[What follows is indebted to my undergraduates at Ghent University.--ES] Let's stipulate that analytic egalitarianism (AE) consists of the following three basic tenets:
[1] Naturally all people are equal, and all salient differences are the product of institutions (law, education, culture, etc).
- [A] This includes the philosophical/economist-expert
- [B] Even if [1] is not quite literally true, (nearly) all people consider themselves to be (at least as) equal.
[2] From [1A] it follows that the the philosophical/economist-expert should be put inside the model (or conceptual framework)
[3] From [1B] we learn that human affairs are (at least) in part intentional systems. (That is, we can't have a fully extensional model.)
AE entails some moral guidelines that should govern public philosophy (or the role of experts in public). I believe AE captures the foundations of what economics ought to be. We find the classic statement of AE in Chapter 15 of Hobbes' Leviathan:
The question who is the better man has no place in the condition of mere nature, where (as has been shown before) all men are equal. The inequality that now is has been introduced by the laws civil. I know that Aristotle in the first book of his Politics, for a foundation of his doctrine, maketh men by nature, some more worthy to command, meaning the wiser sort, such as he thought himself to be for his philosophy; others to serve, meaning those that had strong bodies, but were not philosophers as he; as master and servant were not introduced by consent of men, but by difference of wit: which is not only against reason, but also against experience. For there are very few so foolish that had not rather govern themselves than be governed by others: nor when the wise, in their own conceit, contend by force with them who distrust their own wisdom, do they always, or often, or almost at any time, get the victory. If nature therefore have made men equal, that equality is to be acknowledged: or if nature have made men unequal, yet because men that think themselves equal will not enter into conditions of peace, but upon equal terms, such equality must be admitted. And therefore for the ninth law of nature, I put this: that every man acknowledge another for his equal by nature. The breach of this precept is pride.
Hobbesian laws of nature (or "articles of peace") are precepts that "Reason suggesteth." (Leviathan, ch. 13) In fact, whatever else we can say about the epistemic and ontological status of Hobbesian laws of nature, for Hobbes to be reasonable is to embrace AE (much of ch. 13 is devoted to this). And Hobbes makes clear that a crucial way this is operationalized is by willingness to pay ["just value, is that which they be contented to give" ((ch. 15); see also "the buyer determines the price" (ch. 10))]. And conversely, the rejection of AE is a (version of) pride, that is, a species of unreasonableness--it is a form of "madness" that is "great vaine-Glory" (ch. 8). Interestingly, there is a form of unreasonable pride that is conducive to the social contract:
The force of words being (as I have formerly noted) too weak to hold men to the performance of their covenants, there are in man's nature but two imaginable helps to strengthen it. And those are either a fear of the consequence of breaking their word, or a glory or pride in appearing not to need to break it. This latter is a generosity too rarely found to be presumed on, especially in the pursuers of wealth, command, or sensual pleasure, which are the greatest part of mankind. The passion to be reckoned upon is fear. (Ch. 14).
So, while Hobbes adopts the normative and empirical adequacy of AE, Hobbes here (and elsewhere) clearly recognizes a limitation of AE: there will be (unreasonable) people without the right kind of fear. We cannot always count on the unreasonable to be generous or to play by the rules of the market-place. This is not the place to investigate the possible solution(s) to handling the limitations of AE; they fall outside the scope of economics.
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