Respecting Human Dignity: Contract Versus Capabilities

Abstract

There appears to be a tension between two commitments in liberalism. The first is that citizens, as rational agents possessing dignity, are owed a justification for principles of justice. The second is that members of society who do not meet the requirements of rational agency are owed justice. These notions conflict because the first commitment is often expressed through the device of the social contract, which seems to confine the scope of justice to rational agents. So, contractarianism seems to ignore the justice claims of the severely cognitively impaired. To solve this problem, Martha Nussbaum proposes the capabilities approach. The justifiability condition, on this approach, is met by the idea of overlapping consensus. This essay argues that overlapping consensus cannot meet liberalism's justifiability condition, nor is it more inclusive of the cognitively impaired. Therefore, we have reason to retain the contract device and look for another way to ensure that liberalism respects the justice claims of all.

Inclusive education and intellectual disability: a sociological engagement with Martha Nussbaum

“…Notably, human rights approaches are closely aligned to the capabilities approach, and core International Journal of Inclusive Education entitlements, so, for example, with human rights, the first generation was positioned within political and civil rights and the second generation towards economic and social rights (Nussbaum 2011, 63). There are indeed important critiques of Nussbaum's work and the capabilities approach when it comes to intellectual disability (Berube 2010;Carlson and Kittay 2010;Hartley 2009;Stark 2010;Terzi 2007Terzi , 2009Wolff 2009) and feminist and liberal discourse (Held 2006;Phillips 2001). 2 For example, Nussbaum draws from the social contract tradition, which is challenging, largely because it cannot accommodate intellectual disability, due to the fact that agents are said to be independent, free and equal and assume to enter this 'contract' for mutual advantage.…”

A life of one’s own: republican freedom and disability

“…The capability approach, pioneered by Amartya Sen (1992;1999a;1999b) and further developed in the context of disability by Martha Nussbaum (2006, in particular has made important inroads in constructing a theory of social justice that takes disability seriously (see also Burchardt, 2004). However, not everyone agrees capability theory succeeds in granting disabled citizens full equal status (Silvers and Stein, 2008;Stark, 2009).…”

An Agency‐Based Capability Theory of Justice

“…This attracted different criticisms. (Barclay ; Biondo ; Stark ; Katzer ; Formosa and Mackenzie ). Apart from general criticisms about the adequacy of Rawlsian political liberalism for theorizing social justice, the main problem in the capability context is that it does not seem to make Nussbaum's substantive capability list any less perfectionist.…”