Introduction

We are living in a world with unpreceded affluence, and yet each day, more than a billion people
are struggling to meet their most basic needs such as nutrition, health care, shelter, and clean
water. Is this a problem of justice? Distributive justice, in its broadest sense, is about how
benefits and burdens ought to be distributed among a set of individuals as a matter of right and
entitlement. Political philosophers have traditionally assumed that principles of distributive
justice apply only within the bounds of a given political community. A prominent example of this
is perhaps John Rawls’s A Theory of Justice (1999A). A much-cited quotation from Michael
Walzer’s Spheres of Justice reads as follows: “the idea of distributive justice presupposes a
bounded world within which distributions take place: a group of people committed to dividing,
exchanging and sharing goods, first of all among themselves” (1983, p. 31). However, this
assumption—that the scope of distributive justice should be confined to the state—has been
rigorously challenged by many other political philosophers in recent years. This article surveys
the recent work on global distributive justice. It focuses on a number of debates among
contemporary political philosophers in response to current distribution of wealth and resources
in our world.

It is not surprising that many have doubted the relevance of global distributive justice or
considered it a subject too idealistic to be taken seriously in international politics. A realist, for
example, is likely to dismiss any attempt to further global distributive justice as a futile pursuit or
view it as a pretext for advancing certain political agenda. Realism is an influential approach in
the study of international relations and it is skeptical about global distributive justice for three
reasons. First, realism typically holds a pessimistic account of human nature. Hans J.
Morgenthau (1978, pp. 4–5) famously grounds his theory of international politics on human
nature and maintains that political actions are dominated not by any ethical ideal but the pursuit
of “interest defined as power.” An influential British realist and diplomat, E. H. Carr (1939, pp.
63–88), also warns that moral ideals and universal goods have been routinely abused as a
mere thin veil for the advancement of national interests. Second, skepticism about global
distributive justice can be grounded in its view on the international system. For realism, the
international system is “anarchy,” and there is no central agent that can enforce rules of
distributive justice (Waltz, 1959, 1978). Finally, realists are very much aware of the tension
between successful political actions and moral ideals. For realists, the task of political leaders in
formulating their foreign policies is not to further any abstract moral ideal, such as global
distributive justice, but the advancement of the national interest of their state
(Morgenthau, 1978, pp. 10–11; Kennan, 1954). Nonetheless, one must be cautious about the
actual implications of these realist theories on global distributive justice. First, these realist
theories focus on explaining international affairs. Although some realists like Morgenthau did
comment on how a state should conduct their foreign policies, the primary focus of these
theories is empirical and explanatory rather than normative or moral. Thus, the realist
perspective can at most show the infeasibility or improbability of achieving distributive justice in
the global realm but it does not undermine the moral desirability of such an ideal. Moreover, the
realist misgiving about the hypocrisy in international politics, while justified, does not imply that
moral ideals are irrelevant in the global context. Instead, it only suggests that people should be
more cautious in interpreting the words and deeds of states and other organizations. In short,
global distributive justice is a pressing issue in the contemporary world and no one who takes
international affairs seriously can ignore it.

Poverty at Home and Abroad: Are They “My” Poor?

The current situation of global poverty is morally shocking: 1.2 billion people live on less than
$1.25 a day. In developing countries (where 92 % of the world’s children live), 7 in 100 will not
survive beyond the age of 5 and 25 will live in poverty. Nearly 156 million children are stunted
as a result of malnutrition and infection (UNDP, 2014).The gravity of the problem of global
poverty has prompted many moral or political philosophers to think that the current distribution
of resources, which has left so many lives in peril, is seriously unjust. However, they disagree
strongly about the moral relevance of political boundaries to people’s duties and entitlements.
One of the key debates in global distributive justice is the debate between cosmopolitans, who
reject the moral relevance of political boundaries, and particularistic theorists, who take
seriously the moral implications of group memberships and special ties.

Cosmopolitanism
In his landmark essay, “Famine, Affluence, and Morality,” Peter Singer (1972, p. 231; 2009, p.
3) invites us to consider a hypothetical situation in which one is walking pass a shallow pond
and sees a child drowning in it when no one else is around. Most people would conclude that, in
this situation, one has an obligation to wade in the pond and pull the child out, even if it means
getting one’s clothes muddy or being late for work. Singer then seeks to apply this intuition to
the case of global poverty and argues that physical proximity and distance makes no moral
difference. He further argues that there is no impartial justification for giving preference to the
interests of one’s fellow countrymen when one can prevent great sufferings of the poor abroad
with little cost to oneself (Singer, 2002, pp. 167–180). This position on global distributive justice
is known as cosmopolitanism. Cosmopolitanism can be traced back to the stoics of ancient
Greece, who refused to define themselves in terms of their native city-state. Its central idea is
that each individual is a “citizen of the world” whose allegiance is to the worldwide community of
human beings (Nussbaum, 1996, pp. 4–7; Appiah, 2006). When determining the scope of
distributive justice, cosmopolitanism maintains that principles of distributive justice must be
global, not merely domestic.

