What, if anything, do we owe others as a basic minimum? Sufficiency theorists claim that we must provide everyone with enough – but, to date, few well-worked out accounts of the sufficiency threshold exist, so it is difficult to evaluate this proposition. Previous theories do little more than gesture towards independent accounts of resources, capabilities, or welfare that might play the requisite role (Nussbaum, Reference Nussbaum2000; Nickel, Reference Nickel2007; Haybron, Reference Haybron2008; Brock, Reference Brock2009; Hassoun, Reference Hassoun2009; Segall, Reference Segall2014; Huseby, Reference Huseby2020). Moreover, I believe existing accounts do not provide nearly enough guidance for policymakers (Huseby, Reference Huseby2010; Nielsen, Reference Nielsen2016; Herlitz, Reference Herlitz2018). If sufficiency theory's positive thesis is defensible, if justice requires helping everyone secure a basic minimum, what does that require? This article sketches a mechanism for arriving at an account of the minimally good life that can help locate a plausible sufficiency threshold – one that might inform theories about what members of just societies owe to each other as a basic minimum (Haybron, Reference Haybron2007; Tiberius, Reference Tiberius2008; Angner, Reference Angner, Davis and Wade Hands2011). Doing so does not, on its own, establish that justice requires this much, nor is this account intended to support the thesis that we do not owe each other more than this – sufficiency theory's negative thesis (though that may be so). Rather, on the assumption that we do owe each other some basic minimum, this article attempts to locate a plausible answer to what this might require.
More precisely, this article aims to provide an account that, unlike previous proposals, fulfills two desiderata. First, it is minimal enough to secure wide agreement from those who endorse different theories about what social justice requires (but who also endorse the idea that some minimum is necessary) without sacrificing plausibility.Footnote 1 I will suppose that an adequate account could not require, for instance, that people have everything that they might benefit from, nor should it require sacrificing things of greater importance to ensure that people secure a basic minimum. Second, I hope to provide a standard sufficiently robust so that there is no reason to seriously doubt that an individual who lives a minimally good life can secure a basic minimum. That is, I will suppose people should be able to live choiceworthy lives and have some things that make their lives good for them, but that they require more than this to secure a basic minimum. Those who commit suicide for good causes may live choiceworthy lives, for instance, but I will suppose it is not enough to provide people only with that opportunity (Rawls, Reference Rawls1971; Braybrooke, Reference Braybrooke1987; Arneson, Reference Arneson1999; Arneson, Reference Arneson2006; Lin, Reference Lin2017a; Lin, Reference Lin2017b). I will argue that a few of the main proposals for a basic minimum in the literature fail to satisfy one or both of these desiderata. Further research is necessary to defend this account of the basic minimum against other capability, opportunity, resourcist, needs, and welfarist alternatives (Sen, Reference Sen and McMurrin1980; Brock, Reference Brock1998; Dworkin, Reference Dworkin2000; Nussbaum, Reference Nussbaum2011).
The minimally good life
Although I will unpack each of the conditions in my account below, it can be summarized this way: To live minimally good lives, people need (1) an adequate range of the (2) fundamental conditions for (3) securing those (4) relationships, pleasures, knowledge, appreciation, and worthwhile activities and so forth that (5) a reasonable and caring person free from coercion and constraint would set as a minimal standard of justifiable aspiration.
I will defend this account of the minimally good life, in part, by arguing that each condition is plausible on its own and explaining why employing this mechanism for arriving at an account of the basic minimum is important for respecting each person's fundamental moral equality. We must only set standards for others under which we would be content to live – exercising reasonable care in making this determination. Moreover, no one should be unjustifiably coerced or constrained in deciding whether a life qualifies as minimally good. That said, the full justification for the account is coherentist. What I will say about (1)–(4) can, ultimately, only be vindicated by (5). Similarly, if a free, reasonable, and caring person would not agree with what I say about (1)–(4), I also take that to be a mark against (5).
The first four conditions in the account
The claim that people only need an adequate range of the conditions for living minimally good lives suggests that the minimally good human life need not be perfect, but it should contain some things of value, pleasure, and significance. On the other hand, a human life may not be minimally good even if it has many of these things in it. A minimally good life must be doubtlessly worth living, not just endurable. The adequacy thresholds for securing the things that make lives minimally good must be set so that the life is well worth living – a life at the lowest level of flourishing.
