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Broome's Theory of Fairness and the Problem of Quantifying the Strengths of Claims

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  11 September 2014

JAMES R. KIRKPATRICK  and
NICK EASTWOOD
JAMES R. KIRKPATRICK
Affiliation:
University College, Oxford, [email protected]
NICK EASTWOOD
Affiliation:
University of Reading
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Abstract

John Broome argues that fairness requires that claims are satisfied in proportion to their strength. Broome holds that, when distributing indivisible goods, fairness requires the use of weighted lotteries as a surrogate to satisfy proportionally each candidate's claims. In this article, we present two arguments against Broome's account of fairness. First, we argue that it is almost impossible to calculate the weights of the lotteries in accordance with the requirements of fairness. Second, we argue that Broome rules out those methods whose use might provide some resolution to this problem. From these arguments, we conclude that, contra Broome, fairness does not require the proportional satisfaction of claims.

Type
Research Article
Information
Utilitas , Volume 27 , Issue 1 , March 2015 , pp. 82 - 91
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2014 

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References

1 See Broome, John, ‘Fairness’, Proceedings of the Aristotelian Society 91 (1990), pp. 87–101CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

2 Broome, ‘Fairness’, p. 95.

3 Broome, ‘Fairness’, p. 100.

4 Broome, ‘Fairness’, pp. 91–2.

5 Broome, ‘Fairness’, p. 90.

6 Broome, ‘Fairness’, p. 95.

7 Actually, Broome's theory is slightly more subtle, since he holds that ‘it is not unfair if [a candidate's claim is not satisfied], provided everyone is treated proportionally’ (p. 95). That is, so long as no candidate receives the good, it is not unfair that the candidates’ claims have not been satisfied. However, since nothing we say in this article hinges on it, we shall ignore this subtlety. Thanks to an anonymous reviewer for drawing our attention to this.

8 Broome, ‘Fairness’, pp. 95–6.

9 Hooker, Brad, ‘Fairness’, Ethical Theory and Moral Practice 8 (2005), pp. 329–52, at 350CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

10 Hooker, ‘Fairness’, p. 349.

11 Broome, ‘Fairness’, pp. 93–4.

12 Broome, ‘Fairness’, pp. 97–8.

13 Broome, ‘Fairness’, p. 88.

14 Broome, ‘Fairness’, p. 88.

15 An earlier version of this article was presented as a paper at King's College London, the University of Reading and the University of St Andrews. We would like to thank the audiences of those conferences. In particular, we are most grateful to Brad Hooker, Richard Rowland and Ashley Shaw for useful discussion and feedback. We would also like to thank two anonymous reviewers for helpful comments and suggestions.