Thomas Pogge suggests that there are three elements of cosmopolitanism. The first
is individualism: the ultimate units of concern are human beings, or persons—collectives may be
units of indirect concern in virtue of the well-being of their individual members. The second
is universality: the status of ultimate unit of concern attaches to every living human being
equally without discrimination on the basis of their group membership. In the third, generality,
persons are ultimate units of concern for everyone else (Pogge, 1994; 2002, p. 169; 2007B).

There are some points to note about cosmopolitanism. First, this form of cosmopolitanism is
primarily about obligations and the scope of distributive justice and it is different
from cultural cosmopolitanism, which maintains that one could live a meaningful and flourishing
life without identifying oneself with a particular cultural group whose boundaries are reasonably
clear (Scheffler, 1999). Second, not all cosmopolitans reject the idea of giving special attention
to one’s compatriots over foreigners, but the reason for so doing must be derivative. Martha
Nussbaum (1996, p. 135), in replying to her critics, suggests that sometimes “it is right to give
the local an additional measure of concern” not because the local is more important per se but
doing so is “the only sensible way to do good.” Robert Goodin (1988) also argues that
assigning special duties for particular people, such as one’s fellow countrymen, is justified
because it is, in many cases, a more effective way to fulfill general duties that everyone has
toward everyone else worldwide.

Ethical Particularism
A number of political philosophers have defended a form of ethical particularism that holds that
members of a political society owe to one another some special obligations of justice that they
do not owe to nonmembers.

The most prominent form of this ethical particularism is perhaps nationalism. Although
contemporary nationalists do not necessarily reject global principles of distributive justice
altogether, they contend that one has special obligations of distributive justice to one’s fellow
nationals. But what is a nation? David Miller (1995, p. 27; 2007, pp. 124–127), a leading
contemporary nationalist, provides the following definition: a nation is a group of people (a) with
a common identity; (b) marked off from other communities by its distinct public culture; (c)
whose members recognize special obligations to one another; (d) regard the continued
existence of the nation as a valuable good; and (e) aspire to be politically self-determining.

There are three distinct arguments supporting the nationalist thesis that one has special
obligations of justice to one’s fellow nationals. First, it could be argued that one has special
obligations to those with whom one identifies with, and this sense of identity clearly applies to
nations. Miller (1995, p. 70), for example, points out that one reason why nationality has ethical
significance is that it is a powerful source of personal identity. Yael Tamir (1993, p. 137), in her
book Liberal Nationalism, argues that one’s special obligations to one’s fellow nations are “not
grounded on consent, reciprocity, or gratitude, but rather on a feeling of belonging and
connectedness.” Jeff McMahan (1997), on the other hand, argues that one has special
obligations of justice toward one’s fellow nationals because members of a system of social
cooperation have special obligations of justice to one another (which they do not have to
outsiders), and a nation is such a system.

One does not have to be a nationalist in order to defend special obligations of justice within a
particular society, however. For Samuel Scheffler (2002A, pp. 79–80; 2002B, pp. 106–107), one
cannot value one’s relationship to another person without also seeing it as a source of special
obligations unless the relationship in question is degrading or demeaning, or it serves to
undermine human flourishing. Thus, to the extent that one has reason to value one’s
relationship to one’s fellow citizens, one must accept that there are special obligations among
compatriots.

In response to these arguments for ethical particularism, cosmopolitans could have two replies.
First, as Simon Caney (1999) points out, these arguments, if properly understood, do not
vindicate the particularistic thesis that one has special obligations of justice to one’s
compatriots. It is because the fact that (P1) X has a right to A, and (P2) Y has a special
obligation to X does not show that (C) Y has a special obligation to provide X with A. Moreover,
it could be argued that special duties that arise from shared group membership are valuable
only when they are within the constraints provided by the cosmopolitan theory of global justice
(Abizadeh & Gilabert, 2008).

Global Sufficientarianism
Although many people regard alleviating global poverty as a matter of charity or philanthropy, a
number of political or moral philosophers have argued that it is unjust that some people suffer
from extreme poverty. There are at least four different approaches through which one could
defend the claim that individuals living in affluent societies are under an obligation to help
eradicate severe poverty abroad.
The Utilitarian Approach
The first is the utilitarian approach. Redistribution of resources from affluent to poor societies,
according to the utilitarian view, is mandatory (not merely a matter of charity) because it is the
best way to promote utility globally. Singer’s (1972, p. 231; 2009, p. 3) drowning child
hypothetical, as mentioned in the previous section, is a prime example of this approach. His
argument is utilitarian in nature and contains the following premises and conclusion: (P1)
suffering and death from severe impoverishment are bad; (P2) if it is in one’s power to prevent
something bad from happening without sacrificing something nearly as important, there is an
obligation to do so; (P3) it is in the power of individuals living in affluent societies to prevent
suffering and death from severe impoverishment without sacrificing something nearly as
important; and therefore, it is wrong for them not to do so (Singer, 1972; 2009, pp. 15–16).
Drawing on a different set of hypothetical examples, Peter Unger (1996) defends a similar claim
that individuals in the affluent world should make significant contributions to the effort of
reducing global poverty to a point that they just remain “modestly well-off” and this, in effect,
requires them to contribute funds to foreign aid up to the point where giving more would be
unproductive.