The fundamental conditions (resources, capacities, and institutions) for living a minimally good life include conditions that are necessary and jointly sufficient for securing the things that make lives minimally good (relationships, pleasures, knowledge, appreciation, and worthwhile activities etc.). Things are necessary for living a minimally good life when one cannot live such a life without them. When one has all the conditions necessary to secure the things that make one's life minimally good, the conditions together are jointly sufficient for such a life. One needs some conditions that are merely important for living minimally well – that make a central contribution to individuals’ ability to live such lives or are characteristic of them without being strictly necessary on their own for doing so – because it is not enough if people only have one difficult path available for securing the things that make their lives minimally good (Nussbaum, Reference Nussbaum2000).Footnote 2 At least for one's access to the things one needs to live minimally well to be secure, one requires an adequate range of decent options. I say people need access to the conditions for securing a minimally good life (and not just the things that let them live minimally well) to give enough content to the account for policymakers to implement it: policymakers must provide people with resources like clean water and adequate food, for instance, even when those resources are not of ultimate importance.
Many things are fundamental conditions for a minimally good life. People require resources, capacities, and institutional structures amongst other things (Liao, Reference Liao, Cruft, Matthew Liao and Renzo2015). Everyone needs adequate food and water and most require some amount of education, shelter, social and emotional goods and other resources. Furthermore, people must secure basic capacities, liberty, and autonomy (Griffin, Reference Griffin1986; Kraut, Reference Kraut1994). Everyone should have the ability to think and connect with other people, understand and embrace things of value, and develop skills (Arneson, Reference Arneson1999; Nussbaum, Reference Nussbaum2000; Dorsey, Reference Dorsey2012). People require social and institutional structures to develop their capacities and secure the things that make lives minimally good. In short, everyone requires the internal and external, natural and social, conditions for securing these things.
One's access to the things that make lives minimally good is secure when it is, normally, not too difficult for one to attain them and one is not at great risk of losing this access. To be secure, one's attainment of some of the things necessary for living a minimally good life cannot come at the cost of attaining other things on the list. Although people may live well enough for some time without access to some of the conditions that are only important (and on their own not strictly necessary) for living minimally well, losing access to enough of these things typically undermines individuals’ ability to live minimally well. Those living close to the poverty line without adequate health insurance or welfare provisions can, for instance, easily lose the things they need to live minimally well and this insecurity itself can undermine their ability to live well enough.
Finally, many things may make lives minimally good including relationships, pleasure, knowledge, appreciation, and worthwhile activities (Griffin, Reference Griffin1986; Arneson, Reference Arneson1999; Tiberius, Reference Tiberius2008). Although I cannot hope to give a full account of each of these things here, briefly consider why this is so. Worthwhile activities often give people a sense of the meaning essential for a minimally good human existence. Usually, people need to be able to choose from more than one thing worth doing to exercise sufficient autonomy to live well enough and most value making some contribution through their life's work. Similarly, both small and great pleasures contribute to our ability to live minimally well. They give our lives variety and interest. Those whose lives are devoid of pleasure are usually severely depressed and may lack the desires necessary to engage fruitfully with others and the world. Aesthetic appreciation and deep knowledge and understanding typically contribute to individuals’ ability to live well. But even if people can live well enough without either, some kinds of knowledge and appreciation are necessary. At least an elementary education (and usually much more than that), and the ability to appreciate what one needs to survive and flourish, are prerequisites for most to live well enough. Moreover, most people find close personal relationships add great value to their lives and those without friends or family may find it hard to live minimally well (especially if they lose these relationships early). This list is not exhaustive. Severe forms of discrimination can also undermine individuals’ ability to minimally good lives, for instance (Sen, Reference Sen1999). Protecting individuals’ ability to live minimally well safeguards their basic moral status or dignity (Tasioulas, Reference Tasioulas and McCrudden2013; Killmister, Reference Killmister2017).
