Αν θέλεις την ισότητα, γιατί είσαι τόσο πλούσιος;

by G.A. Cohen, Μιχάλης Παπανικολάου (Translator), Αργύρης Παπασυριόπουλος (Translator)

Πώς επιτυγχάνεται η κοινωνική δικαιοσύνη; Θα επέλθει νομοτελειακά μέσα από την αυτοκατάργηση του καπιταλισμού, όπως υποστηρίζει ο μαρξισμός; Αρκούν για τη διασφάλισή της οι κατάλληλες νομοθετικές ρυθμίσεις, όπως ισχυρίζεται ο πολιτικός φιλελευθερισμός; Στο βαθύτατα προσωπικό αυτό βιβλίο, ο Τζ. Α. Κοέν -ο διαπρεπέστερος εκπρόσωπος του αναλυτικού μαρξισμού και ένας από τους κορυφαίους αγγλοσάξονες πολιτικούς φιλοσόφους του 20ού αιώνα- ασκεί κριτική και στις δύο αντιλήψεις, κινούμενος ανάμεσα στην ιστορία των ιδεών και την πολιτική φιλοσοφία.

Ο Κοέν απορρίπτει τη μαρξιστική πίστη στο αναπόφευκτο της ισότητας αλλά και τον φιλελεύθερο ισχυρισμό ότι η δικαιοσύνη είναι τελικά νομικό ζήτημα. Πιστεύει πως μια αλλαγή στο ήθος, στον τρόπο που οι άνθρωποι παίρνουν τις καθημερινές τους αποφάσεις, είναι απαραίτητη για την επίτευξη της ισότητας και την πραγμάτωση της δικαιοσύνης.

Δεν αρκεί ούτε η ιστορία ούτε γενικώς η πολιτική - απαιτείται πρώτα απ’ όλα μια ηθική επανάσταση, μια επανάσταση στην ανθρώπινη ψυχή. Αν θέλεις την ισότητα, καταλήγει ο Κοέν, δεν μπορείς να είσαι τόσο πλούσιος.

Genres: Philosophy, Politics, Nonfiction, Economics, Social Justice, Sociology, Theory

344 pages, Paperback

First published June 3, 2000

About the author

Gerald Allan Cohen FBA, known as G. A. Cohen or Jerry Cohen, was a Canadian Marxist political philosopher who held the positions of Quain Professor of Jurisprudence, University College London and Chichele Professor of Social and Political Theory, All Souls College, Oxford.

Born into a communist Jewish family in Montreal, Quebec, on 14 April 1941, Cohen was educated at McGill University (BA, philosophy and political science) in his home town and the University of Oxford (BPhil, philosophy) where he studied under Isaiah Berlin and Gilbert Ryle.

Cohen was assistant lecturer (1963–1964), lecturer (1964–1979) then reader (1979–1984) in the Department of Philosophy at University College London, before being appointed to the Chichele chair at Oxford in 1985. Several of his students, such as Christopher Bertram, Simon Caney, Alan Carter, Cécile Fabre, Will Kymlicka, John McMurtry, David Leopold, Michael Otsuka, Seana Shiffrin, and Jonathan Wolff have gone on to be important moral and political philosophers in their own right, while another, Ricky Gervais, has pursued a successful career in comedy.

Known as a proponent of analytical Marxism and a founding member of the September Group, Cohen's 1978 work Karl Marx's Theory of History: A Defence defends an interpretation of Karl Marx's historical materialism often referred to as technological determinism by its critics. In Self-Ownership, Freedom, and Equality, Cohen offers an extensive moral argument in favour of socialism, contrasting his views with those of John Rawls and Robert Nozick, by articulating an extensive critique of the Lockean principle of self-ownership as well as the use of that principle to defend right as well as left libertarianism. In If You're an Egalitarian, How Come You're So Rich? (which covers the topic of his Gifford Lectures), Cohen addresses the question of what egalitarian political principles imply for the personal behaviour of those who subscribe to them.

Cohen was close friends with Marxist political philosopher Marshall Berman.