Nonetheless, this utilitarian approach to global justice has been widely criticized for being overly
demanding on individuals and there should be some limits on the demand to produce best
outcomes. It may be argued, for instance, that individuals could permissibly give proportionally
greater weight to their own interests, projects, or pursuits rather than promoting well-being in a
completely impartial way (Scheffler, 1982, 2010). An alternative view suggests that it is
unreasonable to require individuals to contribute more than their fair share to the effort of ending
global poverty when others are not complying with their respective obligations
(Murphy, 1993, 2000; Ridge, 2010).

The Right-Based Approach

The second is the right-based approach. Many political philosophers argue that there is a
human right to freedom from poverty. In fact, Article 25 (1) of the Universal Declaration of
Human Rights (UDHR) states that “everyone has the right to a standard of living adequate for
the health and well-being of himself and of his family, including food, clothing, housing and
medical care and necessary social services.”

There are indeed different ways to account for the normative significance of the human right to
subsistence that make this right universally applicable.

1. 1. Human interests: Charles Jones (1999) defends a human right to subsistence because
it protects important human interests such as having a normal lifespan and health.
2. 2. Autonomy: A right to subsistence is important because it is necessary for individuals to
exercise their autonomy. David Copp (1992; 1998; 2005, pp. 41–47), for example, argues
that people everywhere should be enabled to meet their basic needs, and it is the global
society’s duty to secure such needs because they are requirements for autonomous
agency and all autonomous agents are equally deserving of respect. James Griffin (2008,
pp. 176–190) also affirms that there is a human right to at least a minimum level of welfare
because it protects a person’s normative agency—the capacity to autonomously choose
and pursue one’s conception of a worthwhile life.
3. 3. Subsistence rights as basic rights: A right to subsistence is important because it is
necessary for the enjoyment of other important rights. Henry Shue (1996, p. 23) argues
 that there is a basic right to subsistence, which includes “unpolluted air, unpolluted water,
adequate food, adequate clothing, adequate shelter, and minimal preventive public
health.” By “basic rights,” he means the special class of rights, the enjoyment of which is
essential for the enjoyment of all other rights. Thus, if one accepts that everyone has a
right to something, then one must also accept that everyone has subsistence rights, the
absence of which makes the enjoyment of other rights impossible or severely disrupted
(Shue, 1996, pp. 30–31).
4. 4. Capabilities: A right to subsistence is important because it preserves important human
capabilities—a person’s real capacity to do what he or she has reason to value. Amartya
Sen (1981, 2009) and Nussbaum (2000, 2006, 2011) maintain that all people have core
entitlements in virtue of their humanity and these entitlements include being free from
severe capabilities deprivation.
5. 5. Institutional harm: It is important to talk about people’s right to subsistence because this
right is being widely and systematically violated. Pogge (2002, 2007A, 2010), in a series of
articles and books, argues not only that there is a human right to subsistence, but it is
being systematically violated. Article 28 of the UDHR states that “everyone is entitled to a
social and international order in which the rights and freedoms set forth in this declaration
can be fully realized.” But Pogge (2002: pp. 113–116) mentions two features of the global
order that harm the poor: (a) the international resources privilege, in which any group
holding governmental power in a country is considered the rightful owner of the country’s
natural resources. This creates great incentives for civil wars and consolidates oppressive
regimes; and (b) the international borrowing privilege, in which any group holding
governmental power in a country can borrow funds in the name of the country and any
successor government is duty-bound to honor the debt. This worsens the problem of
corruption in many poor countries and imposes huge financial burdens on the poor. Thus,
our failure to eradicate global justice is a failure to perform our negative duty not to harm
the global poor. To address global poverty, Pogge (2002: pp. 204–207) proposes a Global
Resources Dividend, which requires countries to share a small value of their natural
resource when they decide to use or sell it. Pogge’s arguments are novel because most
people have seen their duties to the foreign poor, if any, as some form of duties of
assistance, but Pogge clearly argues that they should be viewed as negative duties, which
are more stringent in the eyes of most people. However, the success of Pogge’s
arguments depends crucially on his empirical claim that the global institutional order is in
fact harming the poor. Against this, Mathias Risse (2005) argues that because the
industrialized nations have in fact improved the living standings of the people in the
developing countries, the global institutional order is not actively harming the poor.
It should be noted that there have been some misgivings about the right-based approach to
condemn global poverty. One serious objection to this approach comes from Onora O’Neill
(1996, pp. 128–153; 2001, pp. 124–127), who argues that this approach is misguided because it
cannot provide an adequate account of which agents should bear the obligations to fulfill those
rights and it tends to overlook obligations without counterpart rights. Raymond Geuss (2001, p.
143) also questions the enforceability of subsistence rights and maintains that a set of rights
cannot exist without “some specifiable and more or less effective mechanism for enforcing
them.”

