political philosophy

Estlund’s first argument against epistocracy

1. The truth tenet: there are correct answers to (at least some) political questions

2. The knowledge tenet: some citizens know more of these truths than others

3. The authority tenet: when some citizens have greater knowledge, this justifies granting them political authority over those with lesser knowledge.

We should accept the truth and knowledge tenets.

But we should reject the authority tenet. The authority tenet commits the ‘expert/boss fallacy’.

To commit the expert/boss fallacy is to think that being an expert is sufficient reason for one person to hold power over others.

But possessing superior knowledge is not sufficient to justify having any power, let alone greater power than others. We can always say to the experts ‘You may know better, but who made you boss?’.

Estlund’s second argument against epistocracy

Estlund agrees with Brennan that ‘removing the right issues from democratic control and turning them over to the right experts would lead to better political decisions, and more justice and prosperity’. BUT ‘The trick is knowing, and publicly justifying, which experts to rely on for which issues’. He does not think we can pull this trick off.

The qualified acceptability requirement(a widely accepted principle of justice) requires that any basis for distributing political power has to be acceptable to all qualified points of view.

Epistocratic systems (including the sort of restricted suffrage system which Brennan proposes – an elite electoral system, in which voting rights are restricted to those who can demonstrate competence), would (in practice) violate the qualified acceptability requirement.

Therefore, the practice of epistocracy is intrinsically unjust.

The competence principle

It is unjust to deprive citizens of life, liberty or property, or to alter their life prospects significantly, by force and threats of force as a result of decisions made by an incompetent or morally unreasonable deliberative body, or as a result of decisions made in an incompetent and morally unreasonable way.

Brennan’s argument

An elite electoral system in which voting rights are restricted to those who can demonstrate competence

• not everyone gets a vote

• No one gets more than one vote

  “the way in which democracy violates the competence principle is intrinsically worse than the way in which epistocracy (at least the type of epistocracy that he’s proposing) violates the qualified acceptability requirement”

The qualified acceptability requirement

Any basis for distributing power has to be accepted by all qualified points of view (e.g. a voter exam)

Objection: there is no way that all qualified points of view can agree on one test, epistocracy violates this requirement, will cause disadvantages

why does democracy violate the competence principle more unjust than epistocracy violating the competence principle

• Universal suffrage allows for incompetent people to vote, causing more harm

• Restricted suffrage isn’t any worse than voting age requirements

political obligation

The moral duty to obey the law

pro tanto obligation/duty

it is wrong to not-pi unless there is sufficiently weighty countervailing consideration

duties/natural duties

a class of moral requirements which

all persons owe

to all others

irrespective of their voluntary acts or social roles and relationships

the duty to obey the law is or derives from some natural duty which all persons are thought to owe to all others irrespective of their voluntary acts or social roles and relationships

The standard argument

• States are morally necessary institutions: states alone can rescue us from the ganders of the state of nature. They have the unique ability to settle conflicts peacefully and prevent rights violations, they alone can stand between us and the horrors of pervasive, escalating violence and rape

• States can out carry out such morally essential tasks unless their laws are obeyed by most people. i.e. widespread obligation to their laws is necessary to maintain the stability of states and their ability to perform their morally essential functions

• All persons have a natural duty to (for instance) rescue others from peril when the costs of doing so are not unreasonably high

• Thus, all persons have a natural duty to join together with others to do what is necessary to establish and maintain states capable of performing morally essential tasks when the costs of doing this are not unreasonably high

• Therefore, each of us has a pro tanto duty to obey the law

The objection from sufficiency of partial or selective compliance

Premise (2) is false, maintaining the state’s stability and ability to perform morally essential functions does not require widespread compliance with very many of its laws; widespread compliance wi5 a small subset of its laws would suffice

Assumption

There is a moral right to an equal democratic say. That is, every adult member of a political society has a right to run for political office and vote for representatives, and so via such democratic decision-making procedures, determine the content of the laws and policies to which she is subject

Aim

What I aim to establish is that if there is such a right, the duty to respect it grounds a general duty upon the citizens of democratic states to obey their laws

Swarup argument

Assumption: There is moral right to an equal democratic say, That is, every adult member of a political society has a right to run for political office and vote for representatives, and so via such democratic decision-making procedures, determine the content of the laws and policies to which she is subject.

