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If You're an Egalitarian, How Come You're So Rich?

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In this book Cohen examines the role of individual behavior in the philosophy of justice. Cohen starts by telling about his own life as a jewish marxist in Montreal, who later became an analytic philosopher in Oxford. He discusses the core beliefs of marxism with a special emphasis on Marx's views on religion. He argues that marxists have neglected issues of justice and issues of individual behavior. The first was neglected because of wrong views on the working class and the illusion that there would be no real tradeoffs under communism. The second was neglected because of Marx's theory of revolutionary change and history. He finds the missing egaliarian ethos of individual behavior in christianity. Hence the importance of the relationship between marxism and religion.

Cohens next step is to show that Rawls difference principle, which he accepts, must hold for individuals too in a just society. He gives very careful rebuttals of views to the contrary. From this he shows that much less inequality is justified by the difference principle than usually believed.

Now that he handled the case of individual behavior in a just society from a Rawlsian point of view, he adresses the question of how one ought to act in an unjust society. Specifically how should egalitarians act in an unegalitarian society? This leads to the question posed in the title and Cohen spends the rest of the book examining different justifications for why rich people don't have to spend most of their income on ending inequality.

The book will be of interest mainly to marxists and people interested in contemporary political philosophy.

G.A. Cohen is a reconstructed Marxist - which means he spend much of his time musing over why a socialist utopia hasn't materialised automatically by the dialectical historical process that Marx predicted. Once he has got through several lectures painstakingly working out precisely why this hasn't happened, his material gets more intersting. He offers a powerful critique of the liberalism offered by John Rawls - based on the difference principle which argues that inequalities are justified so long as they benefit the worst off in society. Cohen challenges this view asking why those who are exceptionally well paid for work that is not especially difficult need to earn so much more than their contemporaries, even if their contemporaries don't suffer as a result.

Most interesting of all is the eponymous final chapter which asks whether it is possible for rich people to be egalitarians in their political thought. This investigates the arena of personal obligation in political theory - a largely unexplored area largely untouched by established political writings which tend to focus on theory at the state level. With so many professed egalitarian politicians sending their children to expensive schools, or living in large houses, or engaging in pocket lining business deals, Cohen is right to explore such issues. I hope that the material at the end of this book launches a more extensive debate on the theme, which seems to me to be a significant aspect of contemporary society.

Quite probably one of the best books in political philosophy to emerge in recent decades far outsurpassing Rawls and Nozick's often cited works. In fact these two scholars from Harvard (I believe they are still there), if any, should read this work and then check their bank accounts. Cohen heads straight for the issue confronting contemporary self style liberals or "republicans" in democrat clothing who still speak of economic equality and quasi communitarianism (distributive justice) in today's global economic society so rich with its many "divides" between rich and poor.

The central question comes down to how much people are willing to put their actions and practices where their mouths are, the old cliche of putting one's money where one's mouth is. Cohen elegantly draws the fateful and radical incoherence in the left's incommensurable principles of 1. a just & fair compassionate society and 2. selfish individuals acting in their own interests. Liberals support both by necessity. How do we square these two? How can we demand that society be just economically, that our institutions act altruistically, but on the other hand hold that individuals should be able to act in their own self interest? This is the real dilemma presented by Cohen and I aver that it will take some real time and hard thought to properly answer him on this score. Try turning Ayn Rand into a progressive and you will experience the problem that Cohen presents elegantly in his book. The next book must deal with the implications of all this: do we keep talking like Al Gore but living like the Bushes, or do we give up self interest and create the just society. Liberals want it both ways, Cohen shows they can't have it!

forgive any typos. dms

This book is very much a waste of time in that the most of the book did not directly address the question posed by the title. It also went into a lot of autobiography and for someone who is interested in philosophy I find it a waste of time to learn about someone's boring life - and as a philosopher, if the most important thing you can say about your beleifs is that you have them because of your upbringing, then your beliefs are pretty worthless even if they are right and true. This guy is a communist egalitarian because his parents are communist egalitarians. Not very interesting and quite unphilosophical. This is not to say he didn't address the issue as a philospher should but that he put in too much stuff that a philosopher shouldn't. Now on to the essence of what he should have and did include:
The author, who admits he is not generous himself, does come to the conclusion that there is no moral justification for being a rich egalitarian and not giving away much of your money- there sre strong excuses such as that giving away a lot does not make that much of a difference because it won't change society as a whole - but they are not valid reasons for retaining your wealth when you think it is wrong to be so well off when others are not. What the book reveals, though without intent, is how fundamental a practice it is for liberals not have any integrity. Integrity is defined as acting in accordance with your beliefs. If you think it is wrong that rich people get to keep so much money while others do without or with little, then you should give your money away in copious amounts until you are lower middle class yourself. But rich liberals don't do this. They hang their sense of virture on the notion that they will not give unless everyone else gives - basically, they will only have integrity if everyone else is forced to have integrity.
Now imagine a preacher who condems homosexuality as an evil sin and alcohol as the devil's nectar. Now imagine by chance you meet this priest at a gay bar and he is completely drunk and engaged in homosexual sex right in the middle of the bar. And you ask that priesst, but Father, I thought you said homosexuality and drinking are sins and the priest responds, "well yes they are and I will fight with every breath I have to make the police put an end to these unholy and immoral practices through force by jailing gays cuahgt having sex and anyone who drinks, but as long as it is legal to drink and legal to screw men, I will indulge these sins as much as possible because I find no greater pleasure than being drunk and having gay sex." You would rightfully condemn this priest as a hypocrite with an incoherent and debased sense of morality. So too with the rich leftists who decide to keep their money because the government doesn't force it from them and give it to the poor.
And on a separate note, a criticsm of all leftist analyses regarding wealth and income distribution applies to this work as well. Leftist thinkers never take into account the voluntary nature of economic transactions that lead some to have more and others to have nothing or lilttle. For exmaple, the owner of Apple is super rich because leftists like to buy their Macs and ipods and thier Ipads and their iphones instead of giving that money to bums and drunks and jobless manless women who breed illegitimate kids. The inequality is created by the freedom of action - why is that wrong? But if it is, then the solution lies in leftists not buying iphones and Laker tickets and private jets, all of which make the providers of these goods richer, and giving your money to those who have less. You are free to do it.
I don't see myself as having any duty to give money to complete strangers - i see nothing wrong with making more money than most people and I have no grudge against those who make more money than me. I don't care for the poor or the sick although i wish them no ill - but if you see me as evil for not caring for the poor or the sick or the starving in Africa, then you should be acting differently than I do - that leftists in reality act just as selfishly as I do shows that they have no more integrity than the inebriated penis-loving priest.