To some extent, what is necessary for people to live minimally good lives is determined by historical circumstance. As Adam Smith pointed out, in some societies people need a linen shirt to take part in public life (Smith, 1776/Reference Smith1904; Chase and Bantebya-Kyomuhendo, Reference Chase and Bantebya-Kyomuhendo2014). Food and other resources have to be culturally appropriate (Sen, Reference Sen1999). Some people are so committed to particular cultural practices, ways of life, or societies that they can only flourish within them. Other people require opportunities or resources that are not available when, or where, they live but that they might foreseeably secure in the future.
People can be mistaken about what is necessary for a minimally good life (Sen, Reference Sen and McMurrin1980; Sen, Reference Sen1999; Haybron, Reference Haybron2007; Haybron, Reference Haybron2008). While it matters that people fulfill some important desires, some things contribute to a person's flourishing for other reasons. There is a difference between matters of preference and urgency.Footnote 3 We can be surprised to find things that make our lives go better (Haybron, Reference Haybron2007; Haybron, Reference Haybron2008).
The justifiable aspiration standard
Before explaining how we can figure out to what people can justifiably aspire and how I understand the things that make a life minimally good in more detail, it is important to distinguish between what people need to live the kind of minimally good lives at issue and the much lower standard applicable for reasonably affirming that even some of the most severely disadvantaged live minimally good lives. This article is concerned with what will enable people to live minimally good lives in what Dan Haybron calls a “justified aspiration” sense; this is a standard that everyone should get as close as possible to securing (Haybron, Reference Haybron2013, ch. 8). Note that the phrase “justifiable aspiration” is used here in a purely technical sense – we would normally say people can justifiably aspire to securing significantly more than a basic minimum; here we are concerned with what standard everyone should get as close as possible to securing. When someone does not reach this standard, however, we can sometimes still “reasonably affirm” that the person lives a minimally good life given the constraints of possibility (Haybron, Reference Haybron2013, ch. 8). Even some of the most severely mentally and physically disabled people live minimally good lives in this “reasonable affirmation” sense (Kittay Reference Kittay2005). But it is the “justifiable aspiration” sense of the minimally good life that is at issue here.Footnote 4
We can get a sense of what will make lives minimally good in the “justified aspiration” sense – what a reasonable and caring person free from coercion and constraint would set as a minimal standard of justifiable aspiration – by considering what someone about whom we know little will need for a life at the lowest level of flourishing.Footnote 5 The person's difficulties, pains, losses, and frustrations must be sufficiently compensated for by relationships, pleasures, and worthwhile activities that one would not seriously doubt their ability to satisfactorily live it. Moreover, at any point in time, this must be the case for their life to reach the threshold for a minimally good one. The question is not whether any given individual would trade her current life for a minimally good one – many fortunate individuals would not. Rather, it is whether there are any serious reasons to doubt that the life could be well-lived.
Consider what makes people reasonable, caring, and free from coercion and constraint. To be reasonable, people must be committed to seeing other people as free and equal (Rawls, Reference Rawls1971; Rawls, Reference Rawls1980). Reasonable people want to live with other people on mutually agreeable, fair terms and will sometimes sacrifice their own interests to do so (Rawls, Reference Rawls1971). Other people's legitimate interests – both the interests these people recognize and the interests they do not – move those who care about them (Nussbaum, Reference Nussbaum2006). Caring people want, and are inclined to act, to promote other people's interests in proportion to their weight. Finally, people are free from coercion and constraint when they have some internal and external freedom; they can reason about, make, and carry out their own plans and they have decent options and bargaining power (Raz, Reference Raz1986; Hassoun, Reference Hassoun2011; Hassoun, Reference Hassoun2012).