If there is a moral right to a democratic say, and thus, to the democratic decision-making process which is constitutive of according all such a say, then this process has a special status. It is not just any old procedure – it is a procedure to which people have a moral right.

Everyone has a duty to respect the rights of others, and so everyone has a duty to respect this right.

Respecting a right requires more than simply refraining from violating it.

Fully respecting one’s fellow citizens’ right to a democratic procedure requires that one obey the laws which are the outcome of that procedure. In a democratic state, our duty to respect our fellow citizens’ right to an equal democratic say implies a pro tanto duty to obey the law

We violate a right insofar as we

1) prevent or stop the bearer from enjoying or achieving a good to which she has a right to or performing an activity she has a right to perform or, at any rate, (2) interfere with or impede her access to that good or ability to perform the activity by attaching significant burdens to or placing significant obstacles in the way of that access or performance.

When we violate a right in either of these ways, we disrespect it.

That is, respect – “appropriate consideration” – for a right requires

that we refrain from violating it in either of these ways

1. My claim: “Appropriate consideration” for a right may require more than merely refraining from violating it. That is, even if one does not violate a right in either of the above ways, one may still disrespect or fail to respect the right. Genuine respect may require something more of us –

   that we acknowledge further constraints on our actions, and indeed that we acknowledge an imperative to act or extend our own efforts in certain ways.

   To support this claim, I offer four cases. In each, an agent falls short of adequately respecting a right even though she does not straightforwardly violate it.

   1. Drunk driver

   2. Polluter

   3. Maid

   4. Breastfeeding employee

   The commonality in these cases: In each, an agent behaves as though it is a matter of little importance, and in any case, none of his concern, whether or under what conditions others are able to exercise a right or enjoy the goods that a right protects or is meant to furnish. Insofar

   as one evinces such indifference to a right, one does not respond appropriately to its significance. Respect involves a willingness to help facilitate others’ exercise of their rights – a willingness to expend one’s own efforts in service of this end – at least when one can do so at a low cost to oneself

The right to a democratic say

In light of these observations, let us turn to the right to a democratic say.

The right to a democratic say is held not only against the state, but also against individuals – it places demands on individuals, and may be disrespected by individuals.

Respect for democratic rights requires of both states and individuals that they refrain from violating them. But it also requires more.

I argue that part of what respect for the right to a democratic say requires of individual citizens of democratic states is that they abide by the laws which are the outputs of the procedure which is constitutive of according that right to all. Such obedience is partly constitutive of appropriately valuing their fellow citizens’ right to a democratic say.

Stage 1

In order to successfully argue against immigration restrictions, it’s not enough to appeal to the value of freedom of choice

Basic freedoms vs. bare freedoms

It needs to be shown there is a right to migrate

Canvasses three arguments to justify an unlimited right of migration between states and argues each of them fails

The first argument defending a pro tanto right to migrate/choose one’s country of residence

starts with the general right of freedom of movement and claims that this must include the freedom to move into, and take up residence in, states other than one’s own

Millers response:

There is indeed a basic human right to freedom of movement

But that right does not entail a right to move into and take up residence in any state one chooses

Freedom of movement is restricted in many ways, such as private property, traffic laws, parks, police controlling movements

Basic rights or human rights are justified by pointing to the vital interests that they protect. They correspond to conditions in whose absence human beings cannot live decent lives, no matter what particular values and plans of life choose to pursue

In a world of decent states – states that were able to secure their citizens’

basic rights to security, food, work, medical care, and so forth – the right to move

across borders could not be justified in this way.

a person

can legitimately demand access to is an adequate range of options to choose between

– a reasonable choice of occupation, religion, cultural activities, marriage partners,

and so forth.

The second argument defending a right to choose one’s country of residence

The right to exit is certainly an important human right. But that right does not entail an unrestricted right to enter/migrate to any society of a persons choice. It can be exercised provided that at least one other society is willing to take one in

there are many rights whose exercise is contingent on finding partners who are willing to cooperate in the exercise, and it may be

that the right of exit falls into this category. Take the right to marry as an example.