Cohen died on 5 August 2009.

Reviews

[Σωτήρης Αδαμαρέτσος · Rating 5 out of 5]

Από τα πιο ενδιαφέροντα βιβλία πολιτικής ηθικής φιλοσοφίας που διάβασα φέτος, το οποίο παραμένει άγνωστο εδώ μέσα, δεν απορώ γιατί, οπότε του αξίζουν δύο λόγια αναφοράς.
Ο Κοέν ήταν ένας καθηγητής πολιτικής φιλοσοφίας, αυθεντία στην μαρξιστική ανάλυση και πρώην μέλος του ΚΚ Καναδά. Το βιβλίο του αυτό είναι μια καταγραφή μιας διάλεξης που έδωσε σχετικά με το ερώτημα που θέτει ευθέως στον τίτλο· πως είναι δυνατόν να μιλάμε για ισότητα σε μια κοινωνία όπου η ελεύθερη οικονομία οδηγεί στην συσσώρευση πλούτου. Ο Κοέν δεν θεωρεί κατακριτέο κάτι τέτοιο αλλά αναζητεί το (ηθικό) κριτήριο που θα πρέπει να διέπει την οικονομική μας ελευθερία.

Το ερώτημα αναλύεται με αναφορά σε τρεις πολιτικές σκέψεις/θεωρίες. Την μαρξιστική σκέψη, την θεωρία της δικαιοσύνης του Ρωλς και την προσωπική ατομική ηθική της δικαιοσύνης έναντι του Άλλου. Ως καθηγητής μαρξιστικής πολιτικής σκέψης κατανοεί και καταδεικνύει την αποτυχία της μαρξιστικής ανάλυσης να ισορροπήσει την ισότητα κατανομής πλούτου ανάμεσα στο εργατικό προλεταριατο και τους οικονομικά ανισχυρους. Κατά τον Κοέν η αποτυχία της μαρξιστικής θεωρίας για την ισότητα έγκειται στην ταξική ταύτιση του αμειβομενου εργάτη με τον μη ενεργό εργασιακά πληθυσμό. Η οικονομική άνοδος του εργατικού δυναμικού κατά τα μεταπολεμικά χρόνια οδήγησε στην ιδεολογική αποξένωση των εργατών από όσους δεν είχαν να χάσουν πάρα μόνο τις αλυσίδες τους. Από την αντίπερα όχθη, η ανισότητα στελεχών και μάζας ήταν εκκωφαντικα αποκαλυπτική. Στο πεδίο της ιδεολογικής πάλης, η ίδια η μαρξιστική σκέψη απώλεσε τους θιασώτες της.

Στην συνέχεια αναλύει διεξοδικά την επιχειρηματολογία στην περίφημη θεωρία της δικαιοσύνης του Ρωλς. Κατά τον Ρωλς οι θεσμοί μπορούν και πρέπει να θέτουν το πλαίσιο ισορροπίας μεταξύ δικαιοσύνης, αναδιανομής πλούτου και ισότητας. Ο Κοέν αναρωτιέται - και ομολογώ το κάνει με επιτυχία καθώς προβλημάτισε αρκετά την ρωλσιανης κατεύθυνσης πολιτική μου σκέψη - αν οι πολιτικοί θεσμοί για δικαιοσύνη κ ισότητα μπορούν να επηρεάσουν και τις δομές και βιωματικες αξίες που δεν εντάσσονται στο γενικό θεσμικό πλαίσιο της εκάστοτε πολιτείας. Για τον Κοεν, σε μια κοινωνία που καθορίζεται από βεβαιωμένες ατομικές πεποιθήσεις και δομές που δεν αγγίζει το ίδιο το θεσμικό πλαίσιο (όπως πχ την οικογένεια), κάθε πολιτικός νόμος αφήνει ένα κενό στην πραγματική ισότητα και δεν εισέρχεται στο αληθινό κύτταρο της ουσίας των κοινωνικών σχέσεων. Οι θεσμοί δεν μπορούν να φτάσουν σε βάθος και αν το κάνουν καταργείται η ατομική ελευθερία.

