Value in Ethics and Economics

Front Cover
Harvard University Press, Aug 11, 1995 - Philosophy - 261 pages
Elizabeth Anderson offers a new theory of value and rationality that rejects cost-benefit analysis in our social lives and in our ethical theories. This account of the plurality of values thus offers a new approach, beyond welfare economics and traditional theories of justice, for assessing the ethical limitations of the market. In this light, Anderson discusses several contemporary controversies involving the proper scope of the market, including commercial surrogate motherhood, privatization of public services, and the application of cost-benefit analysis to issues of environmental protection.



Table of Contents:

Preface

1. A Pluralist Theory of Value
A Rational Attitude Theory of Value
Ideals and Self-Assessment
How Goods Differ in Kind (I): Different Modes of Valuation
How Goods Differ in Kind (II): Social Relations of Realization
2. An Expressive Theory of Rational Action
Value and Rational Action
The Framing of Decisions
The Extrinsic Value of States of Affairs
Consequentialism
Practical Reason and the Unity of the Self
3. Pluralism and Incommensurable Goods
The Advantages of Consequentialism
A Pragmatic Theory of Comparative Value Judgments
Incommensurable Goods
Rational Choice among Incommensurable Goods
4. Self-Understanding, the Hierarchy of Values, and Moral Constraints
The Test of Self-Understanding
The Hierarchy of Values
Agent-Centered Restrictions
Hybrid Consequentialism
A Self-Effacing Theory of Practical Reason?
5. Criticism, Justification, and Common Sense
A Pragmatic Account of Objectivity
The Thick Conceptual Structure of the Space of Reasons
How Common Sense Can Be Self-Critical
Why We Should Ignore Skeptical Challenges to Common Sense
6. Monistic Theories of Value
Monism
Moore's Aesthetic Monism
Hedonism
Rational Desire Theory
7. The Ethical Limitations of the Market
Pluralism, Freedom, and Liberal Politics
The Ideals and Social Relations of the Modern Market
Civil Society and the Market
Personal Relations and the Market
Political Goods and the Market
The Limitations of Market Ideologies
8. Is Women's Labor a Commodity?
The Case of Commercial Surrogate Motherhood
Children as Commodities
Women's Labor as a Commodity
Contract Pregnancy and the Status of Women
Contract Pregnancy, Freedom, and the Law
9. Cost-Benefit Analysis, Safety, and Environmental Quality
Cost-Benefit Analysis as a Form of Commodification
Autonomy, Labor Markets, and the Value of Life
Citizens, Consumers, and the Value of the Environment
Toward Democratic Alternatives to Cost-Benefit Analysis

Conclusion
Notes
References
Index



Reviews of this book:
Anderson/auhtor is anxious to combat what she sees as a tendency for commercial values to invade areas of human life where they do not belong...A useful contribution to debate about the proper scope of the market.

"Not everything is a commodity, insists Anderson, and her brief should shake up social science technocrats." DD--Philadelphia Inquirer

"The book is rich in both argument and application." DD--Alan Hamlin, Times Higher Education Supplement

"In this rich and insightful book Elizabeth Anderson develops an original account of value and rational action and then employs this account to address the pragmatic political question of what the proper range of the market should be. Anderson's principal targets are consequentialism, monism and the crude 'economistic' reasoning which underpins much contemporary social policy...This is an important book...For anyone interested in political philosophy this is essential reading." DD--A. J. Walsh, Australasian Journal of Philosophy
--Hugo Dixon, Financial Times [UK]

Reviews of this book:
Not everything is a commodity, insists Anderson, and her brief should shake up social science technocrats.
--Philadelphia Inquirer

Reviews of this book:
The book is rich in both argument and application.
--Alan Hamlin, Times Higher Education Supplement

Reviews of this book:
In this rich and insightful book Elizabeth Anderson develops an original account of value and rational action and then employs this account to address the pragmatic political question of what the proper range of the market should be. Anderson's principal targets are consequentialism, monism and the crude 'economistic' reasoning which underpins much contemporary social policy...This is an important book...For anyone interested in political philosophy this is essential reading.
--A. J. Walsh, Australasian Journal of Philosophy

 

Contents

A Pluralist Theory of Value
1
An Expressive Theory of Rational Action
17
Pluralism and Incommensurable Goods
44
SelfUnderstanding the Hierarchy of Values and Moral
65
Criticism Justification and Common Sense
91
Monistic Theories of Value
117
The Ethical Limitations of the Market
141
Is Womens Labor a Commodity?
168
CostBenefit Analysis Safety and Environmental
190
Notes
223
References
231
Index
241
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About the author (1995)

Elizabeth Anderson is John Dewey Distinguished University Professor of Philosophy and Women's Studies; John Rawls Collegiate Professor; and Arthur F. Thurnau Professor at the University of Michigan.

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