This is a right held against the state to allow people to marry the partners of their choice (and perhaps to provide the legal framework within which marriages can be contracted). It is obviously not a right to have a marriage partner provided – whether any given person can exercise the right depends entirely on whether he is able to find someone willing to marry him, and many people are not so lucky.

The right of exit is a right held against a person’s current state of residence not to prevent her from leaving the state (and perhaps aiding her in that endeavor by, say, providing a pass-

port). But it does not entail an obligation on any other state to let that person in, just like no one is obligated to have a partner.

It’s wrong to force people to stay in association

The third argument defending a right to migrate appeals to international distributive justice.

Fundamental moral equality of all human beings

Given the huge inequalities in living standards that currently exist between rich and poor states, it is said, people who live in poor states have a claim of justice that can only be met by allowing them to migrate and take advantage of the opportunities

we should play our part in ensuring that their basic

rights are respected, where these are understood as rights to a certain minimum level

of security, freedom, resources, and so forth – a level adequate to protect their basic

interests, as suggested earlier in this chapter. These basic rights can be universally

protected and yet some people have greater opportunities than others to pursue certain

aims, as a result of living in more affluent or culturally richer societies.

Millers response: Embracing the moral equality of all human beings—accepting that every human being is equally an object of moral concern—does not yet tell us what we are required to do for them as a result of that equality

But before jumping to the conclusion that the way to respond to global injustice is to encourage people whose lives are less than decent to migrate elsewhere, we should consider the fact that this policy will do little to help the very poor, who are unlikely to have the resources to move to a richer country.

in most instances they should contribute to improving conditions of life on the ground,

as it were, rather than bypassing the problem by allowing (inevitably selective) inward

migration.

Indeed, a policy of open migration may make such people worse off still

One answer might be that we should attempt to provide everyone with equal opportunities to pursue their goals in life.

But another, equally plausible, answer is that we should play our part in ensuring that their basic rights are respected, where these are understood as rights to a certain minimum level of security, freedom, resources, and so forth

Allow equal opportunities so we should allow people to move to access opportunities that are available to them

All of us ought to have our equal rights secured

Macroanalysis

General trends in literary data

Equivalent to macroeconomics

Analyzes over reading, de-emphasizes the more interpretive act of reading

Mill

Miller’s argument in favor of limits for immigration

• Aiming to establish (and does he establish)

• That nation-states have the right to exclude at least some immigrants (have the right to impose at least some limits on immigration)?

Stage 1: In order to successfully argue against immigration restrictions, it’s not enough to appeal to the value of freedom of choice

In order to successfully argue against immigration restrictions, it needs to be shown that there is a pro tanto right to migrate

He

Caren’s argument

Will argue that borders should generally be open and that people should normally be free to leave their country of origin and settle in another, subject only to the sorts of constraints that bind current citizens in their new country

He draws on three well-articulated contemporary theoretical approaches that many people find persuasive to construct a variety of arguments for relatively open borders

Each of these theories begins with some kind of assumption about the equal moral worth of individuals

Caren’s argues that all three approaches lead to the same basic conclusion there is little justification for restricting immigration

The fact that all three theories converge upon the same basic result with regard to immigration despite their significant differences in other areas strengthens the case for open borders.

Property rights theories

One popular position on immigration goes something like this: "It's our country. We can let in or keep out whomever we want."

This could be interpreted as a claim that the right to exclude aliens is based on property rights, perhaps collective or national property rights.

Do theories in which property rights play a central role support such a claim?

Carens: No

Nozick’s View

Individuals in the state of nature have rights, including the right to acquire and use property.

The assumption about moral equality that underlies this tradition:

All individuals have the same natural rights.

The "inconveniences" of the state of nature justify the creation of a minimal state whose sole task is to protect people within a given territory against violations of their rights.

The state has no right to do anything other than enforce the rights which individuals already enjoy in the state of nature.

Individuals have the right to enter into voluntary exchanges with other individuals.

The state may not interfere with such exchanges so long as they do not violate someone else's rights.