The Contractarian Approach

The third approach is the contractarian approach. This approach is built around the concept
of consent: Any social arrangement or practice cannot be just unless individuals subject to it
would have reason to consent to it, in a suitably defined choosing situation.
John Rawls’s The Law of Peoples is a prominent example of this contractarian view. Rawls is
one of the most influential political philosophers in the twentieth century. His Theory of
Justice (1999a) provides a robust defense of liberal democracy and redistributive taxation. But
Rawls is reluctant to extrapolate his domestic theory to the global domain. The first thing to note
about Rawls’s theory of global justice, which is remarkably different from his domestic theory, is
his focus on people rather than individuals as the agents of justice in the global arena. The aim
of Law of Peoples is to defend “a particular political conception of right and justice that applies
to the principles and norms of international law and practice” (Rawls, 1999B, p. 3). The
term people (as distinct from states) is meant to highlight the moral characters of societies as
collective agents that are not solely motivated by prudence or rationality (Rawls, 1999B, pp. 23–
27). One principle in the law of peoples is the principle that “people have a duty to assist other
peoples living under unfavorable conditions that prevent their having a just or decent political
and social regime” (Rawls, 1999B, pp. 37, 105–113). Those who are familiar with Rawls’s work
will also be familiar with the idea of the original position in which the contracting parties who are
subject to a veil of ignorance determine principles of justice for a liberal democratic society. In
the Law of Peoples, Rawls invokes a second original position to determine the principles of
global justice. In the second original position, parties are representatives of liberal peoples
(whereas in the domestic case, parties are representing individual citizens) subject to a veil of
ignorance—not knowing the size of the territories, the population, the relative strength, the
extent of natural resources, or the level of economic development of the peoples they represent.
What seems to have motivated Rawls’s shift to a more minimalist theory of global justice is his
own concern about the legitimacy of the international order, so he wants to make ensure that
even nonliberal (but reasonable) peoples would have reason to accept the law of peoples. For
Rawls (1999B, pp. 119–120), the reason for providing aid to poor societies is to enable them to
develop a reasonably just or decent political system and he is indifferent to any remaining
inequality once this aim has been achieved. That is to say, in his global theory Rawls (1999B,
pp. 32–33) aims at the equality of peoplesinstead of persons.

Gillian Brock (2009, pp. 63–72) follows the Rawlsian contractarian approach and defends a
need-based minimal floor principle of global justice that guarantees every individual is
adequately positioned to enjoy the prospects of a decent life. Drawing on the empirical research
by Norman Frohlich and Joe Oppenheimer, Brock argues that the contracting parties would
actually favor some minimal floor principle. Frohlich and Oppenheimer have designed
experiments to find out people’s actual judgments about fairness under the condition of
impartiality in which the majority of participants would choose the principle that guarantees an
income floor to the worst-off individual (Frohlich & Oppenheimer, 1992; Brock, 2009, pp. 54–57).
Therefore, Brock (2009, p. 52) argues that a “minimal package” that includes what is necessary
for people to meet the basic needs of themselves and their dependents would be reasonable to
agree to in the ideal choosing situation.

Finally, Nicole Hassoun (2012) advances a legitimacy argument (or autonomy argument) for
global distributive justice. Her argument proceeds as follows: (P1) coercive institutions must be
legitimate; (P2) for a coercive institution to be legitimate, it must provide its subjects with
sufficient autonomy to consent to, or dissent from, its rules; (P3) to have sufficient autonomy,
one must have enough food, water, shelter, education, health care, social support, and
emotional goods; and (P4) there are many coercive international institutions. Therefore, (C1) to
the extent that the global poor cannot autonomously consent to the existing international
institutions, they are illegitimate; and (C2) these institutions should ensure that their subjects
have enough food, water, and other goods necessary for sufficient autonomy. This argument
has resonance with the contractarian approach because it identifies the conditions under which
individuals could consent to coercive institutions and by so doing lands support to an account of
global distributive justice.

Subordination of the Poor

The fourth approach focuses on the morally problematic power relations associated with severe
poverty. On the one hand, severe poverty causes subordination of the poor to the relatively
wealthy. On the other hand, poverty is in fact the result of relations of subordination which are
exploitative. For example, Richard Miller (2010, p. 210), who believes the goal of global justice
is “provision of basic needs with respect for autonomy,” maintains that American citizens should
share a greater responsibility for helping the global poor because of the imperialist behavior of
the United States (2010, pp. 147–180). Another example of this approach is Cecile Laborde
(2010). Applying the republican ideal of nondomination to the global context, Laborde argues
that the global poor should be protected from the systemic domination that jeopardizes their
ability to secure basic needs for themselves.

