micro (desert and equity theories); and multidimensional micro (Miller's theory and the multiprinciple approach). A fifth group of hybrid theories is identified (including Walzer's and Jasso's theory of justice), which is built upon the layers of the other taxonomy cells, combining elements of macro- and microjustice and emphasizing the multidimensional character of distributive justice. The analysis revealed that the empirical and normative traditions have much in common. In certain cases, as with the utilitarian approach and Rawls' theory, empirical research has sought correspondence between the “ought” and the “is.” In other cases, such as with equity theory and the multiprinciple approach, it has used some basic normative ideas and assumptions as its starting point. Nevertheless, these research traditions often develop in parallel ways without sufficient mutual recognition or interaction. The study concludes by considering possible exchanges that may develop between these two traditions, examining to what extent and how philosophical–normative and empirically oriented research can contribute to one another.

The Architectonic of Michael Walzer's Theory of Justice

L'A. souligne la pertinence de la theorie egalitariste de la justice developpee par M. Walzer dans son ouvrage intitule «Spheres of justice» (1983), qui propose une alternative a la Grande Theorie representee par Rawls, Nozick, Dworkin ou Habermas. Malgre le pluralisme et l'adequation locale de sa theorie, Walzer applique une structure theorique a la question de l'echange des biens qui n'est pas la structure reelle qu'il a decrite. Examinant la version complexe de l'egalite, ainsi que la definition de l'appartenance a une communaute politique en termes de bien dominant, l'A. evalue les differents principes distributifs (subsidiarite, non-dominance) qui determinent les differentes spheres de la justice et leur signification sociale

The Adjudicating Citizen: On Equal Membership in Waltzer's Theory of Justice

This article presents a reconstruction of Michael Walzer's pluralist theory in Spheres of Justice. It starts by noting that Walzer's main thesis (justice resides in autonomous spheres of social goods, according to principles reflecting each good's social meaning) is too restrictive to clarify his own concern with ‘complex equality’. After analysing the shortcomings of the thesis by reference to medical care and social security, this article proposes an account of ‘justice across spheres’: citizens adjudicate the boundaries of the distributive spheres so as to achieve complex equality, the state in which no one counts as another's social inferior. The citizens are held to be motivated by the desire to create and maintain what Walzer calls the ‘society of equals’. As a result, Walzer's theory is recast in a form that makes it easier to compare his distinctively pluralist approach with the abstract-egalitarian theories of Ronald Dworkin and John Rawls. The account of ‘justice across spheres’ is also used to explain Walzer's radical institutional recommendations for achieving complex equality in his own society, the United States.

Complex equality - some notes on redistribution in South Africa

In this article I attempt to show that a theory o f redistribution can be derived from Walzer's political theory as presented in his Spheres o f justice. I argue that this theory shows in what areas o f South Africa’s public life redistribution is required, and what patterns of redistribution should be followed Walzer’s political theory leans heavily on the notion of shared understandings. In South Africa there are many areas of public life in which interpretations of these understandings are in conflict. I attempt to identify these areas and to show what premisses underlie the conflicting interpretations.

Selecting subjects for participation in clinical research: one sphere of justice.

Recent guidelines from the US National Institutes of Health (NIH) mandate the inclusion of adequate numbers of women in clinical trials. Ought such standards to apply internationally? Walzer's theory of...

Press law debate in Kenya: Ethics as political power

Journalists in many Afiican countries have long been caught between differing ideals i n their relationship between press and government. Two models viefor dominance-the western, libertarian and development journalism models. This article uses Walzer's (1983) theory of distributive justice to illuminate the ethical significance of this debate. A t issue is political power. A case study of the 1996 proposed press law i n Kenya illustrates the ethical arguments mounted for each press model and how the arguments are marshaled not necessarily for moral purposes but to gain political advantage. Finally, a viable third alternative avoids a false dilemma between the libertarian and development journalism models. Communitarianism preserves the independence from government SO central to the libertarian model while providing a basis for activist journalism.

Noncombatant Immunity in Michael Water's Just and Unjust Wars

Issues of immunity from attack and the assignment of responsibility for civilian deaths are central to the modern war convention. Koontz addresses several difficulties with Walzer's treatment of noncombatant immunity in Just and Unjust Wars. Walzer's theory of noncombatant immunity states that immunity from attack is a fundamental human right that can only be lost once a person becomes a direct threat or consents to give up his or her right to immunity. Koontz cites inconsistencies in Walzer's method of determining the immunity of soldiers and civilians. He argues from a deontological perspective that there can be no grounds for consent to the loss of immunity other than a direct threat posed by a civilian. This strengthens the protection of noncombatants, a principle that had been weakened by Walzer.

Pluralism, Justice, and Equality.

The book contains a series of critical appraisals by political theorists of Michael Walzer's book Spheres of Justice. The main ideas of Walzer's work are summarized in the introduction, and Walzer himself replies to criticisms in the concluding chapter. Four main issues are addressed. First, does the interpretative approach to justice favoured by Walzer, which focuses on the shared understandings of political communities, allow him to obtain sufficient critical distance from the beliefs and practices of his own society? Second, is it possible to preserve separate ‘spheres of justice’ in which different social goods are distributed by different criteria, or do some goods— especially money—have a significance that blurs the boundaries between spheres? Third, can equality be achieved simply by keeping the spheres of justice separate, or does it require a more radical form of redistribution? Fourth, what role does democratic citizenship play in Walzer's theory of justice?

Foucault & Walzer: Sovereignty, Strategy & the State

Michael Walzer faults the political theory of Michel Foucault for failing to provide an account of the liberal state and the rule of law or to provide the kind of knowledge that regulates disciplinary arrangements in society. This article assesses Walzer's criticism in light of Foucault's analysis of liberal political theory. It concludes that Walzer's theory, couched in the discourse of sovereignty, employs disciplinary strategies of power, akin to those Foucault describes, to combat the tyrannical state.