Προσωπική του θέση παραμένει η ανάπτυξη μιας προσωπικής ηθικής στάσης ισότητας και δικαιοσύνης του ίδιου του ατόμου, που πρέπει να εκκινεί από την κατανόηση ότι η αναδιανομή του υπέρμετρου κέρδους προς τα κάτω ενισχύει την κοινωνική συνοχή και ισότητα, ο από κάθε πολιτική θεωρία και ιδεολογία. Ο καθένας μας, στο βαθμό που δύναται, οφείλει να καλλιέργει τη προσωπική του ηθική ισότητας ώστε να χρησιμοποιεί το υπερβάλλον κέρδος του, που η επαγγελματική και κοινωνική του αξία κερδίζει, για να εξισορροπεί την δεδομένη οικονομική ανισότητα. Με ποιους τρόπους όμως το πετυχαίνει κάνεις αυτό, για τον Κοέν αποτελεί και μια προσωπική επιλογή και ευθύνη. Κυρίως μια ευθύνη έναντι της κοινωνίας και του εαυτού μας.

Αν όλα αυτά σας λένε κάτι είναι γιατί στην λογική της σκέψης του ομνυουν σήμερα χιλιάδες γνωστοί μεγάλο επιχειρηματίες και δισεκκατομυριουχοι που πρόθυμα και με ζήλο χρηματοδοτουν ιδρύματα και οργανισμούς με σκοπό την βελτίωση ανθρώπινων δομών και κοινωνικών δικτύων. Κατά αυτόν τον τρόπο, χωρίς να χάνει κάποιος την οικονομική του αυτοτέλεια μπορεί να επιλέξει πως θα βοηθήσει την ίδια την κοινωνία διανέμοντας το επιπλέον και βοηθώντας σε μια ισορροπία ισότητας, δικαιοσύνης και οικονομίας. Για τον Κοέν πρώτα και κύρια ο ίδιος ο άνθρωπος οφείλει να θέτει το μέτρο της δικαιοσύνης πέραν από ιδεολογικές φόρμες που καταδυναστευουν την ελευθερία και πολιτικούς θεσμούς που δεν επηρεάζουν τις κοινωνικές δομές.

[Anthony · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is one of the most enjoyable philosophy books I've read recently (and in general). The published form of a set of lectures Cohen delivered in Scotland, the chapters walk through a series of loosely connected topics, with the overarching theme being a sort of intellectual biography of Cohen's life and work. But the book is engaging even if you didn't know or care about Cohen before jumping in because of the path his work has taken: from his upbringing as a Communist in Montreal, to his early work developing an analytically respectable form of Marxism, ultimately leading to him abandoning Marxism and exploring the normative foundations of egalitarianism, and crafting an egalitarian response to liberal political philosophy (e.g., Rawls). It ends with a discussion of a titular question, how people who claim to be egalitarian can justify being rich in unequal societies. Cohen's famously hilarious, and while I'm sure he peppered these lectures with jokes that didn't make it into the print form, his humor combines with his philosophical acumen to make these incredibly entertaining to read.

[Jennifer · Rating 5 out of 5]

There are few philosophy books these days that give you a full sense of the person writing them, what the author is like as a person and where he is coming from, this is one of those books. And, amazingly enough, its humanity does not detract from its philosophical value. Inspiring.

[Stefania · Rating 4 out of 5]

Πολύ εύστοχο στην κριτική του για τον μαρξισμό και για την θεωρία της δικαιοσύνης του Ρωλς (θα ήταν ιδιαιτέρως ωφέλιμο οι σημερινοί υποστηρικτές και των δύο πλευρών να το είχαν διαβάσει). Το μεγάλο θέμα όμως είναι ότι δεν υπάρχει μια κατάθεση πειστικής αντιπρότασης, όσο πειστική είναι η κριτική του. Και αυτό βέβαια είναι το δύσκολο, γιατί όντως η ανθρώπινη φύση έχει μια κοντόφθαλμη ιδιοτέλεια. Επίσης η ατομική προσπάθεια του καθενός να είναι πιστός σε κάποιες ηθικές αξίες δεν σημαίνει ότι μπορεί να φέρει και τα επιθυμητά αποτελέσματα. Για αυτό το λόγο πιστεύω ότι χρειαζόμαστε όσο ποτέ άλλοτε εμπνευσμένους πολιτικούς και όχι τεχνοκράτες.. Θα καταλήξω λοιπόν ότι μάλλον είχε δίκιο ο Πλάτωνας στην Πολιτεία του!

