more from this thinker | more from this text
Full Idea
Political choices can be made by the utility principles (maximising total utility), or maximin (maximising for the worst off, a view for pessimists), or maximax (not serious, but one for optimists, being unequal, and aiming for a high maximum).
Gist of Idea
Political choice can be by utility, or maximin, or maximax
Source
Jonathan Wolff (An Introduction to Political Philosophy (Rev) [2006], 5 'Choosing')
Book Ref
Wolff,Jonathan: 'An Introduction to Political Philosophy (Rev)' [OUP 2006], p.162
A Reaction
[my summary of a page of Wolff] Rawls embodies the maximin view. Wolff implies that we must choose between utilitarianism and Rawls. Would Marxists endorse maximin? He also adds 'constrained maximisation', with a safety net.
21384 | The Stoics saw the whole world as a city [Stoic school, by Long] |
20859 | The best government blends democracy, monarchy and aristocracy [Stoic school, by Diog. Laertius] |
23830 | A group is only dangerous if it endorses an abstract entity [Weil] |
15664 | Ideology is 'socially necessary illusion' or 'socially necessary false-consciousness' [Adorno, by Finlayson] |
23955 | Ideologies are mythologies which guide our actions [Solomon] |
21906 | Political theory should not focus on the state or economy, but on the small scale of power [Deleuze/Guattari, by May] |
23424 | An ideology judges things now, and offers an ideal, with a strategy for reaching it [Dobson] |
22851 | In the 1950s they said ideology is finished, and expertise takes over [Lukes] |
20530 | Political choice can be by utility, or maximin, or maximax [Wolff,J] |
21118 | Constitutional Patriotism unites around political values (rather than national identity) [Shorten] |