Do All Persons Have Equal Moral Worth?: On 'Basic Equality' and Equal Respect and Concern

In present-day political and moral philosophy the idea that all persons are in some way moral equals is an almost universal premise, with its defenders often claiming that philosophical positions that reject the principle of equal respect and concern do not deserve to be taken seriously. This has led to relatively few attempts to clarify, or indeed justify, 'basic equality' and the principle of equal respect and concern.Such clarification and justification, however, would be direly needed. After all, the ideas, for instance, that Adolf Hitler and Nelson Mandela have equal moral worth, or that a rape victim owes equal respect and concern to both her rapist and to her own caring brother, seem to be utterly implausible. Thus, if someone insists on the truth of such ideas, he or she owes his or her audience an explanation. The authors in this volume-which breaks new ground by engaging egalitarians and anti-egalitarians in a genuine dialogue-attempt to shed light into the dark. They try to clarify the concepts of "basic equality", "equal moral worth","equal respect and concern", "dignity," etc; and they try to (partially) justify-or to refute-the resulting clarified doctrines. The volume thus demonstrates that the claim that all persons have equal moral worth, are owed equal concern and respect, or have the same rights is anything but obvious. This finding has not only significant philosophical but also political implications.

Table of Contents:
1: Christopher Nathan: What is basic equality? 2: George Sher: Why we are moral equals 3: Richard Arneson: Basic equality: neither acceptable nor rejectable 4: Thomas Christiano: Rationality, equal status, and egalitarianism 5: Héctor Wittwer: The irrelevance of the concept of worth to the debate between egalitarianism and non-egalitarianism 6: Jan Narveson: Equality, universality, and impartiality-how they work and why they matter 7: Stefan Gosepath: On the (re)construction and basic concepts of the morality of equal respect 8: Uwe Steinhoff: Against equal respect and concern, equal rights, and egalitarian impartiality 9: Jiwei Ci: Do liberal egalitarians really believe in equality given their commitment to equality of opportunity?

About the Author :
Uwe Steinhoff, is Associate Professor at the Department of Politics and Public Administration, University of Hong Kong, and Senior Research Associate in the University of Oxford Changing Character of War Programme. He is the author of the four books Effiziente Ethik, On the Ethics of War and Terrorism, The Philosophy of Jürgen Habermas, and On the Ethics of Torture, as well as of articles on ethics, political philosophy, epistemology, and postmodernism.

Review :
Written and edited by experts, this volume shows that not all persons have equal moral standing and that a question "Do all human beings have equal moral worth?" is important and relevant to moral philosophy. It shows that the doctrine of equal moral worth, equal moral status, equal respect and concern, and equal rights must not simply be accepted as axioms. They are in need of defense and legitimate targets of attacks.