[yara ❦ · Rating 3 out of 5]

i wish this had a different title, three quarters of this book is an autobiography and the remainder touches on the title question. it is still an interesting philosophical read but i picked this up for class and left feeling ‘clickbaited’ lol

[Emmanouil · Rating 4 out of 5]

Βρήκα εξαιρετικά ενδιαφέρουσα την κριτική ματιά του απέναντι στον μαρξισμό και στο έργο του Τζών Ρωλς. Ωστόσο, στο τελευταίο κεφάλαιο που προσπαθεί να απαντήσει στην ερώτηση 'Αν θέλεις την ισότητα, γιατί είσαι τόσο πλούσιος' μου προκάλεσε εκνευρισμό. Τελικά ενώνοντας το τελευταίο κεφάλαιο με τα κεφάλαια που αναφέρονται στην προσωπική του ζωή είδα την ψυχαναλυτική του προσπάθεια να δικαιολογήσει τον εαυτό του. Για να τελειώσω με τον τρόπο που τελείωσε ο Κοεν, είμαι πλέον σίγουρος ότι
"εὐκοπώτερον γάρ ἐστι κάμηλον διὰ τρυμαλιᾶς ραφίδος εἰσελθεῖν ἢ πλούσιον εἰς τὴν βασιλείαν ΤΗΣ ΙΣΟΤΗΤΑΣ εἰσελθεῖν."
ΚΑΤΑ ΛΟΥΚΑΝ ( ιη΄ 25)

[Naeem · Rating 5 out of 5]

Review of G. A. Cohen, If You are an Egalitarian, How Come You are so Rich? Harvard, 2000

This set of lectures can be difficult going when Cohen is parsing words and phrases, giving definitions, and displaying his logical rigor. But mostly it has the elegance and clarity I also appreciated in his Karl Marx’s Theory of History (KMTH). The two books often overlap. But I found the repetition worthwhile.

I skipped the two opening autobiographical chapters as I had read a version of those elsewhere. I also skimmed the last three chapters devoted mostly to dismantling Rawls. In the 2000 version of KMTH, Cohen shows why Marx avoided speaking of values, ethics, and justice. Marx was committed to a scientific analysis of capitalism, says Cohen. The Marxist tradition, he things, doubles down on this mistake. He announces that Marxism must turn to liberal theorists of justice and learn from them. So, it was no surprise that Cohen moves to a critique of Rawls (and Dworkin and Nozick). However, I don’t have it in me to open up to the Rawlsian world because its announcing move is to defend inequality – even if Cohen gives a sizzling critique. My uneducated and uncultured position is that functional inequality arguments cannot but be wrong since they measure value and goodness in terms of utility and not in terms of more meaningful ethical principles.

That leaves the middle of the book – ch 3. Utopian and Scientific Socialism, ch 4. Hegel in Marx; ch 5: Opium of the People; and, ch 6: Equality. These I found superb and clear enough to use for undergraduate students.

Here Cohen both clarifies and critiques Marx.

Examples of Cohen’s clarifications: why Marx critiqued French and utopian socialism; how Hegel’s influence remains in Marx; Hegel’s understanding of what I would call “objective idealism”; Marx’s upturning of Feuerbach’s critique of religion because it lacks a sociological grounding; a much more dialectical (my word use, not Cohen’s) understanding of Marx’s 11th thesis on Feuerbach which calls for both action and interpretation; Marx’s defense of reformism when coupled with structural understanding of capitalism and of history; Marx’s sympathy for those who rely on religion and his understanding of why people create religion and God, and, therefore, how and why people dupe themselves.