Consider, then, how reasonable and caring people free from coercion and constraint would reason about the standard necessary for living a minimally good life. As John Rawls suggests, reasonable people would not set a standard for other people under which reasonable people themselves would not be content to live (Rawls, Reference Rawls1971; Rawls, Reference Rawls1980). The basic idea is simple: People should be content to bear the costs of living the “merely” minimally good lives the least fortunate will live when setting this standard. The question is not whether the person one is deciding for will be content, as, for example, that person's preferences may be adaptive.Footnote 6 Rather it is whether a reasonable, free, caring person would now (reflecting on, but not yet occupying, the person's life) be content to live that life. The reasonable, free, caring person must fully understand the other person's circumstances, psychology, and history in deciding whether they would be content to live as the other person (Frankfurt, Reference Frankfurt1988).Footnote 7
To see why reasonable, caring, free people would employ the preceding test, consider what (free) reasonable care requires.Footnote 8 Reasonable, caring, free people must try to fully understand emotionally, and otherwise, what it is like to live as other people do by appreciating other people's history as well as their current states. This is what Darwall calls “projective empathy” (Darwall, Reference Darwall2002, 61–62). When we empathize in this way, we share other people's feelings as their perspectives warrant (Darwall, Reference Darwall2002, 62). As Adam Smith put it: “in order to enter into your grief, I do not consider what I, a person of such a character and profession, should suffer, if I had a son, and if that son were unfortunately to die; but I consider what I would suffer if I were you, and I not only change circumstances with you, but I change persons and characters” (Smith, 1759/Reference Smith and Haakonssen2002, §371). Projective empathy is different from proto-sympathetic empathy, which is a version of the sympathetic concern Darwall endorses.Footnote 9 Proto-sympathetic empathy requires self-consciously reflecting on the state of the person with whom one is emphasizing (Darwall, Reference Darwall2002, 67). Reasonable, caring, free people will empathize with other people but then consider what is necessary to contentedly live other people's lives given others’ current states, not just how other people do, or might, feel about their states.
More generally, it is not enough to sympathize and have “a feeling or emotion that responds to some apparent obstacle to an individual's good and involves concern for him, and thus for his welfare, for his sake” (Darwall, Reference Darwall2002, 67). This is because sympathy is too impoverished along two dimensions. First: one needs to do more than care only how a person's life goes for her sake to determine whether she can reach a basic minimum; one must understand her life. If we are evaluating the life of a parent who has lost a child, we must properly focus on the loss of the child, not on how bad the parent feels, to understand that loss in her life. Second: one should care about more than how a person's life goes for her sake (or even what is choiceworthy from her perspective) when reflecting on what she needs to live a minimally good life; one should care about a person simpliciter. To see both points, consider a slightly different case where the child is seriously ill. If one focuses on how the parent feels, one may try to help her in a variety of ways. It may be good for her to have a break from caring for her child. But if one focuses on the ill child and knows what it is like to be a parent, one may know that for that person to live even a minimally good life, she cannot give her child up. What she needs to get as close as possible to living a minimally good life, if the child's recovery is impossible, may be a lot of assistance in caring for her child.Footnote 10 If we focus on what the parent experiences, we can give her experiences due weight, but we should care about more than what is good for someone when considering what makes her life minimally good.Footnote 11
Arguing for justifiable care in practice
Consider why the proposed mechanism for figuring out what people need to live a minimally good life is likely to issue plausible results. If I empathize with other people in the appropriate way when considering what they need to live minimally good lives, and am free from coercion and constraint, I will set a standard for other people under which I would be content to live as they will. If I am reasonable (appropriately impartial), I will not set for other people a standard under which I would not be content to live as they will. If I am caring, I will set a standard that I believe is sufficient for other people with those people's interests. If I am free from coercion and constraint and appropriately empathetic and have all the relevant information, I will set a standard that is sufficient for other people with those interests.Footnote 12
It is important that people employ the reasonable, caring, free standard because doing so is necessary to respect individuals’ fundamental moral equality. This is most evident in the reasonableness requirement: in thinking about what people need to live minimally well (in the justifiable aspiration sense) we must be reasonable because respect for individuals’ moral equality requires this kind of appropriate impartiality (Hassoun, Reference Hassoun2018; Hassoun, Reference Hassoun2020; Hassoun, forthcoming). But if we do not care for people as moral equals we may likewise fail to give their interests due weight – our equality is not merely formal but substantial. Moreover, I believe that our moral equality resides, at least in part, in our being free individuals who cannot be unjustifiably coerced or constrained (Locke, Reference Locke1689; Hassoun, Reference Hassoun2012; Hassoun, Reference Hassoun2020; Hassoun, forthcoming). So, coercion and constraint should not determine what qualifies as a good enough life for free (equal) individuals.
