Libertarian Egalitarian Communitarianism

Abstract

Chapter 6 argued from the Moral Original Position to the following analysis of moral rightness:

Rightness as Fairness: an action is morally right if and only if it satisfies the Four Principles of Fairness, that is, if and only if it is (A) is morally relevant, (B) has coercion-avoidance and minimization, assisting human and nonhuman sentient beings to achieve interests they cannot best achieve on their own and want assistance in achieving, and the development and expression of settled dispositions to have these ends, as at least tacit ideals, and (C) is in conformity with the outcome of an actual process of fair negotiation approximating all human and sentient beings affected by the action being motivated by the above ideals and having equal bargaining power over how those ideals should be applied factoring in costs, or, if such a process is impossible, the outcome of a hypothetical process approximating the same, where moral relevance is determined recursively, by applying (B) and (C) to the question of whether the action is morally relevant.