Global Prioritarianism
As mentioned in the previous section, Rawls is reluctant to extend his domestic theory of justice
to the global context. His own account of global justice, however, has been criticized for
underplaying the significance of the existing interactions and institutional practices in the global
domain. In addition, there is a question whether Rawls’s two theories—one for domestic justice,
and the other for global justice—actually fit together (Buchanan, 2000). As part of his domestic
theory of justice, Rawls argues for the Difference Principle as one of the principles regulating
social and economic inequalities in a given society. It states that social and economic
inequalities are acceptation only if they are “to the greatest benefit of the least-advantaged
members of society” (2001, pp. 42–43; 1971, pp. 75–83; 1999b, pp. 65–73). Although Rawls
himself considers the Difference Principle to be an egalitarian principle of justice, other theorists
such as Derek Parfit argue that it should be classified as a “prioritarian” principle since the
Difference Principle “gives absolute priority to benefiting those who are worse off” and requires
the worse-off group to be as well-off as possible (Parfit, 2002, pp. 116–121). Therefore, the
advocates of a Global Difference Principle can be seen as advocating a prioritarian view on
global distributive justice, which separates their views from other egalitarian arguments.

In the field of global distributive justice, there have been debates about the proper scope of this
principle. Charles Beitz (1979) and Pogge (1989) argue that transnational social and economic
interdependence is sufficiently complex to constitute a scheme of social cooperation, and
therefore one should apply the Rawlsian original position to the global context to determine the
suitable principles regulating that scheme. They conclude that the difference principle, which
maximizes the life-prospect of the least well-off individuals, should be applied globally. It should
be noted, however, that Beitz (1983) adopts a more nonrelational account of global distributive
justice and maintains that individuals should be included in the global original position simply in
virtue of their moral personality.

Global Egalitarianism
The previous sections mainly deal with sufficientarian accounts of global distributive justice—
that is, no one should suffer from absolute deprivation. But there is also an issue of whether
people’s relative shares should also be a concern in global distributive justice. Although
egalitarianism does not deny the moral significance of avoiding sufficiency shortfalls, it firmly
rejects the view that, above a certain basic minimum, inequalities in individuals’ life prospects
simply become morally irrelevant (Casal, 2007). Egalitarianism, therefore, is committed to
reducing relative deprivation of some even when no one suffers from absolute deprivation
(Blake, 2001). The debate about whether justice requires equality or mere sufficiency has long
been an important topic in the contemporary studies of distributive justice. (For some
discussions, see Weston, 1982; Raz, 1986, pp. 217–244; Frankfurt, 1987; Cavanagh, 2002;
Kekes, 2003; Casal, 2007.) A notable exception is Thomas Nagal (2005, p. 118) who holds that
justice must, by definition, be concerned with relative shares of resources enjoyed by individuals
and he regards sufficiency as a demand of humanity, not justice.

It may be objected that equality as such is irrelevant to justice because whatever good reasons
we might have to be moved by egalitarianism actually appeal to some fundamental values
distinct from equality itself (Miller, 1982; 2007, pp. 51–52). But this objection rests on the
mistake that egalitarians must somehow think that equality is intrinsically valuable. It seems
rather dogmatic to insist that any genuinely egalitarian doctrine must appeal to nothing but
equality itself particularly if “equality” is understood as an abstract distributive pattern which
commends our allegiance apart from all other values. For instance, many egalitarians argue that
inequality is objectionable because it is unfair if someone is worse off than others through no
fault or choice of one’s own, or it is unfair that equally deserving people are unequally well off.
Although these arguments involve an understanding of fairness, it is rather unclear why they
cannot be regarded as egalitarian doctrines. Moreover, it is perfectly legitimate for an egalitarian
to argue that social and economic inequalities should be reduced because such inequalities
may give rise to objectionable forms of domination by some over others. The underlying idea is
that preventing domination is itself an egalitarian reason for favoring social and economic
equality as it forms part of the background conditions under which people can live with one
another as equals, and it goes beyond attending to basic needs (O’Neill, 2008).

Arguments for Global Equality

A number of arguments have been made in favor of global equality. One strand of these
arguments can be called nonrelational arguments because they try to defend an egalitarian
account of global justice by appealing to what individuals are owed in virtue of their moral status
as human beings independent of their respective institutional membership. First, the underlying
moral conviction underlying luck egalitarianism could be invoked to justify some form of “equality
of fortune” or “responsibility-sensitive” egalitarianism: that inequalities of advantage deriving
from unchosen circumstances are unjust seems to apply across political boundaries. After all,
just like one’s family background or native endowments, citizenship acquired by birth is simply
another aspect of people’s circumstances, which, according to this view, should not be allowed
to influence people’s relative positions. For example, Cecile Fabre (2003, 2005) argues that
residence in a particular country could be considered an involuntary disadvantage for which
people should be compensated. One way to implement this luck egalitarian principle is to regard
birthright citizenship of affluent, stable countries as a special kind of inherited property, the
transfer of which can be taxed for global distributive purposes (Shachar, 2009). Simon Caney
(2001; 2005, pp. 122–123) also defends this position by arguing that the internal logic of the
justification of fair equality of opportunity in the “domestic” case—that it is unfair for a person to
have worse opportunities because of his cultural identity—entails that the scope of this principle
of justice should be global. Second, one may insist that equality is a morally privileged
benchmark in thinking about global justice. Brian Barry (1998), for example, applies the
Scanlonian test to the global case and contends that all transnational inequalities of rights,
opportunities, and resources have to be justifiable in ways that cannot be reasonably rejected
by those who get the least. Pablo Gilabert (2012), for another example, maintains that a
commitment to the moral equality of persons and cosmopolitan justifiability could give rise to
some egalitarian principles of global justice without appealing to any associative grounds.

