This post is a draft of an idea I have been working on. I deliberately flag that this is not the finished article as yet, and more a work in progress, seeking to reconcile theories of justice with the practical politics of care. It is in part a reaction to discussions on Saturday at the Scottish Festival of Economics.
I have been thinking about what equality must mean if a politics of care is to be taken seriously.
Care is, of course, a known concept in our current society, around which differing understandings exist. Discussion of care might arise in the context of health, education, social security, resilience and participation in a community. I have suggested it might underpin politics and what I call an economics of hope. However, care has no meaning unless we are clear about what standard of equality we are using to measure its delivery, and I am not convinced that approaches to equality currently in use are adequate for this purpose.
Current discussions of equality focus upon people having rights, opportunities, or access. These claims dominate modern economic and political thinking. Debates on outcomes rarely arise. Instead, modern thinking on equality runs from Friedrich Hayek's claim that justice is secured when the same rules apply to all, through to John Rawls' attempt to design a society that would be judged fair whatever position we might find ourselves in. These are not the same arguments, and they lead to very different policy prescriptions. They do, however, share a common starting point that is rarely acknowledged. Equality is defined in both cases by the system's rules.
That sounds plausible. It is also profoundly misleading, because rules do not deliver outcomes. They create the conditions within which outcomes might arise, and as such, they are important and must be well chosen, but they do not guarantee them. And if we are talking about care, it is outcomes that matter. Rules are not enough in that case.
In fact, if equality is reduced to the claim that everyone faces the same rules, then all that is really being said is that people are permitted to take part in society, but that, too, is not enough. Permission does not guarantee the ability to access that for which permission is held, and in any case, the language of access, which is also a part of the debate on equality, is no better.
The suggestion that there might be equality of access tells us that services exist. It tells us that people can, in principle, use them. But it tells us nothing about whether those services deliver what people need, or whether people are in a position to benefit from them. This is not a minor technical flaw. It is a fundamental failure in how equality is understood.
The point has, of course, been made before. Amartya Sen demonstrated that rights, underpinned by rules, and resources, to which permission of access is granted, are not the same as real opportunity. What matters is what people are actually able to use these resources. Two people with the same formal rights and the same nominal access to services can have entirely different lives because of differences in income, health, security, or social circumstance. Capability, not permission, is what mattered, according to Sen's view, and that was a major step forward.
But even that insight, important though it is, does not go far enough if we stop there. That is because capability itself depends on systems of provision. It depends on whether the structures that surround people are designed to deliver the conditions for a decent life, or, as I would describe it, well-being.
Let me explore this argument using some examples.
You can be permitted to buy a house. You can have access to the housing market. But if you cannot afford to actually participate, you are not housed. The rules granting permission exist. The access exists. The market exists. The outcome does not.
Similarly, you can supposedly have access to education. But if your family circumstances limit your ability to study, and if you cannot afford the costs associated with learning, then you are not meaningfully educated. Again, the formal condition of access is met. The real outcome is not.
Likewise, you can be entitled to healthcare. But if waiting times are excessive, services are inaccessible, or if insecurity delays treatment, then you are not cared for. The right to care might exist, but the care itself does not.
These are not exceptional cases. They are the routine experience of many people in our society. And they expose the weakness of the prevailing concept of equality.
So, to be clear, permission granted by rules cannot establish equality, although they might be a precondition of it. Nor is a right of access sufficient to deliver equality. And whilst the capability of access as promoted by Sen is important, it is still not enough unless it is reliably delivered.
The reason these insufficient concepts persist is not hard to identify. They shift responsibility long before they get to capability. In particular, if rules exist that deliver superficial equality, then inequality of outcome can be attributed to the individual. And if access exists, then failure to benefit from it can be explained as a matter of choice or effort. The system is absolved. That has been one of the central ideological achievements of neoliberal economics. Systemic failure is attributed to individuaL weakness, by design.
But an economy is not described by philosophical rules. It is a system for meeting needs, and if we take that idea seriously, then the questions we ask about the nature of equality change.
We should not only ask whether people are allowed to participate.
And nor should we limit ourselves to asking whether access is in principle available to services that exist.
What we should ask is whether provision is actually made. The question changes in that case.
We have to ask, are people housed? The question is not about theory, but about practice. Do people, as a matter of fact, have secure, affordable accommodation that meets their needs?
And, are people fed? Do they, every day, have reliable access to adequate nutrition without insecurity or dependence on charity?
Do they also receive healthcare when they need it, delivered in a timely and effective way?
Importantly, do they have access to education to the extent they want, and does that education equip them to participate fully in society in a way they might wish, accepting that this will not be the same for everyone?
