Macrojustice: The Political Economy of Fairness

by Serge-Christophe Kolm

Overview

The main features of the just society, as they would be chosen by the unanimous, impartial, and fully informed judgment of its members, present a remarkable and simple meaningful structure. In this society, individuals' freedom is full respected, and redistribution amounts to an equal sharing of individuals' different earnings obtained by the same limited "equalization labour." This also amounts to general balanced reciprocity, where each individual yields to each other the proceeds of the same labour. The concept of equalization labour is a measure of the degree of community, solidarity, reciprocity, redistribution, and equalization of the under consideration. It is determined by a number of methods presented in this study, which also emphasizes the rationality, meanings, properties, and ways of practical implementation of this optimum distribution. This result is compared with various distributive principles found in practice and in political, philosophical, and economic thinking, with the conclusion that most can have their proper specific scope of application. The analytical presentation of the social ethics of economics is particularly enlightening. Serge-Christophe Kolm is the author of more than thirty books and several hundred professional articles concerning, notably, normative economics, public economics, macroeconomics, social change, and political psychological philosophy. He is Professor and Director at the Ecole des Hautes Etudes en Sciences Sociales, Paris.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780521176545
Publisher:	Cambridge University Press
Publication date:	06/30/2011
Edition description:	Reissue
Pages:	544
Product dimensions:	6.00(w) x 8.90(h) x 1.30(d)

Table of Contents

Part I. Bases: Consensus, Freedoms and Capacities: 1. Macrojustice: an overview of its place, method, structure and result; 2. Social freedom; 3. The liberal theory; 4. Free and equal in rights; 5. Resources; 6. Capacities; Part II. Overall Distributive Justice: ELIE (Equal Labour Income Equalization): 7. Equal labour income equalization: general presentation; 8. Models of labour and productivity; 9. Equal duration income equalization; 10. Information; 11. Income justice; 12. General equal labour income equalization: the model; 13. Involuntary unemployment; Part III. Comparisons with Policies and Philosophies: 14. Comparisons: general issues; 15. Comparison with distributive schemes; 16. Comparison with philosophies; Part IV. The Degree of Community, Equality, Reciprocity, and Solidarity: 17. The degree of redistribution, solidarity, community, and reciprocity; 18. Impartiality, consensus, and information; 19. Disinterested judgments and the moral surplus; 20. Communication and dialogue; 21. Impartialization and consensus; Part V. Comparison with Economics' Social Ethics: 22. Related economic values; 23. The structure and substance of distributive principles; 24. Happiness and freedom; 25. Freedoms, responsibility, desert, merit, equality of opportunity, capacities, capabilities, basic needs; 26. The theory of equivalence; 27. Conclusion.

Editorial Reviews

"Professor Kolm continues his deep investigations into the nature of justice and, in particular, just income transfers. He justifies his proposal on the basis that justice is determined by the values of the society. In the course of his examination, he probes into the logic of many aspects of justice and the various theories currently under discussion." Kenneth Arrow, Stanford University

"Macrojustice, which concerns the overall distribution of economic wealth, is a prominent and time-honored object of philosophical and social science scholarship, the current relevance of which is highlighted by the widening economic disparities of recent decades. Serge-Christophe Kolm, who not only possesses an impressive breadth of knowledge of this literature but also is a prolific contributor to it, proposes and thoroughly defends an ambitious theory in this tome that, to its credit, integrates the concepts of basic needs, efficiency, proportionality and desert based on a structure of freedom, impartiality and information, and that sets a very high standard for work in this area." James D. Konow, Loyola Marymount University

"Serge Kolm is one of the most prolific and deeply original thinkers of our time. His footsteps are engraved in many research areas including normative economics, public economics, and political philosophy....even these skeptical readers would no doubt find the experience of being exposed to Kolmas ideas/reasonings fascinating and rewarding in rethinking and reorienting his/her own conceptions of fairness. It gives me pleasure to recommend this book to those who would like to think systematically about fairness." Kotaro Suzumura, Institute of Economic Research, Hitotsubashi University

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