Equality, Community, and Diversity in Cohen’s Socialist Ideal
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Jason Brennan
Abstract
The ‘community principle’ is crucial to G. A. Cohen’s argument for socialism, because it is the best independent argument he has adduced for his strongly egalitarian conclusions. Cohen argues that even small differences in wealth ought to be prohibited because they bring us out of community with one another. In this paper, I show that his underlying premises lead to some repugnant conclusions, and thus should be rejected. If Cohen is right that even small differences in wealth can upset community, then, by the very psychological mechanisms he identifies, we should think that other differences, such as differences in religion, conceptions of the good, race, or taste, should also upset community. Cohen is thus caught in a trap: the more strongly egalitarian his community principle is, the more it not only prohibits differences of wealth, but diversity of any kind, including the forms of diversity we should celebrate rather than reject.
© 2015 by Lucius & Lucius, Stuttgart
Articles in the same Issue
- Contents
- Editorial: The Normative Turn from Marxism
- I. Marx and Ethics: Coherent Company?
- Marx and Mendacity: Can There Be a Politics without Hypocrisy?
- Why Marxism Still Does Not Need Normative Theory
- The Moral Legacy of Marxism
- II. G. A. Cohen’s Development
- G. A. Cohen and Marxism
- Thoughts on G. A. Cohen’s Final Testament
- Equality, Community, and Diversity in Cohen’s Socialist Ideal
- G. A. Cohen, Constructivism, and the Fact of Reasonable Pluralism
- III. Marx and Liberalism
- The Theory of Marxian Liberalism
- Freedom in Times of Struggle: Positive Liberty, Again
- Libertarianism on the Brink
- Sterba on Liberty and Welfarism
- A Response to Jan Narveson: Why Libertarians Are and Are Not Like Turnips
- IV. Repercussions
- Myths about the State of Nature and the Reality of Stateless Societies
- Horkheimer, Religion, and the Normative Grounds of Critical Theology
- Exploitation, Labor, and Basic Income
- In Company of the Funny Sunny Surfer off Malibu: A Response to Michael Howard (and Some Others)
- Authors
Articles in the same Issue
- Contents
- Editorial: The Normative Turn from Marxism
- I. Marx and Ethics: Coherent Company?
- Marx and Mendacity: Can There Be a Politics without Hypocrisy?
- Why Marxism Still Does Not Need Normative Theory
- The Moral Legacy of Marxism
- II. G. A. Cohen’s Development
- G. A. Cohen and Marxism
- Thoughts on G. A. Cohen’s Final Testament
- Equality, Community, and Diversity in Cohen’s Socialist Ideal
- G. A. Cohen, Constructivism, and the Fact of Reasonable Pluralism
- III. Marx and Liberalism
- The Theory of Marxian Liberalism
- Freedom in Times of Struggle: Positive Liberty, Again
- Libertarianism on the Brink
- Sterba on Liberty and Welfarism
- A Response to Jan Narveson: Why Libertarians Are and Are Not Like Turnips
- IV. Repercussions
- Myths about the State of Nature and the Reality of Stateless Societies
- Horkheimer, Religion, and the Normative Grounds of Critical Theology
- Exploitation, Labor, and Basic Income
- In Company of the Funny Sunny Surfer off Malibu: A Response to Michael Howard (and Some Others)
- Authors