And, as a result of the provisions, are people able to work if they wish to do so, in conditions that are fair and secure?
And do they have social security available to them that provides stability when work is not possible?
Vitally, do they have security in old age or when they can no longer work?
If the answer to these questions is no for any significant part of the population, then equality does not exist, whatever the formal rules might claim, and this is the key test
This is what equality means in the context of a politics of care. It is equality of provision. The test is not based on theory, whether that theory be political, economic or philosophical. It is pragmatically based and tests whether the reality of ensuring that the conditions of well-being are met for all has been achieved.
That is a much more demanding standard than anything offered by the language of rights, opportunity or access.
It requires systems that are designed to deliver outcomes.
It requires collective provision.
It requires investment, planning and commitment.
And it requires us to judge our economy not by abstract indicators, but by whether it actually works for the people who live within it.
This also changes how we think about hope.
Hope is not the claim that individuals might succeed if they try hard enough within a system that routinely fails many of them. That is not hope. It is wishful thinking.
Hope is grounded in the knowledge that the system itself is designed to work and that the essentials of life are secure, meaning that housing, healthcare, education, income and security are not contingent on luck or market success, but are available, as a matter of course, to all, when nothing less will do.
That is what makes hope rational rather than aspirational.
So I am increasingly convinced that we need to change the way we think about equality. Most existing concepts, including the now-rarely-discussed issue of income equality, set the bar far too low (in this case, by failing to consider whether the income target is sufficient). As a result, they allow pragmatic failure to deliver to be excused. They shift responsibility away from where it belongs, within society, onto individuals whose inability to negotiate the system they face is considered a personal failing
If we are serious about a politics of care and an economics of hope that has substance, then we need to be clear about this. The purpose of an economy is to provide well-being. Equality only exists when it does. And to achieve that goal, existing theories of equality are not enough.
What a politics of care actually requires is that we approach the hierarchy of equality like this:
Step 1: Permission. People must have the right to use services. The rules must be in place.
Step 2: Access. Services must exist and be available. Otherwise, permission to access them is meaningless.
Step 3: Capability. People must be able, in purely practical terms, to use the services required to deliver well-being.
Step 4: Outcome. The system must actually deliver well-being.
At present, most policy stops at Step 2. A politics of care must reach Step 4. That is what makes it radically different.
The politics of care, coupled with an economics of hope, has to be based on the provision of the means that underpin well-being. Nothing less will do. Only when that well-being is available to all can equality be said to have been delivered, and it is delivery that matters.
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Thought provoking, thank you. We have stopped at 2, particularly in education. Some children going to better schools than others through sheer luck is an injustice that many on the right think is acceptable, I’m afraid there’s no reaching those folks. Others believe in the meritocracy but it’s a necessary but not sufficient condition of a civilised society. I wouldn’t go as far as the Marxian “from each according to his ability etc” but I do like the idea of Universal services. In other words the basics are free and the extras cost. For example in energy. Electricity needs to be nationalised and we all pay the same. A fixed, low, standing charge would include enough units to power a small home. After that additional units at the prevailing rate. Everyone can keep themselv3s warm and the big users are incentivised to be economical.
We must, as a society, ensure everyone has the basics of life.
YES! This makes so much sense.
Hmmmm……………
Let’s look at slavery in the West back in the day – say, the American deep South.
Which came first?
The racism or the opportunity of economic exploitation and self enrichment? Or was it both? I don’t know.
What did those plantation owners see or were aware of?
I ask this question simply because I’m intrigued by the effects of extreme wealth and power on human beings – as well as its absence of. To me those slavers and and plantation owners were suffering from pleonexia – their greed and dependence on free labour – slavery – enabled them to override their conception of humanity other than themselves and they saw the slaves as nothing but beasts of burden. In dehumanising the slaves, they of course dehumanised themselves. But they would not have seen that at the time.
Why am I mentioning this here? I suppose what I am seeing in our society is shortages of everything – staff, wages, other resources. Shortages exacerbate inequalities just like having too much can exacerbate them. My point is that good economics is the driving force of equality – a fair allocation of resources will mitigate most human weaknesses and conflicts? My experience in social housing is that any community whether BAME or white are extremely sensitive to perceived injustices around the allocation of resources to another group, racial, national or otherwise.
The problem is in the cynical way in which we are ruled. We are deliberately kept short of things to keep us at each other’s throats, when the purpose of good governance is to provide enough as fairly as possible? This I am sure would produce more peace and harmony but means that we have to accept and confront the darker aspects of ourselves.
