Abstract
There are several ways to understand the idea of a ‘politics of vulnerability’, each of which raises many questions at various levels of analysis.
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Notes
- 1.
See, for example, some definitions on http://www.ecn.org/settorecyb/txt/shortly.cypunk.html
- 2.
Note that this Rawlsian excursion starts from the assumption that further developments towards human enhancement cannot be stopped. I am convinced by the argument (frequently made by transhumanists) that it is unlikely that a ban on (certain forms of) human enhancement will be able to prevent some people from developing it and using it, and that therefore it is better to think about how to organise a society in which human enhancement plays a role than waste our efforts on trying to stop it. Thus, a total ban on human enhancement may not be fully effective, whatever ethical position we wish to defend. Having said that, however, a Rawlsian solution does not exclude a ban on the use of certain forms of human enhancement, but may even require it. For example, it seems to require stopping an elite from reserving a certain form of enhancement to themselves only—although, of course, this ban too may not be very effective. But tax systems are also not always entirely effective, and still we use them and justify this by appealing to social justice.
- 3.
For instance, UNESCO’s Universal Declaration on the Human Genome and Human Rights says that ‘prior, free and informed consent of the person shall be obtained’ in all cases of research, treatment, and diagnosis (Art. 5b).
- 4.
Note that this also applies to capabilities, in so far as they can be understood as ‘goods’ at all. They are also both natural and social. Given my remarks on natural and social goods, we can no longer understand capabilities as pure ‘social’ or ‘non-natural’ goods or divide them up into ‘natural’ and ‘social’ goods. Consider Nussbaum’s capabilities list: life, bodily health, senses, imagination and thought, emotions, practical reason, affiliation, being able to live with other species, play, and control over one’s environment (Nussbaum 2006, pp. 76–77). Each of these capabilities can be considered natural-social capabilities. For instance, life and bodily health seem ‘natural’ goods, but cannot be considered apart from the technological culture and social institutions that promote or threaten these goods, such as medical care or crime. And thought and practical reason cannot be considered entirely separate from ‘natural’ bodies, from ‘social’ others, from society, and from the ‘natural-social’ environment to which they are directed. A just distribution of these goods, then, must concern the distribution of these ‘hybrid’ capabilities. However, in the next section, I will argue that capabilities are better interpreted as having to do with outcome rather than resources.
- 5.
I believe this is also the direction Nussbaum takes in recent work on law and capabilities. I will discuss Nussbaum in the next section.
- 6.
The issue concerning resources versus goals reminds me of the debate between Dworkin and Sen on equality. Dworkin argued in Sovereign Virtue (2000) for equality of resources (a resource-based and procedural approach), whereas Sen (and later with Nussbaum; see Nussbaum and Sen 1993) is concerned with the goal of giving people capabilities (an outcome-based approach) (Sen 1992, 1995). For Dworkin, the issue is about resources, not outcomes—which is also the reason why Dworkin resists the term luck egalitarianism.
For Dworkin, the resources or ‘initial endowments’ that need to be equalised in order to allow people to face luck and uncertainty do not include what he calls ‘talents’. The ‘income-talented’ would still have more income than others once the ‘social’ game is played (Dworkin 2002). Dworkin’s resources seem not to include any ‘natural endowments’. With regard to disability, he remarks that it is not the aim ‘to make people equal in physical and mental constitution so far as this is possible’ (Dworkin 2002, p. 123). He even suggests that we should treat ‘genetic luck like other forms of luck’ (Dworkin 2002, p. 125). (Dworkin actually means money and social position inherited from your parents, but I suppose he would make the same point about ‘genetic potentials’.) While people should get equal resources that allow them to (hypothetically) insure them against luck, when the game plays out, the outcome is dependent on luck and talents. What matters for Dworkin is the initial starting situation, not the outcome. However, evaluating human enhancement in terms of justice seems to fall outside the scope of Dworkin’s theory, since natural goods are excluded; it is a form of ‘luck’. Now we could modify the theory to include natural-social goods in the initial resources, but then we encounter the problems of knowledge and freedom discussed above.
- 7.
This problem is also raised by Nussbaum’s arguments for inclusion of animals and future generations (Nussbaum 2006).
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Coeckelbergh, M. (2013). Politics of Vulnerability: Freedom, Justice, and the Public/Private Distinction. In: Human Being @ Risk. Philosophy of Engineering and Technology, vol 12. Springer, Dordrecht. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-007-6025-7_8
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