Since they are committed to respecting individuals’ moral equality, reasonable, caring, free people will be sensitive to the costs other people must bear of providing the standard they set, which is why reasonable people will be content with a minimally good (as opposed to extremely good or excellent) life. They might use a similar test to take the costs of provision into account, but the basic idea is just that they cannot make some slaves to others’ less significant interests.Footnote 13 Reasonable people have different degrees of willingness to bear significant costs and, because we are free and independent individuals, what costs we should be willing to bear to help others live even minimally well is a matter of some debate – so I will not suppose reasonableness requires any strong form of outcome egalitarianism in what follows (Rosati Reference Rosati1995).Footnote 14
Moreover, it is possible to specify (and limit) obligations to ensure people can live minimally good lives in a variety of ways. It may require vast resources to help people live minimally good lives on the proposed account (Fried, Reference Fried1976), but helping people live minimally well may not always trump other things that matter. On some sufficiency theories, it is acceptable to help many people above the threshold rather than help one person below it while, on others, we can help many far below the threshold get closer before helping fewer people close to the threshold rise above it (Hassoun, Reference Hassoun2009; Winderquist, Reference Winderquist2010; Knight, Reference Knight2015; Shields, Reference Shields2018). Sufficiency theories need only claim that there is a shift in the reasons we have for helping people once they reach the threshold (and it is plausible that we have especially weighty reasons to respect, protect, and help everyone live at least minimally well) (Shields, Reference Shields2018). Individuals can plausibly claim the proposed basic minimum when it is possible to help them live minimally good lives without violating other moral requirements even if ensuring that they can secure this much requires a lot (Segall, Reference Segall2014; Nielsen, Reference Nielsen2016).
People may use this article's mechanism to make moral progress in their particular (and limited) historical circumstances. It gives us some critical leverage on the limits we face, though sometimes there is no way someone can live a minimally good life in her world (though she should get as close as possible to living such a life). Because people can be more or less reasonable and caring or fail to freely occupy an appropriately impartial deliberative stance in a way that provides some space for reflection relatively free from framing effects, deliberation may be necessary to guard against unintentional biases and to figure out what is actually reasonable and caring in any particular case.Footnote 15
To make the case that the minimally good life account can help guide action, consider how reasonable, caring, free people might reason about three concrete cases. Suppose that some such policymakers are considering what someone in the Limpopo province of South Africa needs to live minimally well. They consider the life of a typical child who is sometimes food insecure, lacks adequate water and sanitation, and is at significant risk of being unable to attain more than an elementary education (De Cock et al., Reference De Cock, D'Haese, Vink, van Rooyen, Staelens, Schönfeldt and D'Haese2013; OECD, 2019; South African Government, 2020). The child and her family members are also likely to die young of AIDS or violence (Africa Check, Reference Check2019; World Bank, 2019; Avert, 2020). Even if the child is currently healthy, she almost certainly lacks secure access to the institutions, resources, and capabilities she needs to live a minimally good life. Reflecting on what she needs to maintain decent relationships, pleasures, knowledge, appreciation, and worthwhile activities, etc. can guide policymakers in trying to improve her life prospects.
Here is a harder case. Consider how a reasonable, caring, free person would evaluate the life of a fourteen-year-old Amish girl who loves her community and has been baptized into the Amish church, but decides she really wants to go to college. Even if the child is eventually able to flourish in the outside world, she may lose her community, which she values greatly. Since she will lack her family's support and information about the outside world, it will likely be hard for her leave. It may also be possible for her to successfully live within the Amish community but, fully understanding and empathizing with her, one could also see how this might be quite difficult. What can policymakers do to help? Perhaps not much besides finding ways to make the transition to the outside world easier for the girl if she decides she wants to leave the community.
Finally, consider a single parent of three children who lives in Colorado, has minimal savings, and loses his job when he gets hit by a car, develops a serious heart condition, and can no longer work. Can that parent continue to live minimally well? Can his children? Arguably, the parent will be at high risk of losing access to the relationships, pleasures, knowledge, appreciation, and worthwhile activities that make his life minimally good, not only because his disease, and its treatment, cause significant pain and may kill him young, but also because our social safety net is woefully inadequate. Medicaid and ObamaCare may provide some relief from medical costs, but it may be hard for him to get access to housing, and other benefits, and his family may not qualify. Furthermore, if the parent cannot provide for his children, they may be taken into foster care – notorious in the United States for providing inconsistent care that can also threaten children's ability to live minimally well (Finkelstein et al., Reference Finkelstein, Wamsley and Miranda2002; Wertheimer, Reference Wertheimer2002; U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, 2016).
