Hostname: page-component-78c5997874-4rdpn Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-03T02:48:59.393Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

The Concept of Well-Being

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  16 October 2009

Mozaffar Qizilbash
Mozaffar Qizilbash
Affiliation:
Sustainable Development Policy Institute, Pakistan
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Extract

The concept of well-being is central to the subject matter of moral philosophy as well as economics. According to some moral theorists (particularly utilitarians) morality is about the maximization of social well-being. According to others, notably John Rawls (1972) we ought to give particular priority to the worst off members in society. Both these and other moral positions, whatever the priority they attach to different members of society in arriving at moral judgements, require an account of well-being or advantage. The concern with well-being is thus of foundational importance in moral philosophy, even if well-being is not thought of as all that matters. Furthermore, those who want to distinguish ‘morality’ from ‘self-interest’ must furnish us with an account of human interests, so that we can distinguish the moral realm from that of self-interest or prudence. The concerns of moral philosophers, here, clearly overlap with those of economists. Economists (particularly in welfare and development economics) are much concerned with questions of how well people are doing, with their ‘standard of living’ or ‘quality of life’. However, there are very different ways of thinking about each of these ideas. Indeed, we need to discriminate between different views of the quality of life and to decide which is the most appropriate for the purposes of moral theory and the normative parts of economics.

Type
Essays
Information
Economics & Philosophy , Volume 14 , Issue 1 , April 1998 , pp. 51 - 73
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1998