Examples of Cohen’s critique: Marx false belief that activists cannot be engineers and can only be the midwives of history; Marx’s unwarranted belief that solutions to problems can only be immanent to the problems themselves; and Marx’s optimism about a post-capitalist future.

I remain amazed at Cohen’s ability to simultaneously be generous and take apart Hegel, Marx, and anybody. My apprenticeship with him does not mean that I think he gets it all correct. His understanding of dialectics is, I think, inferior to that of Zizek’s. Zizek (in Tarrying with the Negative, believes that dialectic dynamism carries (my word) all negations (or to use a Freudian/Lacan word) all “wounds” with it. Nothing is smoothed over; all scars, wounds, negations remain as the dialectic unfolds. I think it is a smoothed over understanding of dialectics that allows Cohen to link Hegelian “totality” to “totalitarianism” (90).

I was immediately suspicious of Cohen’s incorporation of “scarcity” -- one of the two pillars of neo-classical economics and of contractarian social theory (e.g., Hobbes, Locke, Rousseau). The two pillars are: needs are infinite, means are scarce. Result: a tragic world. Cohen believes Marx’s vision of an abundant future is impossible due to natural “scarcity.” This means that Western standards of living will have to be reduced. More crucial, Third World people will never attain those standards. In effect, Cohen is ready to dismiss most of the world’s population aspirations as impossible.

One of Cohen’s most important lines is about the deepest root meaning of injustice: injustice is when results derive from luck and circumstance (130). Cohen consistently rejects, as Marx does, all distributive schemes that do not follow from what Cohen calls the need principle, namely the famous “from those according to their abilities, to those their needs.” I have been won over by Cohen’s claim that Marx’s deepest ethical commitment is to the need principle. This commitment speaks to one of my most basic concerns, one I have held even as a child. At the end of the day, the power of Marx’s vision results from his embrace of the need principle AND his rejection of luck and circumstance as determining of one’s life chances. The scarcity assumption undoes that aspiration. It also goes against the central assumption of both Hegelianism and Marxism – that humans re-create nature to for their own purposes.

The twin pillars of scarcity of means and infinity of wants are, ideologically, an embrace of hierarchy and a rejection of equality. Their opposite is a wealthy equality, namely an abundance of means (due to technology, due to human creativity) and finite needs (that meaningful consumption can be satisfied, that therefore that the circuit M-C-M’ serves the circuit C1-M-C2).

The politics of scarcity necessarily abandons either the relative abundance that technology (the human manipulation of nature) creates, or, it abandons a commitment to equality. Part of Marx’s greatness – despite his many problems – is that he refuses to forsake either abundance or equality. Cohen, in contrast, gives up on abundance and therefore also on equality. So falls analytical Marxism’s visionary appeal – if it ever had one. Precision is always a laudable goal but it must serve some purpose. What greater purpose it serves analytical Marxists, I still do not know.

[C · Rating 3 out of 5]

One of the least impressive works I've read by this otherwise extremely impressive individual. It's title is a tad misleading, because only the final chapter (out of approximately ten) deals with that question. Cohen is a really bizarre but interesting philosopher. It's clear that he's brilliant. I mean really brilliant. And it's clear he has a cunning analytical mind that works like a devastating demolitionist. He can locate the precise premise that an entire argument is based upon, unravel it, unpack it, bat it around and reflect on it, and ultimately use it to bring down the entire house of cards the argument was supporting. This is a good skill to have in philosophy. But it's also wholly bizarre that someone with such a fantastic skill for comprehending arguments in their totality, and in their individual links, should have such a - I'm not sure how else to put this - cold war reading of Marx. Cohen claims to be a "no bullshit Marxist" (or as he should say, just "a bullshit Marxist"). And he's read everything Marx wrote. But he reads Marx like people who haven't read Marx, but want to straw man him into incoherence and stupidity, read him. So Cohen is always trying to rescue Marx within the confines of a straw man picture. Thus we get a lot of weird chapters in this book about how Marx's inevitable theory of history is false. Marx's theory of super radical abundance is false. Marx's theory solutions being embedded within their problems is false. And Marx's view of religion is false. Only after a half dozen chapters of beating up a straw man does Cohen finally get to the claim that if you're rich you should give money away, and you have no excuse not to. Those arguments mostly work, but by the time that chapter comes around, it's really hard to take anything Cohen says seriously....