Understanding what it is like to live in a South African township, an Amish community, and as a poor sick person in Colorado is essential for resolving any disagreements about whether these people can live minimally well. I believe that if reasonable, caring, free people put themselves in the relevant other's shoes and consider what they would need to live minimally well as that person, they will think more clearly about what minimally good lives really require. Discussion and further inquiry into what it is really like to live as others do can help resolve remaining disagreements.
The advantages of the account
The account sketched above fulfills the desiderata with which this article began. First, it provides a minimal standard; it lets us bracket many important disagreements about what social justice requires in providing a standard on which we can secure broad agreement. It does not require people to have everything that they might choose, for instance. On the account, people only need an adequate range of the things that let them live minimally good lives; they do not need everything from which they could benefit. People only require all the things that are necessary and important for living a minimally good life. Second, it provides a sufficient standard. It ensures that everyone can live a choiceworthy life and one in which they have enough of the things that make their lives good for them. The standard ensures that people can doubtlessly live well. To live a minimally good life, people need to function well and have some resources (as well as capabilities) even if they choose to sacrifice the things they have in order to secure other ends.
I believe this account provides a plausible basis for what we owe to other people as a basic minimum – though, again, it is only a useful tool for cashing out a theory of social justice and cannot on its own resolve any debates between these theories. Consider what a theory on which we must only ensure everyone can live a minimally good life entails (just to illustrate one way the account may be used). On the one hand, this theory is not compatible with libertarianism or even pure luck egalitarianism, because the theory suggests we must help even the irresponsible live such lives, at least when it is not too costly.Footnote 16 However, it leaves a great deal of room for personal responsibility (and in some respects much more than, say, luck egalitarianism) (Fleurbaey, Reference Fleurbaey1995; Fleurbaey, Reference Fleurbaey2008). On the other hand, this theory does not permit us to enforce complete equality or even democratic socialism; as long as everyone can live a minimally good life, the affluent are free to devote the rest of their resources elsewhere.
Those who have different perspectives on personal responsibility, freedom, equality, and permissible paternalism that yield different theories of social justice, however, can also use this article's account of the minimally good life (Lippert-Rasmussen, Reference Lippert-Rasmussen2015). Luck egalitarians and others who reject sufficiency theory might say we must only ensure people can live minimally good lives when they act responsibly, and insofar as doing so does not undermine individual freedom or require paternalism (Dworkin, Reference Dworkin2000; Nussbaum, Reference Nussbaum2011). On the other hand, perhaps we must ensure that people live minimally good lives and provide them with much more (Arneson, Reference Arneson2006; Goodin, Reference Goodin2010).Footnote 17 Pluralist egalitarianism remains a promising possibility. It is also possible to introduce different thresholds to say, for instance, that we should help everyone live a minimally good life before helping other people secure more than this (Casal, Reference Casal2007). This article has not attempted to resolve any of these debates but, rather, provides an account of the minimally good life that can play such roles.
However we resolve debates about exactly how a basic minimum should fit into an account of what we owe to other people, I believe this article's account of the minimally good life has some advantages over the other well-worked out accounts of what a basic minimum requires in the literature (Nussbaum, Reference Nussbaum2000; Dorsey, Reference Dorsey2012; Sher, Reference Sher2014; Liao Reference Liao, Cruft, Matthew Liao and Renzo2015). I focus here only on three – Matthew Liao's account of the minimally good life, Martha Nussbaum's capability theory, and Dale Dorsey's proposal for a basic minimum. I will argue that these accounts fail to provide some of the things people plausibly need to secure a basic minimum (they are not sufficient) and, moreover, that Nussbaum's and Dorsey's require we provide people with things that most will agree they do not require to do so (so they are not minimal).
