BOUNDS OF JUSTICE ONORA O’NEILL CAMBRIDGE UNIVERSITY PRESS BOUNDS OF JUSTICE In this collection of essays Onora O’Neill explores and argues for an account of justice that is fundamentally cosmopolitan rather than civic,yet takes serious account of institutions and boundaries, and of human diversity and vulnerability. Starting from concep- tions that are central to any account of justice – those of reason, action,judgement,coercion,obligations and rights – she discusses whether and how culturally or politically speciWc concepts and views,which limit the claims and scope of justice,can be avoided. She then examines the demands and scope of just institutions, arguing that there are good reasons for taking the claims of distant strangers seriously,but that doing so points not to a world without boundaries but to one of porous boundaries and dispersed power. Bounds of Justice will be of interest to a wide range of readers in philosophy,politics and international relations. onora o’neill is Principal of Newnham College, Cambridge. She has written widely on ethics and political philosophy, and her most recent books include Constructions of Reason: Explorations of Kant’s Practical Philosophy (Cambridge University Press, 1989) and Towards Justice and Virtue: A Constructive Account of Practical Reasoning (Cambridge University Press,1996). This page intentionally left blank BOUNDS OF JUSTICE ONORA O’NEILL Newnham College,Cambridge PUBLISHED BY CAMBRIDGE UNIVERSITY PRESS (VIRTUAL PUBLISHING) FOR AND ON BEHALF OF THE PRESS SYNDICATE OF THE UNIVERSITY OF CAMBRIDGE The Pitt Building, Trumpington Street, Cambridge CB2 IRP 40 West 20th Street, New York, NY 10011-4211, USA 477 Williamstown Road, Port Melbourne, VIC 3207, Australia http://www.cambridge.org © Cambridge University Press 2000 This edition © Cambridge University Press (Virtual Publishing) 2003 First published in printed format 2000 A catalogue record for the original printed book is available from the British Library and from the Library of Congress Original ISBN 0 521 44232 X hardback Original ISBN 0 521 44744 5 paperback ISBN 0 511 00989 5 virtual (netLibrary Edition) For Martin Hollis 1939 1998 – with happy memories of good conversations about reason, justice and everything else This page intentionally left blank Contents Preface page ix Introduction 1 part i: philosophical bounds of justice 11 Four models of practical reasoning 11 12 Agency and autonomy 29 13 Principles, practical judgement and institutions 50 14 Kant’s justice and Kantian justice 65 15 Which are the oVers you can’t refuse? 81 16 Women’s rights: whose obligations? 97 part ii: political bounds of justice 17 Transnational economic justice 115 18 Justice, gender and international boundaries 143 19 Identities, boundaries and states 168 10 Distant strangers, moral standing and porous boundaries 186 Bibliography 203 Index 214 vii This page intentionally left blank Preface I hardly know where to begin in stating my debts and my gratitude to those who have helped with this work. Throughout the 1990s I was helped by numerous audiences,colleagues,pupils and friends.A long list of names would trivialize what I owe in an enterprise that is necessarily in many ways collective. All I can do is to state my warm thanks. The dedication calls to mind one particular,long-standing and much-missed philosophical conversation and friendship from which I constantly learnt. ix