Costa, cancer and coronavirus: contractualism as a guide to the ethics of lockdown

Abstract

Lockdown measures in response to the COVID-19 pandemic involve placing huge burdens on some members of society for the sake of benefiting other members of society. How should we decide when these policies are permissible? Many writers propose we should address this question using cost-benefit analysis (CBA), a broadly consequentialist approach. We argue for an alternative non-consequentialist approach, grounded in contractualist moral theorising. The first section sets up key issues in the ethics of lockdown, and sketches the apparent appeal of addressing these problems in a CBA frame. The second section argues that CBA fundamentally distorts the normative landscape in two ways: first, in principle, it allows very many morally trivial preferences—say, for a coffee—might outweigh morally weighty life-and-death concerns; second, it is insensitive to the core moral distinction between victims and vectors of disease. The third section sketches our non-consequentialist alternative, grounded in Thomas Scanlon’s contractualist moral theory. On this account, the ethics of self-defence implies a strong default presumption in favour of a highly restrictive, universal lockdown policy: we then ask whether there are alternatives to such a policy which are justifiable to all affected parties, paying particular attention to the complaints of those most burdened by policy. In the fourth section, we defend our contractualist approach against the charge that it is impractical or counterintuitive, noting that actual CBAs face similar, or worse, challenges.

Must We Vaccinate the Most Vulnerable? Efficiency, Priority, and Equality in the Distribution of Vaccines

“…Finally, when we focus on bringing about the largest sum of aggregate benefits, our judgements are shaped by assumptions about which benefits are relevant. 17 Perhaps the most obvious way of specifying these principles in the vaccination context is to focus on health-related aspects or determinants of wellbeing. But, of course, there are different ways of conceptualising and measuring health-related wellbeing states.…”

Non-pharmaceutical Interventions and Social Distancing as Intersubjective Care and Collective Protection

“…In this regard, the paper aspires to provide ethical considerations that, despite stemming from a philosophical tradition that differs from the liberal and contractualist one, are consistent with numerous recent works by many non-consequentialist theorists of freedom. For instance, Oberman ( 2022 ) argues that NPIs and lockdowns can be justified precisely because they “could increase overall freedom, protect more valuable freedoms, or improve the distribution of freedom.” Others (John and Curran 2021 ; Kugelberg 2021 ) maintain that such health measures are morally justifiable because the cost–benefit analysis, personal value choice, and individual freedom are outweighed by other interpersonal and ethical considerations.…”

Values for victims and vectors of disease

“…John and Curran recently argued in this journal that TM Scanlon’s contractualist framework does a better job than the CBA at assessing the permissibility of these measures 1. Scanlon’s theory looks at the burdens that particular individuals are under and allows us to choose the policy that individuals have least reason to complain about 2.…”

“…John and Curran demonstrate how the burdens that different people would be under on particular lockdown policies can be weighed against each other. They make clear that contractualism, in contrast with CBA, has the resources to explain why and when it is justified to restrict people’s liberties (John and Curran,1 p3).…”