As Rowan Cruft helpfully summarizes Matthew Liao's view, it focuses on what “human beings qua human beings need in order to . . . pursue . . . basic activities” (Cruft, Reference Cruft, Cruft, Matthew Liao and Renzo2015, 103). These activities affect individuals’ lives as a whole and improve the quality of our lives qua human beings – that is, they are things that typically improve humans’ quality of life (Liao, Reference Liao, Cruft, Matthew Liao and Renzo2015, 6). Some examples include “deep personal relationships with, e.g., one's partner, friends, parents, children; knowledge of, e.g., the workings of the world, of oneself, of others; active pleasures such as creative work and play; and passive pleasures such as appreciating beauty” (Liao, Reference Liao, Cruft, Matthew Liao and Renzo2015, 7). One does not need virtue or excellence to live a (minimally) good life on Liao's account but requires “various goods, capacities, and options that human beings qua human beings need” (Liao, Reference Liao, Cruft, Matthew Liao and Renzo2015, 8). Some of these fundamental conditions may only be necessary for securing some of the basic activities, but he specifies that everyone needs all of them. Moreover, Liao says people should have “an adequate range of fundamental goods, capacities and options so that they can pursue those basic activities that are characteristic of a minimally decent human life” (Liao, Reference Liao, Cruft, Matthew Liao and Renzo2015, 8). He does not propose the reasonable, caring, free, person standard for figuring out what the minimally good life requires.
I reject the idea that people can secure the basic minimum because they have what people typically need for a good life on Liao's account if they need more to pursue basic activities and secure the other things that make their lives minimally good. Individuals may have idiosyncratic needs, for particular kinds of health care or social conditions.Footnote 18 Further, contra Liao, it is not enough if people are only able to pursue the things that make their lives minimally good (he does not take pursuit to require success) (Liao, Reference Liao, Cruft, Matthew Liao and Renzo2015). People must be able to secure these things to have a basic minimum. Moreover, normally, people must find it easy enough to do so. Furthermore, we should care about much more than basic activities – though Liao says that these can include passive as well as active pleasures, good relationships, and knowledge (Liao, Reference Liao, Cruft, Matthew Liao and Renzo2015). As capability theorists point out, we should care about what individuals can be as well as what they can do. Finally, some things contribute to individuals’ ability to secure a basic minimum that do not, on their own, impact individuals’ lives as wholes. Many small pleasures together can enhance life's quality even if none do so alone. While Liao and I probably agree about the first and second conditions in my account of a minimally good life, we disagree about the third through fifth.
Perhaps, however, it is better to say that people require basic capabilities to secure a basic minimum, rather than specifying that they can only do so when they have whatever will enable them to live minimally good lives? Note, first, that my account of the basic minimum is a capability theory if one specifies that people must only be able to live minimally good lives. One might argue that ensuring people actually live minimally good lives is too paternalistic; we must only ensure that people are capable of living such lives. Note, though, that even ensuring basic capabilities may be paternalistic; we may have to tax people to ensure that they secure these capabilities (Dorsey, Reference Dorsey2012; Wolff and de-Shalit, Reference Wolff and de-Shalit2013). Moreover, I believe we should sometimes help people live minimally well even when this requires providing for them things they could provide for themselves (were they making better choices), at least as long as they do not reject our help.
Be that as it may, however, I believe the minimally good life account has an advantage over at least the best-known capability theories because it better allows for individual differences and has a more expansive ground (Nussbaum, Reference Nussbaum2006; Venkatapuram, 2011; Ruger, Reference Ruger2016). For instance, Nussbaum says a “fully human” life must include sufficient sensation, imagination, emotion, thought, health, affiliation, play, bodily integrity, practical reason, connection with other species, and control over one's environment as well as life (Nussbaum, Reference Nussbaum2000, 71). Not everyone needs everything on this list to secure a basic minimum. Some people hate nature (and only desire to connect with animals and plants at meal times); many of these people can secure a basic minimum even if they are not capable of connecting with other species and even if they lack effective access to nature conceived more broadly. It is hard to see why these people must have the opportunity to access nature if they do not value doing so at all and will never come to value nature. Others may need specific capabilities to secure a basic minimum that are not on Nussbaum's list. Some may require the capability to be a part of a particular religious community, for instance, and not just some kind of affiliation. So, Nussbaum and I disagree about what people need to live minimally well under (4) (and the conditions under (2) which I suggest go well beyond capabilities themselves).Footnote 19
Alternately, consider Dale Dorsey's view in The Basic Minimum: A Welfarist Approach. Dorsey adopts a view much like the one Joseph Raz defends in Morality as Freedom (Raz, Reference Raz1986, 308–09). On this account, to fare minimally well, people need success in valued projects. These projects are “global”; they are long-term goals that help unify people's lives (Dorsey, Reference Dorsey2012, 39–41).Footnote 20 To avoid endorsing problematic adaptive preferences, Dorsey says we should make sure individuals would still endorse their projects if their preferences were coherent and complete (Dorsey, Reference Dorsey2012, 89). This view is sensitive to differences between individuals in a way that Liao's view is not (Dorsey, Reference Dorsey2012, 10). Different people have different values and can succeed in different projects. This is an advantage of Dorsey's account over Liao's and many other accounts of what we owe people as a basic minimum as well.