These nonrelational arguments clearly seem plausible to some, but others would argue that
they ignore the nature and the extent of transnational interactions which might have some
bearings on distributive justice. In contrast to these nonrelational arguments,
the relational perspective on global justice according to which the demands of equality apply
only to individuals who stand in some morally relevant relationship with one other. The current
level of global economic interdependence has often been invoked to justify applying certain
egalitarian principles of justice to the global context. Darrel Moellendorf (2009), for example,
argues that an egalitarian account of global distributive justice can be grounded in the inherent
dignity of individuals in conjunction with their membership in global institutions because the
respect for human dignity requires a justification of institutional principles that can be reasonably
accepted by those who are unavoidably subject to their rules. In particular, he contends that the
principle of equality of opportunity should be applied globally because justificatory respect rules
out any principle of distribution that permits persons to be privileged merely because of their
citizenship or nationality at birth. Kok-Chor Tan also defends a global version of luck
egalitarianism, but he appeals not only to the moral arbitrariness of citizenship, but also to the
fact that the global institutional order turns some natural facts about the world into advantages
and disadvantages for people. As such, for Tan (2011), the scope of luck-egalitarian justice
would not be global without people’s sharing a global institutional order with one another. Pogge
(2007C) and Lea Ypi (2012, pp. 112–127) independently argue for a form of global instrumental
egalitarianism that draws on the causal link between absolute deprivation and relative
deprivation. Ypi focuses in particular on the unequal distribution of state power in the
international arena and argues that such inequality causes absolute deprivation on the part of
the global poor. As such, if one is concerned about global poverty, one cannot leave such
inequality of state power unchallenged. Finally, some political theorists defend different versions
of global relational egalitarianism. They hold that relational equality—standing in relations of
equality to one another (rather than relations characterized by domination or exploitation)—is a
requirement of global justice. According to this view, global inequality is unjust to the extent that
it gives rise to or reflects morally problematic forms of relations in which people stand to one
another (Altman & Wellman, 2009; Nath, 2011; Ip, 2016).

Critiques of Global Equality

The ideal of global equality has been subjected to powerful critiques from different theoretical
perspectives. Each of these challenges points out some disanalogy between the domestic and
the global contexts that their claim justifies restricting the scope of egalitarian justice to the
former. They all share the following structure: (i) concerns for equality are appropriate within a
particular context only when certain property is present; (ii) the property is present in the context
of a domestic society (such as a state or a nation) but not in the global realm; and therefore, (iii)
egalitarian principles of distributive justice should be adopted within the state but not at the
global level (Caney, 2008). There are at least three distinct challenges to global egalitarianism:

The Argument from Coercion maintains that equality is a demand of justice only among those
who are subject to the same sovereign authority which coerces them to abide by its rules. Thus,
what grounds the relevance of egalitarian principles of justice is the fact of political coercion.
Michael Blake (2001) maintains that political coercion is a sine qua non of egalitarian justice
because the autonomy-restricting character of the state which requires a special justification
that gives rise to egalitarian claims. Nagel (2005) states that our putative joint authorship of a
coercively imposed legal system of the state that generates concerns for equality. In response,
opponents have pointed out that coercion does exist in the global context. Obvious examples
include border control and the international property rights treaties (Cavallero, 2006, 2010;
Abizadeh, 2007). Therefore, the coercion theorists have to offer some account of how political
coercion exercised by the state against its members differs from other forms of coercion that
could be found in the global context. Risse (2006), for example, holds that what matters to
egalitarianism is not coercion as such but coercion that meets the requirements of “political and
legal immediacy” which distinguishes coercion exercised by the state from other forms of
coercion, say, exercised by supra-state institutions. In his more recent works, Blake (2011,
cf. 2013, pp. 97–107) distinguishes between two forms of coercion: vertical coercion, in which
all agents are subject equally to a central authority; and horizontal coercion, in which some
powerful agents coerce weaker agents. Blake argues that international coercion is horizontal in
nature and egalitarian rights are not appropriate justification for this coercion.