[Vanessa Zoltan · Rating 5 out of 5]

One of the best collection of essays I've ever read.

[Sharif Farrag · Rating 5 out of 5]

Brilliant and funny. It's a shame that Cohen didn't find a way to incorporate the part of the lecture when he sang songs from musicals to demonstrate various ways in which bad things can be good.

[Sharad Pandian · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is a fantastic book which broadly has three parts.

In the first, Cohen talks about his early life growing up in a communist Jewish household and how it imprinted a deep egalitarian impulse in him. He then tries to grapple with the fact that if he had been born in some other circumstance, he would have had vastly different political leanings even if he hadn't had better epistemic grounds for those other beliefs compared to what he now has for his (this final part gets a little analytic and dull)

In the second, he traces the history of Marx's thought from Hegel and through Feurebach, and argues that its genius consisted in the combination of three incipient political/philosophical movements - German idealism (where the major figure was Hegel), French Utopian Socialism, and British materialism (in the figures of classical economics). He points out that scientific socialism had made assumptions which no longer hold today, namely that the working class:

1. constituted the majority of society;
2. produced the wealth of society;
3. were the exploited people in society; and
4. were the needy people in society.
5. would have nothing to lose from revolution, whatever its upshot might be
6. could and would transform society

The assumption that all these features existed together meant that scientific socilatists didn't have to worry too much about philosophical argument or moralizing because they just assumed all considerations (eg: justice, fairness, charity, freedom) would end up supporting their cause. The fact that these features no longer seem to go together, and since the inevitable demise of capitalism through internal developments no longer seems inevitable, we should reconsider a version of utopian socialism instead.

In the third, he finally talks about his egalitarianism - where "egalitarianism" refers to the stance that inequality isn't just bad, but is an injustice. He argues that you cannot simply subscribe to egalitarian political institutions and disregard egalitarian attitudes in your personal life, and argues that Rawls waffled/was unclear on this precise question in his work. Then he considers various reasons wealthy people who claim to be egalitarians give for not being more generous with their money in the non-egalitarian world we live in now. As he sharply puts it:

If you hate inequality because you think it is unjust, how can you qualmlessly accept and retain money your retention of which embodies that injustice—money which you could give to others, or donate to an egalitarian cause, and thereby diminish, or hope to diminish, the amount of injustice that prevails, by benefiting sufferers of that injustice?

He shows that although some reasons work (eg: if someone only desires equality since they thought inequality disfigures communities), most don't (eg: thinking your contribution won't do much or won't affect the fundamental structure of capitalism). He doesn't explore how strong the reasons given are so there are no strong conclusions about what should be done all-things-considered, but it's still some excellent analytic leftist political philosophy here.

[Andreas · Rating 4 out of 5]

There are many things to talk about regarding this book as far as analysis goes. It can provide the reader with some very good material for further discusion, more so than food for thought. Since I am not an native English speaker (pardon my mistakes) and certainly not in any way entitled to write an extensive yet comprehensive analysis of the book, I will only attempt to write a brief summary of my thoughts.

I found Cohen's retrospect of (the roots of) marxist philosophy ,which consists of the better part of the first half of the book, well put together. It was exceptionally well written in my opinion, with a quite clear way of laying out writer's thought proccess. The structure of arguments and justifictions regarding his opinions are cohesive and easy to follow.

