Intergenerational Justice

Intergenerational Justice Name Course number Instructor’s name Date Introduction Intergenerational justice is often attributed to concerns about environmental hazards. There is growing fear that the future generations may have to survive in environmentally depleted situations with low standards of life. This is a concern about intergenerational equity whereby different generations require some degree of equity in environmental living conditions. Sustainable development has been cited as a solution for ensuring intergenerational equity. This is with the intention to bequeath a decent society to future generation (Dobson, 1999). Beckerman states that this understanding is inadequate because it lacks a feature about sustaining life itself because it only seeks seeking to maintain quality of life. Wilfred Beckerman argues that we should not accept sustainability or egalitarianism as ideals for our duties to future generations. (a) Why does he think we should reject these ideals? Beckerman states that equality is not the same as equity and that egalitarian principles are not the only possible kinds of equity. He states that the prevailing understanding of sustainable development is about sustaining improvement or maintenance. The prevailing standard definition of sustainable development involves maintaining welfare per head of population. This means that equity is only about achieving positive change in economic welfare per capita. Thus future generations must enjoy the same per capita welfare as enjoyed by the current generations and never a standard lower that that the current generation enjoy (Dobson, 1999). He states that we should reject these ideas because they have insufficient normative significance. One cannot argue that the present standard of living is the required minimum or subsistence level that when decreased would be unfit or harmful for future generations. He indicates that past generations were able in survive in lower standards of life and thus the central idea for sustainable development is about preventing successor generations from living in lower standards than those of previous generations. This is a rule that precludes any decline in welfare in any period rather that one about sustainability as many put it (Dobson, 1999). He argues that this rule is not egalitarian because it permits perpetual growth in welfare leading to a large divide between generations and is the epitome of inequality. The prevailing circumstances are the result of such growth. This rise in welfare from generation to generation is not egalitarian. Beckerman finds that sustainable development is in fact primarily concerned about total welfare rather than about appreciating or depreciating welfare. Intergenerational equality is focused on rising or constant welfare even when it may imply a lower cumulative total welfare.(b)What kind of ideal does he think we should replace them with, and why? He suggests that the ideal concern should be whether people have good lives. This is essential for the ideal of distributive justice where members of the present generation are willing to make sacrifices that may lower their current welfare for the sake of future generations. This is because the egalitarian condemnation of inequality loses much of its force when people consider those doing worse as doing rather well. The concern about whether people have good lives is driven by a need to establish a decent society where institutions do not humiliate people. The decent society should avoid policies that might condemn future generations to acute poverty. It should also be concerned about the people alive today. Sustainable development should not be focused upon the total welfare but rather about how it is distributed across generations. This is because sustainable development is not helpful in providing guidance to obligations towards future generations. It is inter-generationally egalitarian and its emphasis on ‘no decline in welfare’ is unjustified. It is non-egalitarian and unjustified because it focuses on increasing welfare even when this may imply a lower cumulative total welfare for future generations. Beckerman states that even when the ‘no decline in welfare’ aspect is removed from the sustainable development principle, generational equity is still unachieved. For instance, it cannot be argued that greater inter-generational equality of incomes would promote intergenerational harmony. Additionally, great differences in wealth and income promote the divide between the rich and poor leading to unacceptable inequalities of liberty between them. Hence, this would not be a feasible way on ...