The politics and economics of care would be/could be the social leveller.
Thanks and I agree with your conclusion
I love this. It’s like a modern version of Beveridge which was right for it’s time, but we need something relevant to the world we now live in. We have become divided as a nation with the disabled pitted against the elderly etc. And where university education and graduate jobs are increasingly becoming the province of those with parents who can support them, not necessarily the most academically able.
We have to return to a society that cares, especially for the more vulnerable. We can’t carry on being told there is no money only for it to be found when there is a war etc.
This goes very nicely with the Green Party message of hope not hate and their explanation as to why there is no money for the things we care about. I hope these ideas find their way into Green policy.
There is a world of difference between treating everyone equally and wanting to make them equal.
There is, which is why I have also written about Robert Nozick this morning. And let me be clear, I am not only in favour or treatig people equally, bu givimng them the chnace to participate equally. Do you have a problem with that?
Gordo
The proposal is not to ‘treat people equally or make them equal’. That is impossible and no one in their right mind would propose that. I have to ask whatever gave you such an idea? Our thoughts here are guided simply by the division of wealth and growing disparities in it between social strata which are very well evidenced statistically and just by walking around.
The proposals are essentially to stop what is the mass transfer of wealth from one set of people to another; to lessen/ reduce the mechanisms of exploitation by markets (this is where the rich essentially feed off the poor and middle class by charging rents as monopolistic suppliers of services); for the state to mitigate the known negative outcomes from the current mode of capitalism ensuring that the losers do not lose bad without support (and the winners get to exploit) and become a social order problem merely to be exploited by other negative factors like fascism; to have a democracy with those objectives at its heart; to create jobs with decent wages and conditions looking after people and the planet; to stop private monopoly.
I remember the 1990’s and early noughties being about trying to solve social exclusion (remember that anybody?) by making society more inclusive. Currently all of that seems like ancient history these days but we need to get back to it right quick.
For the record, I don’t mind that billionaires exist – I can tolerate the rich and self made people. But not when they are getting rich by reducing the wealth of others, purchasing our democracy and playing with shitty ideas like fascism and racism. And they are guilty as charged I’m afraid.
According to billionaire Marc Andreesson,
https://www.thecanary.co/global/world-analysis/2026/03/23/billionaire-claims-rejects-introspection/
all this “deep thinking” is a waste of time, and a bad habit we got into about 400 years ago.
Sigh… has he never read Peanuts, or Douglas Adams, or Terry Pratchett? Or the book of Job? Or anything from east of the Danube or south of Marseilles? The man must suffer from a horrible inner poverty of spirit.
On equality, I found myself comparing equality and “difference”. I am neither an Olympic athlete nor a member of Mensa – am I equal to them, or different from them, or both? St Paul reflects on this aspect of difference in 1 Cor 12.15-26 https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=1%20Corinthians%2012.15-26&version=NIVUK
I found myself saying “wellbeing” to myself about half way through the article, then you mentioned it, I am sure it is key – and forces us into practicality. In my foodbank days, some would feel that “equality” meant some got food from the shops, some got it by our charity, from the foodbank and like Jacob Rees-Mogg, would say how “uplifting” that was – making food-poverty/economic injustice a “good” thing because it allowed for “charity”. That was not my view!
Neither an 8yr old boarder being bullied at Eton, nor an 8yr old being bullied at primary school because his clothes smell due to hygiene poverty, nor an 8yr old being attacked in a tent in Gaza, are experiencing well being. Nor are they equal, except in human worth. But they each NEED wellbeing, and a politics of care should aim to provide it for each of them in the short term, AND seek to deal with the causes of their misery in the longer term.
That’s an important post, I look forward to its development.
KUTGW!
Thanks again to all for a much needed article!
Might “equity” be an additional/alternative word-concept for equality?
Might it be more achievable and have more caring connotations?
A reason for this comment comes from teaching in a deprived part of Birmingham where the lesson was about fairness/equity.
Asked for their definiions of this concept, one offering was, “Nobody gets pissed on.”
Might the submerged purposes of our sham democracy and Neoliberarilism/Austerity include that the vulnerable get pissed on for the benefit of the currently enternched?
Is this a white paper?
Not yet
People hope for an outcome, the outcome does not appear, and so that person then needs the care and which in too many cases is not available and the means may not be available either – a vicious circle and (if a circle can do it) which results in a downward spiral with even more care needed – etc etc –
I am not sure that equality of provision is the right term – I’m not sure it is really very different to equality of access, both work if all your 4 steps. My very simple definition is that all people matter equally. If 1 person is not housed or educated or fed, then there is no equality. The difficulty comes because that means individual needs must be taken into account, rather than trying to find a general way of dealing with the issue.