In my opinion Cohen does an even more impressing job continuing on, building up his positions while discussing Rawls' theory. That being said, I believe the presentation of the second half of his 8th lecture (specifically sections 4 through 6), which is one of the main points of his discussion in this book, could be better organized. Of course, this might be due to my lack of further exposition in his work and generally to much of political/moral philosophy. Nevertheless, I believe a case can be made about Cohen repeatedly overanalyzing some concepts in order to better explain his reasoning, which leads to some context actually being lost (I should also mention that I have in my hands a translation of the book, in Greek, and not in English, which could obviously be a contender).

Finally, I was a bit let down by the fact that (again, in my opinion) despite the title of the book the subject of the relation between the (egalitarian) rich people and their stance on handling their wealth in various justice systems, is not discussed/analyzed in the depth I thought it would be. Once again, many people might be overly satisfied with the depth the subject is covered in lectures 9 and 10. Personally, I am satisfied with the questions arised but not so much with the kind of superficial way this is done.

Even though I do have these two aforementioned issues with the book, I was able to learn and think of some interesting aspects in a variety of issues that I am concerned with. It is a good and straight forward reference book which can certainly, if nothing else, be very helpful as an introduction to the issues it deals with.

(also keep in mind that I am only a young guy criticising Cohen from his keyboard, that in itself is enough reason to disregard most of what I said if you so see fit)

[Jared Baker · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book, compiled from a lecture series, was enlightening about socialism (utopian vs. scientific), the role of Hegel in Marxist thought, what a Canadian Communist upbringing looks (looked) like, and different arguments for why one can be rich and an egalitarian.

One main takeaway about socialism is that (I think) Marx believed abundant production made equality inevitable, and now that abundant production is in doubt, things are different. With climate change etc, it's clear that a whole world consuming like the wealthiest nations do presently is not physically possible.

As I understood it, Marx was also expecting working class solidarity, even across national borders. We have not seen this play out because the relativity of wealth makes the exploited tech guy not easily identifiable with an exploited farmer, communication is hard, and the unionized worker class has been crumbling due to tech advances, saving your way into the upper class, and some more reasons I am forgetting.

With equality less inevitable, and workers not always producing a ton of value with improved tech, justifications for equality rely more on norms than as being an inevitability. ie We should treat folks very well even if they are not exploited/producing.

It was enjoyable, and a good bit of it also made little sense to me lol. Also I wanna read more Hegel, especially his takes on theology-- God creating as was the only way to explore themself, know themself, be free?

[Lucas · Rating 5 out of 5]

This gets 5 stars not for overall brilliance, but for the brilliance of the last three chapters. Similar to Self-Ownership, Freedom and Equality, this book is not a tightly knotted coherent whole; however, the last three chapters flow together beautifully.

Cohen uses chapters 8 and 9 for a systematic destruction of Rawls’ Theory of Justice and from there propels into previously-unexplored grounds of how, given the lack of ability for a Rawlsian framework to distinguish the political from the private sphere, a self-professed egalitarian can horde their wealth. He does not reach any definite answers (and Cohen was well-off himself), but he outlines several ways of possible traversing this minefield of a problem.

These last three chapters are some of, if not the, best political philosophy I have ever had the pleasure of reading, and for that, Cohen gets 5 stars.

[Adam · Rating 4 out of 5]

Cohen's question is a good one, and in this book, he categorizes and analyzes potential answers. Most are, as he demonstrates, unpersuasive.

Meanwhile, readers are treated to the settings of his thinking on the problem of the rich egalitarian. There are sections on his (childhood) Marxism, his (agnostic) Judaism, and his appreciation for the teachings of Jesus Christ. Thinking examined and responded to includes that of Marx, Engels, Rawls, Ronald Dworkin, and Nagel.

[Eve · Rating 4 out of 5]

part philosophy, part autobiography. focused on cohen's relationship with his non-religious, egalitarian upbringing and his academic attempts to justify these views.

[Berta · Rating 5 out of 5]

Genial

[Daniel Schotman · Rating 3 out of 5]

Interesting title but unfortunately mainly autobiographical.

[Ellie · Rating 3 out of 5]

3.5, really.

[Curtis Holmes · Rating 2 out of 5]

Other than the last chapter - the rest of the book seemed disorganized and repetitive