The Argument from Cooperation contends that egalitarian principles of distributive justice should
be applied within certain schemes of social cooperation. From this view, global egalitarianism is
indefensible because the relevant kind of social cooperation (still) does not exist at the global
level. This view has been defended by Samuel Freeman and Andrea Sangiovanni. Defending a
Rawlsian view on distributive justice, Freeman (2007, pp. 304–308) argues that the problem of
distributive justice is a question of political design of basic social institutions; and because, in
the absence of a world state, there can be no global basic institutions on a par to the basic
institutions of a society, principles of distributive justice do not apply at the global level.
Sangiovanni (2007) argues that equality is a requirement of reciprocity in the mutual provision of
a central class of collective goods necessary for preserving individual autonomy; and, since only
states provide these collective goods, we owe a special duty of egalitarian reciprocity only to our
fellow citizens and residents who do their part in sustaining the state’s capacity to provide these
collective goods.

Alternatively, one may argue that substantive principles of equality can apply only within the
context of a national community. This kind of objection to global equality, unlike the previous two
which focus on the state, holds that nations are the privileged context within which egalitarian
principle of justice apply. According to this view, global egalitarianism is misguided because it
overlooks the moral relevance of nationality in determining people’s responsibilities and
entitlements. David Miller’s contributions (1995, 1998, 2000, 2007) to the debate of global
distributive justice are perhaps the best examples of this form of argument. In his book National
Responsibility and Global Justice, Miller (2007) argues that a shared national culture is essential
for identifying the appropriate metric for egalitarian principles of justice to work. Besides, the fact
that people belong to different self-determining nations poses a serious threat to global
egalitarianism because individuals can be held responsible for the collective decisions and
preferences of their nations.

Applications of Global Distributive Justice

Even in more abstract theoretical discussions, researchers in the field of global distributive
justice have paid considerable attention to how certain facts about the global domain might
affect the grounds of their normative judgments. So it should come as no surprise that they have
tried to apply normative theories to concrete issues. The next discussion focuses on four of
these issues: reparations for historic injustice, climate change, transnational trade, and natural-
resources ownership. These issues share two things in common: first, they are inevitably global
in scope and cannot be confined to any single society; and second, these issues potentially give
rise to different distributions of burdens and benefits among individuals from around the world.

Historic Injustice
There is no denying that our world is full of historic injustice—slavery, aggression, resources
exploitation, and colonialism, to name but a few. Political philosophers are interested in whether
a group of people who have suffered from past injustice is entitled to compensation.

Some scholars are skeptical about rectifying historic injustice. Sometimes they appeal to the
difficulties in identifying the relevant counterfactual to determine the amount of harm suffered by
the victims. George Sher (1980), for example, argues that, with the passage of time, the
difference between the victim’s well-being in the actual world and her well-being in the
alternative world (where the initial wrong did not take place) may actually be the effects of the
actions of many other intervening agents and not the effect of the initial wrong itself. Thus, there
will be little or nothing left to be compensated for. Alternatively, as Jeremy Waldron argues,
historic entitlements are weakened by the fact of historic persistence of dispossession because
the relation between the original owner and the resource taken is weakened by the passage of
time. Also, the change of social and economic circumstances from the time of original
acquisition might mean that historic injustice should be superseded in order to prevent present
and prospective deprivation (Waldron, 1992, pp. 7–14, 20–26).

Against such skepticism, some theorists argue there are indeed duties of rectification for historic
injustice. In his Rectifying International Injustice, Daniel Butt (2009, p. 17) contends that the
present generations can be linked to past wrongdoing, in a morally relevant way, through
benefit, entitlement, or responsibility, and concludes that “those living in the developed world
possess significant rectificatory duties to many of those in less developed countries.” Examining
the moral implications of colonialism, Lea Ypi, Robert Goodin, and Christian Barry (2009) argue
that individuals linked by ex-colonial relations of their societies owe one another duties of
“robust distributive justice” because colonial rule constitutes a political association which
involves special duties of distributive justice.

Climate Change
Climate change is arguably one of the most dangerous challenges facing humanity. The
overwhelming majority of climate scientists agree that the earth’s climate is changing and such
changes are human-induced (IPCC, 2014, pp. 125–129). It is not hard to see why climate
change is an issue of global distributive justice. To begin with, the problem of climate change is
global in scope and its solution clearly requires transnational cooperation. Also, climate change
involves a distribution of burdens—extreme weather conditions, rising sea level, spread of
diseases, and mitigation costs—and benefits, such as consumption and carbon emissions
rights.