Suppose a farmer from the United States wanted to hire workers from Mexico. The government would have no right to prohibit him from doing this. To prevent the Mexicans from coming would violate the rights of both the American farmer and the Mexican workers to engage in voluntary transactions. Of course, American workers might be disadvantaged by this competition with foreign workers. But Nozick explicitly denies that anyone has a right to be protected against competitive disadvantage.

Note what this implies for immigration:

- Nozick’s theory provides no basis for the state to exclude aliens.

- Nozick’s theory provides no basis for individuals to exclude aliens that could not be used to exclude citizens as well

People only have a right to exclude as individuals not as members of a collective

Nozick explicitly says that the land of a nation is not the collective property of its citizens.

Rawls View

Activist state with positive responsibilities for social welfare

Rawls asks what principles people would choose to govern society if they had to choose from behind a "veil of ignorance," knowing nothing about their own personal situations (class, race, sex, natural talents, religious beliefs, individual goals and values, and so on).

He argues that people in this hypothetical “original position” would choose two principles:

The first principle would guarantee equal liberty to all.

The second would permit social and economic inequalities so long as they were to the advantage of the least well off (the difference principle) and attached to positions open to all under fair conditions of equal opportunity.

People in the original position would give priority to the first principle, forbidding a reduction of basic liberties for the sake of economic gains

Caren’s response to Rawls’ theory

The purpose of the "veil of ignorance" in Rawls’ theory is "to nullify the effects of specific contingencies which put men at odds" because natural and social contingencies are "arbitrary from a moral point of view" and therefore are factors which ought not to influence the choice of principles of justice.'

It ensures that the resulting agreement is fair.

Whether one is a citizen of a rich nation or a poor one is arbitrary from a moral point of view.

A fair procedure for choosing principles of justice must therefore exclude knowledge of these circumstances, just as it excludes knowledge of one's race or sex or social class.

We should therefore take a global, not a national, view of the original position:

Those in the original position would be prevented by the "veil of ignorance" from knowing their place of birth or whether they were members of one particular society rather than another

Given that parties in the OP don’t know these things about themselves,

would they regard freedom of movement among states as a basic

liberty?

Carens argues that they would. Carens argues that in the original

position, the parties would insist that the right to migrate be included in

the system of basic liberties for the same reasons that one would insist

that the right to religious freedom be included: it might prove essential to

one's plan of life. … the basic agreement among those in the original

position would be to permit no restrictions on migration (whether

emigration or immigration).

The public order restriction

Restrictions would be

justified only if there were a "reasonable expectation" that unlim-

ited immigration would damage the public order and this expecta-

tion would have to be based on "evidence and ways of reasoning

acceptable to all."

Utilitarianism

If more immigration would hurt some citizens economically, that would count against a more open immigration policy in any utilitarian theory.

But that would not settle the question of whether restrictions on immigration were justified.

In the utilitarian calculation, current citizens would enjoy no privileged position. The gains and losses of aliens would count just as much

The dominant view among both classical and neoclassical economists is that the free mobility of capital and labor is essential to the maximization of overall economic gains. But the free mobility of labor requires open borders. So, despite the fact that the economic costs to current citizens are morally relevant in the utilitarian framework, they would probably not be sufficient to justify restrictions on immigration.

Economic consequences are not the only ones that utilitarians consider.

But whatever consequences we consider, and whatever method of calculation is used, the concerns of aliens must be counted equally.

Under current conditions, when so many millions of poor and oppressed people feel they have so much to gain from migration to the advanced industrial states, it is unlikely that a utilitarian calculus which took the interests of aliens seriously would justify significant restrictions on immigration

Nonideal theory

priority should be given to those seeking to immigrate because they

have been denied basic liberties over those seeking to immigrate simply for economic opportunities

Second, one could not justify restrictions on the grounds that immigration would reduce the economic well-being of current citizens

the effect of immigration on the particular culture and

history of the society would not be a relevant moral consideration,

so long as there was no threat to basic liberal democratic values.

This conclusion is less apparent from what I have said so far, but

it follows from what Rawls says in his discussion of perfection-

ism.19 The principle of perfectionism would require social institu-

tions to be arranged so as to maximize the achievement of human

excellence in art, science, or culture regardless of the effect of such

arrangements on equality and freedom