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

REFERENCES

Berlin, Isaiah. 1969. Four Essays on Liberty. Oxford University PressGoogle Scholar
Brandt, Richard. 1992. ‘Two Concepts of Utility’. In Morality, Utilitarianism and Rights, pp. 158–75. Brandt, Richard (ed.). Cambridge University PressGoogle Scholar
Brandt, Richard B. 1997. Facts, Values, and Morality. Cambridge University PressGoogle Scholar
Braybrooke, David. 1987. Meeting Needs. Princeton University PressCrossRefGoogle Scholar
Broome, John. 1978. ‘Choice and value in economies’. Oxford Economic Papers, 30:313–33CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Crocker, David A. 1992. ‘Functioning and capability: the foundations of Sen's and Nussbaum's development ethic, Part 1’. Political Theory, 20:584–612CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Crocker, David A. 1995. ‘Functioning and capability: the Foundations of Sen's and Nussbaum's development ethic, Part 2’. In Women, Culture and Development, pp. 153–97. Nussbaum, Martha C. and Glover, Jonathan (eds.). Clarendon PressCrossRefGoogle Scholar
Doyal, Len and Gough, Ian. 1991. A Theory of Human Need. MacMillanCrossRefGoogle Scholar
Dworkin, Ronald. 1981. ‘What is equality? Part 1: equality of welfare’. Philosophy and Public Affairs, 10:194–200Google Scholar
Elster, Jon and Roemer, John E. (eds.). 1991. Interpersonal Comparisons of Weil-Being. Cambridge University PressCrossRefGoogle Scholar
Frankfurt, Harry G. 1971. ‘Freedom of the will and the concept of a person’. Journal of Philosophy, 68:5–20CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Gasper, Des. 1997. ‘Sen's capability approach and Nussbaum's capability ethic’. Journal of International Development, 9:281–3023.0.CO;2-K>CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Griffin, James. 1986. Well-Being: Its Meaning, Measurement and Moral Importance. Clarendon PressGoogle Scholar
Griffin, James P. 1991. ‘Against the Taste Model’. In Interpersonal Comparisons of Well-Being, pp. 45–69. Elster, Jon and Roemer, John E. (eds.). Cambridge University PressCrossRefGoogle Scholar
Griffin, James P. 1996. Value Judgement: Improving Our Ethical Beliefs. Clarendon PressGoogle Scholar
Harsanyi, John C. 1955. ‘Cardinal welfare, individualistic ethics, and interpersonal comparisons of utility’. Journal of Political Economy, 63:309–21CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Harsanyi, John C. 1982. ‘Morality and the Theory of Rational Behaviour’. In Utilitarianism and Beyond, pp. 39–62. Sen, Amartya K. and Williams, Bernard A. O. (eds.). Cambridge University PressGoogle Scholar
Jeffrey, Richard. 1974. ‘Preferences among preferences’. Journal of Philosophy, 71:377–91CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Lewis, David. 1989. ‘Dispositional theories of value’. Proceedings of the Aristotelian Society, 63, Supplementary Volume:113–37CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Mirrlees, James A. 1982. ‘The Economic Uses of Utilitarianism’. In Utilitarianism and Beyond, pp. 63–84. Sen, Amartya K. and Williams, Bernard A. O. (eds.). Cambridge University PressCrossRefGoogle Scholar
Nussbaum, Martha C. 1986. The Fragility of Goodness. Cambridge University PressGoogle Scholar
Nussbaum, Martha C. 1988. ‘Nature, function and capability: Aristotle on political distribution’. Oxford Studies in Ancient Philosophy, 6, Supplementary Volume:145–84Google Scholar
Nussbaum, Martha C. 1990. ‘Aristotelian Social Democracy’. In Liberalism and the Good, pp.203–43. Bruce Douglass, Gerald Mara and Henry Richardson (eds.). RoutledgeCrossRefGoogle Scholar
Nussbaum, Martha C. 1992. ‘Human functioning and social justice. In defence of Aristotelian essentialism’. Political Theory, 20:202–46Google Scholar
Nussbaum, Martha C. 1993. ‘Non-Relative Virtues: An Aristotelian Approach’. In The Quality of Life, pp. 242–69. Nussbaum, Martha C. and Sen, Amartya K., (eds.). Clarendon PressGoogle Scholar
Nussbaum, Martha C. 1995a. ‘Human Capabilities, Female Human Beings’. In Women, Culture and Development, pp. 61–104. Nussbaum, Martha C. and Glover, Jonathan (eds.). Clarendon PressCrossRefGoogle Scholar
Nussbaum, Martha C. 1995b. ‘Aristotle on Human Nature and the Foundations of Ethics’. In World, Mind and Ethics: Essays on the Ethical Philosophy of Bernard Williams, pp.86–131. Altham, J. E. J. and Harrison, Ross (eds.). Cambridge University PressCrossRefGoogle Scholar
Parfit, Derek. 1984. Reasons and Persons. Oxford University PressGoogle Scholar
Qizilbash, Mozaffar. 1996a. ‘Ethical development’. World Development, 24:1209–21CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Qizilbash, Mozaffar. 1996b. ‘Capabilities, well-being and human development’. Journal of Development Studies, 33:143–62CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Qizilbash, Mozaffar. 1997a. ‘Well-being and despair: Dante's Ugolino’. Utilitas, 9:227–40.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Qizilbash, Mozaffar. 1997b. ‘Needs, incommensurability and well-being’. Review of Political Economy, 9:261–76CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Qizilbash, Mozaffar. 1997c. ‘Pluralism and well-being indices’. World Development, 25:2009–26CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Railton, Peter. 1986. ‘Moral realism’. The Philosophical Review, 95:163–207CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Rawls, John. 1972. A Theory of Justice. Oxford University PressGoogle Scholar
Raz, Joseph. 1986. The Morality of Freedom. Clarendon PressGoogle Scholar
Rosati, Connie S. 1995. ‘Persons, perspectives and full information accounts of well-being’. Ethics, 105:296–325CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Sen, Amartya K. 1984. ‘Rights and Capabilities’. In Resources, Values and Development, pp. 307–24. Sen, Amartya K. (ed.). BlackwellGoogle Scholar
Sen, Amartya K. 1985a. ‘Well-Being, Agency and Freedom: The Dewey Lectures 1984’. Journal of Philosophy, 82:169–221Google Scholar
Sen, Amartya K. 1985b. Commodities and Capabilities. North HollandGoogle Scholar
Sen, Amartya K. 1992. Inequality Reexamined. Clarendon PressGoogle Scholar
Sen, Amartya K. 1993. ‘Capability and Well-Being’. In The Quality of Life, pp. 30–55. Nussbaum, Martha C. and Sen, Amartya K. (eds.). Clarendon PressCrossRefGoogle Scholar
Sen, Amartya K. 1997. On Economic Inequality. Expanded edition with a substantial annexe by Forster, James E. and Sen, Amartya K., Clarendon PressGoogle Scholar
Sen, Amartya K. et al. 1987. The Standard of Living. Cambridge University PressCrossRefGoogle Scholar
Sobel, David. 1994. ‘Full information accounts of well-being’. Ethics, 104:784–810CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Sobel, David. 1997. ‘On the subjectivity of welfare’. Ethics, 107:501–8Google Scholar
Streeten, Paul et al. 1981. First Things First: Meeting Basic Needs in Developing Countries. Oxford University PressGoogle Scholar
Sumner, L. W. 1996. Welfare, Happiness and Ethics. Oxford University PressGoogle Scholar
Wiggins, David. 1987. Needs, Values, Truth. BlackwellGoogle Scholar