Still, we should reject Dorsey's view both because it does not guarantee enough for some and because it may provide other people with too much. Individuals’ values (and life plans) matter, but they are not all that matter. It is not enough to help people satisfy complete coherent preferences that constitute unifying life plans on my account if, for instance, they completely and coherently adapt to a bad situation.Footnote 21 A horribly abused woman who only wants to live with her abuser does not plausibly live a minimally good life (even if she has completely and coherently adapted to her situation). Moreover, people in dire poverty do not live minimally good lives, though Dorsey's account wrongly suggests that they do as long as they can sustain and value their global, unifying projects (Dorsey, Reference Dorsey2012). Even some of the sickest, poorest, and most disadvantaged among us are able to fulfill their global unifying plans. Furthermore, Dorsey and I disagree about my condition (4). On my account, we much more plausibly have to provide the impoverished with the health care, education, food, water and shelter as well as opportunities and capabilities necessary to contentedly live life in their shoes. At the same time, we do not have to provide everyone with whatever they need to have the kind of unifying plan that Dorsey thinks the basic minimum requires if people can live minimally good lives without such plans. Suppose someone with very expensive tastes requires nearly the whole of their country's gross domestic product to achieve their life's goals. I do not think that means they should get such assistance at all, never mind as part of the basic minimum.
Consider a concrete example. In Valuing Freedom, Sabina Alkire describes an aid project to help poor villagers improve their livelihood. The aid agency presented two options: growing vegetables for export or roses to sell for decorating shrines. The women chose the roses because this option supported one of their valued life projects – it helped them honor their gods (Alkire, Reference Alkire2002). Alkire rightly believes that we should help people live lives they value. But, at the same time, this project's value went beyond giving the women meaningful work. It also helped them feed their families, send their children to school, secure basic health care, and so forth. Sometimes helping people honor their gods is a good way of helping them secure a basic minimum. Sometimes it is the only effective way of doing so. But, if the roses did not help the women improve their livelihoods, the women should still be able to secure adequate food, water, shelter, and so forth. We should help people live minimally good lives even if that does not help them carry out their life projects. What we owe people as a basic minimum should be sensitive to individuals’ preferences in some ways but cannot be completely determined by them.
There are many other possible accounts of the basic minimum that might inform theories of what we owe to other people and I do not have the space here to consider other possibilities. Still, I have said enough to illustrate some common ways in which accounts can fail; few may be both minimal and sufficient.
Conclusion
This article's account of the minimally good life provides a plausible standard for what we owe to other people as a basic minimum. The account has some advantages over the main alternatives. It plausibly provides a minimum sufficient for informing theories of human rights or global justice (Nussbaum, Reference Nussbaum2000; Nickel, Reference Nickel2007; Brock, Reference Brock2009; Hassoun, Reference Hassoun2013; Liao, Reference Liao, Cruft, Matthew Liao and Renzo2015). Moreover, those with different perspectives on what we owe to other people can draw on the account. Individuals’ claims might be limited, for instance, if their demands are so onerous that something more morally significant will be lost in the process. Still, providing a plausible minimal standard is very important. Understanding what we owe people as a basic minimum may help guide efforts, and shape policies, to better fulfill everyone's claims. As researchers articulate substantive standards for a basic minimum using the mechanism the account provides, it can open the door to new empirical work on the factors that contribute to minimally good lives and how this conception relates to other accounts of good lives, well-being, and happiness (Graham, Reference Graham2009; Kahneman and Deaton, Reference Kahneman and Deaton2010).Footnote 22 Together this work may help us design institutions and policies that better enable people to live minimally good lives.Footnote 23
The author has no competing interests to declare.