I think they are massively differently. Access is not delivery. I can go into a shop. But if I cannot buy there is no solution because delivery is not possible. Delivery or provision is key.
1: Permission. 2: Access. 3: Capability. 4: Outcome.<p>
‘Present policy stops at step 2’. Yes but the Outcome is often the subject of political debate – the poverty and destitution of up to 30% of the population, the declining healthy life span, the excess deaths resulting from the collapsing NHS.<p>
Steps 1 and 3 seem to be a function of individuals, steps 2 and 4 function of the system and whole population. <p>
Could the characterisation somehow incorporate more of a sense of people and the system together comprising a whole, rather than the system on the one hand , delivering or not delivering to people, on the other? Does that make any sense?
I have been working on that.
The edge cases are really difficult. As a thought experiment, imagine a society where everyone is made equal, in terms of both wealth and opportunity. Differences in personality, morality and capabilities would rapidly lead to a wide disparity of outcomes. Where are the limits of society’s obligation to intervene? How do we deal with the artist who chooses to buy paints rather than housing or food? Is it their right to die of starvation or exposure, given that it’s their choice, or does society intervene because the artist is clearly making the ‘wrong’ choice?
What do you say?
Of course ,”society” ( whatever that means) doesn’t intervene but it would be normal for the close family and friends of the anorexic artist to “intervene” because normally such people care for those close to them.
What I like in Richard’s thinking here is that we need to conceive equality in broader terms than income equality. There is a tendency to think that tackling social inequality is about dealing with income inequality. That is only part of the picture. I think it is derived from obsession with monetary value rather than “use value”. Creating use value is the end, money is the means.
Agreed
I really like the practicality of this.
The system is what the system does. If the answers to questions like “Are people housed?”, “Are people fed?”, “Are people healthy” are no, then the system isn’t working and we need to find a way to fix it.
I also like how a question like “Are people housed?” cuts through weaselly claims like “We’re building 30,000 homes”, enabling ordinary people to see more clearly what’s really going on. Whch means they are hopefully more able to do something about it.
There is more to do on it though
I like the direction this is heading!
It’s good to see the specifics, more tangible. It’s measurable and achievable, realistic and timewise? Idk, it’s a process, but you could get more specific there. Imagine we did it! We’re there, in that future. Describe it for people.
You have unique selling points, especially the one where you have already done all the work! None of the ‘BBC correspondents’, ‘think tanks’ ‘experts’ or politicians have! You have created a solution, vs the bulk of social media… our daily outrage, propaganda and rhetoric. On loop.
But you have a plan. And if you show us a step-by-step guide to the HOW, how we get to there from here, that would help.
And some words about WHAT such a society looks like with reference to your common sense politics and ‘Murphian Economics’.
What we stand to gain. In technicolor and triplicate!
Also, some examples are always good to illustrate the narrative.
That’s about it for now
Have a nice evening 🙂
I have been thinking on this for much of the day, but enough for now!
Recognising that, as you say, your post is not the finished article as yet, I hope you’ll forgive my suggesting the addition alongside your ‘essentials of life’ a few examples of services essential for anyone’s full membership of society – none of which should be post code dependent (i.e. constrained by a person’s geographic location) nor should they be inaccessible to people with disabilities:
· Heating lighting and water services (perhaps assumed as part of housing provision)
· Public transport
· Postal (letters and parcels) service
· Telecommunications infrastructure
· Basic banking service
· Legal aid
· Probably others that I haven’t thought of
Thanks
Just another six penn’orth for what it’s worth. Even where the rules benefit someone, if they lack the resources to access the means to enforce their rights those rights might as well not exist. As Sir James Mathew (probably) said ironically over 100 years ago ‘ Law, like the Ritz Hotel, is open to rich and poor alike’. Because (of course) ‘we can’t afford it’ civil legal aid barely exists any more so unless you can afford a solicitor you’re often on your own. There may be some free assistance, perhaps through citizens advice, perhaps from some law students or other volunteers but in court you’re your own advocate. The ‘rules’ don’t permit anyone who’s not-legally trained to conduct the case on your behalf. I’m proud to be British!
I agree. This is scandalous.
My brother and I were discussing similar only last week. I would go a step further and suggest that there is also a fixation with process and that the adherence to process has become a substitute for success. If the rules are deemed fair, if access is formally available, and if procedures are followed correctly, then systems are often judged to be working—even when they are failing to deliver acceptable outcomes. Process can actively obscure failure.
