What is fair? To begin to find a response to this question consider the following thought experiment. There is a diverse group of people and a quantity of food to sustain them. How should the food be distributed if that distribution is to be fair?
Option 1: The food could be placed in a central position and then the people could be set in a circle around the food at an exactly equal distance. At the blow of whistle every one sets off to fend for themselves. Perhaps it will be argued, rightly, that some folk can travel faster than others: some use different mobility aids, some are older, some are less fit. The shape of the starting line could be adjusted to that everyone can reach the food at essentially the same moment if they all contribute their maximum effort. Would this now be fair? In essence this option is a model of equality of opportunity in competition. There may not be enough food to go round, but everyone has an equal opportunity of grabbing what they can. But note, in this model, while everyone has an equal opportunity to succeed, they also have an equal opportunity of failure. The competition might be ‘fair’, but not the end result.
Option 2: We could treat each person the same. We could divide up what food there is in exactly identical portions. Would this be fair? While equality of treatment has the appearance of justice, the consequences of such a policy would be somewhat less than equal given that calorific and nutritional requirements vary greatly from individual to individual on the basis of health, age, weight and sex.
Option 3: Give each person a different quantity of food dependent on need.
What this simple thought experiment demonstrates, perhaps, is that treating people fairly means treating people differently on the basis of their equal value.
The notions of ‘equal opportunity’ and ‘meritocracy’ are both of limited value: the former because present outcome shapes future opportunity (so perpetuating advantage); the latter because, in a competitive market economy, there is a restriction of certain opportunities (deliberately so?) so that not all who merit a particular position can occupy it. Thus fairness cannot be based on ‘fair’ competition, nor equality of treatment. Rather, what is required is an equality of outcome rooted in the fundamental equivalence of value of every life. Karl Marx put the matter well:
“From each according to one’s ability, to each according to one’s need.” (1875)
This simple principle is philosophical dynamite (and a test of whether equality is being pursued for its own sake or in the interests of another agenda). Imagine, for example, what this principle might mean for the wage and remuneration policy of a university! It is not for nothing that the parable of the workers in the vineyard (Mt 20:1-16), where, irrespective of the work done, all received what was required, influenced the founding of the Labour Party (via John Ruskin) and the perspective of both Mahatma Ghandi and Martin Luther King.
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