This, I think, creates a kind of institutional comfort zone. So long as procedures are followed, responsibility is deflected away from the system and onto the individual. If someone is not housed, not educated, or not receiving timely healthcare, the existence of process allows that failure to be rationalised rather than confronted. Process can become self-legitimising. Systems prioritise compliance with rules over the purpose those rules were meant to serve. The question shifts from “are people actually experiencing well-being?” to “were the correct procedures followed?”. I think your argument also points to something more fundamental: that an overemphasis on process has helped entrench a model of equality that tolerates poor outcomes, provided they arise through formally fair systems.
For a politics of care to have real substance, it seems to me that process has to be decisively subordinated to outcome. Not abandoned, but stripped of its status.. The system should not be judged by how well it follows its own rules, but by whether it actually delivers the conditions of well-being you describe. In that sense, the shift you are proposing is not just an extension of existing ideas of equality, it is a challenge to one of their core assumptions.
Noted
Thanks
This is a really thought provoking article.
Equality is a difficult term to define. To me it feels a bit mechanical in approach and I doubt very much that that is your intent. The reality is that everyone is different in a myriad of ways but their needs – at least in a very basic way – are similar. Food, water, shelter – and connection.
We cannot sever the physical needs of people from their psychological needs and perhaps this all can be encompassed by the term ‘wellbeing’.
What this leads to for me is that the politics of care is an expression of our connection to and compassion for others in our society and the world generally. The practical expression of this is less a tortured definition of ‘equality’ that is our pass to our physical needs but communities of people who both care for each other (you can love without liking!) and have the means to implement the provision of the physical needs themselves without reference to some higher authority.
This of course then leads to a discussion about devolution and self governance but any talk of equality necessarily requires consideration of who decides on what it means and who polices its implementation.
[…] appreciate all the comments received yesterday on the post on the need for equality of provision. I think it is fair to say that this has been well received. However, as I noted, this was never […]
A very useful and practical framework- thank you Richard. Some initial thoughts
Step 1: Permission. People must have the right to use services. The rules must be in place.
Also people knowing that the permission and the rights are there and can be used by them.
Addressing the pervasive issue of low expectations “University is not for you” as my teacher said.
Step 2: Access. Services must exist and be available. Otherwise, permission to access them is meaningless.
How do we address the current postcode lottery for many services?
Step 3: Capability. People must be able, in purely practical terms, to use the services required to deliver well-being.
Critical issue here is that the system can either enable or disable individual capability. It can be constructed to mitigate adverse circumstance beyond the control of the individual particularly in the early years. It is not simply down to the individual
https://fhcappg.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/2024/03/ADVERSE-CHILDHOOD-EXPERIENCES-FINAL-REPORT.pdf
Step 4: Outcome. The system must actually deliver well-being.
Does the extreme wealth of some impact the well-being of others? I have been challenged by the philosopher and economist Ingrid Robeyns in her provocative and radical book “Limitarianism: The Case Against Extreme Wealth” -advocating for a legal upper limit on how much personal wealth an individual can have.
Thanks, I will reflect on these.
Richard,
I’m very pleased to have found your blog and website today after looking for economic information relating to MMT. Also pleased to see you are a fellow member of the 1958 Club 🙂
I’ve been a follower of Bill Mitchell for several years and see a move to an MMT based economy as essential for implementing the kind of caring society you propose here. Measuring economic success in terms of surgical waiting lists (lack of) or access to free education rather than maximum GDP and a balanced budget will be essential. The economy must be seen as a servant of the people rather than the other way round as at present .
A major difficulty in achieving these ends however will be staffing for the expansion of medical and other social services that will be required, especially in the coming years when us boomers are in our decrepitude but still hanging onto the perch. This is where the MMT’s idea of a job guarantee (which can include further education rather than work) where people are effectively required to contribute in some way to the well-being of their fellow citizens has merit over the potential for paid idleness that a universal income may provide. The phrase “From each according to their ability, to each according to their needs” comes, I think, from the communist manifesto and is therefore not a very popular quote, but the fact is that NOTHING gets done in a modern society unless somebody gets out of bed in the morning and goes to work, whether it be to empty dustbins (an essential public health service), perform brain surgery (see previous brackets) or pull pints (see previous brackets) at the end of a hard days work for the other two. A caring society that works in practice will require a high participation rate of competent, responsible adults with significant skills. Achieving this may require elements of both the carrot and the stick.
Kit
I think you seriously misunderstand the MMT proposed job guarantee which is nothing like what you imply. You need to do some more reading. Sorry to say so, but the JG is an unemployment measure, nothing more.