A number of issues in climate justice deserve particular attention. The first issue is whether and
how climate change is a human rights problem. It has been widely argued that climate change
undermines a broad range of human rights. Among these are the rights to subsistence and a
safe environment, and the global poor are most vulnerable. (See, e.g., Shue, 1993, 2011;
Nickel, 1993; Caney, 2009; Humphreys, 2010). Besides, climate change potentially endangers
the rights of the future generations (Gardiner, 2011, pp. 143–184). Another issue concerns the
distribution of emissions rights. Taking the atmosphere to be a “global sink” that absorbs
greenhouse gases, Singer (2002, pp. 35–36) argues that everyone is entitled to an equal share
of this sink and thus each person should have equal emissions rights. Steve Vanderheiden
(2008) also qualified an egalitarian view and argues that after basic needs have been met, the
remaining emissions rights should be distributed equally. However, some have disputed this
egalitarian view and argued that the distribution of emission rights should be more sensitive to
the fulfillment of people’s basic needs and developmental rights (Caney, 2011, 2012;
Moellendorf, 2011, 2014, pp. 123–151, 236–239). Finally, there is an issue regarding how to
distribute the burdens associated with climate change mitigation. Few would dispute that
affluent countries and individuals should bear more of a burden in mitigating the harmful effects
of climate change. It is either because these countries and individuals are better able to do so,
bearing extra burdens will be less costly to them, or because of their past emissions, which lead
to the current problem (Shue, 1999; Harris, 2010, pp. 121–155; Miller, 2010, pp. 84–117;
Risse, 2012, pp. 199–200; Brown, 2013).

Transnational Trade
Trade occupies a vital role in the world’s economy and the demand for “fair trade” has become a
global civic movement. However, trade prompts important moral questions, including questions
of justice: what terms of trade can be considered fair to the parties involved? How should
benefits from trade be distributed? Some economists defend the claim that trade liberalization
policies or free trade has in general helped raise living standards of the global poor. (See, e.g.,
Wolf, 2005; Bhagwati, 2007; Irwin, 2009.) Other researchers feel more ambivalent about the
impacts of trade and contend that, with appropriate institutions, trade generally benefits the poor
and international trade rules should be designed to reduce poverty and promote development
(Stigliz, 2006; Stiglitz & Charlton, 2006; Tesón & Klick, 2012).

Some political philosophers, however, would argue that transnational trade gives rise to distinct
fairness issues concerning how the burdens and benefits arising from trade should be
distributed among participants. Most, if not all, political theorists researching the normative
aspects of transnational trade would argue that the current arrangement of transnational trade,
including the World Trade Organization (WTO) regime and other bilateral trade agreements, are
far from just. For example, Aaron James (2012A, 2012B) argues that, for the terns if trade to be
fair, trading nations must protect people from the harms of trade (collective due care) and the
gains of trade ought to be distributed equally unless unequal gains flow to poor countries
(international relative gains). Starting with an understanding of the nature of trade itself, Frank
Garcia (2013) argues that trade cannot be fair unless it can be reasonably regarded as a
consensual exchange of economic values.

Natural-Resources Ownership
Many factors affect the economic development of a particular society but natural-resources
endowment is clearly one of these factors. One cannot have a complete theory of global
distributive justice without addressing the question of who should own what resources and this
question has received more attention in the recent literature of global distributive justice.

Many theorists have sought to defend the right to own natural resources held by people living in
a particular territory in which these resources are located. The nationalist account maintains that
national communities can come to have a right to a territory (with the natural resources in it)
because they have transformed the territory (Meisels, 2003) and thereby established an internal
relation between the territory and its culture (Miller, 2007, pp. 217–218; 2012). The Lockean
account maintains that people gain such ownership of territories and natural resources through
adding material value to the territory or resource they occupy (Simmons, 2001;
Nine, 2008, 2012, pp. 72–93). The Kantian account holds that a state can have right to a
territory if that state imposes a system of property law that meets the basic conditions of
legitimacy such as protection of minimal freedom, equality, and independence for each citizen
(Stilz, 2009, 2011). The commitment to people’s ownership of natural resources has
implications for international trade on natural resources. If the people, not the tyrannical
governments which happen to rule them, are the rightful owners of natural resources, then
importing oil from many countries will be just like buying stolen properties. It is clear that the
governments of these countries, controlled by a small group of corrupt elites, will simply capture
the revenue from this trade while the living standard of the common people will not be improved
(Wenar, 2008).

Not all theorists, however, believe in ownership of natural resources by particular individuals or
groups. Other theorists argue that individuals have essentially the same entitlement to the
natural resources of the earth regardless of their respective citizenship or nationality. Some of
these accounts, such as Beitz (1979), Hillel Steiner (1999, 2005), and Tim Haywood (2006),
have explicit egalitarian implications and call attention to the moral arbitrariness of the
distribution of natural resources. Other accounts like Risse (2012) are sufficientarian and hold
that people are entitled to resources that would allow them to meet their basic needs.

Beyond the cosmopolitan/statist debate just stated here, some theorists try to develop
alternative accounts of the natural resources right, which gives states some partial rights to own
natural resources of their territory. Criticizing Haywood’s account of natural resources, Avery
Kolers (2012) argues that what counts as a resource should be decided by whoever has a
morally legitimate territorial right to that place and those goods, which are not treated as means
for economic exchange and should not be subject for redistribution. Margaret Moore
(2012, 2014, 2015), as another example, allows states to have control over the natural
resources that they need to maintain collective self-determination. Chris Armstrong (2013, 2014)
also develops a broadly egalitarian account of natural resources ownership by arguing that
individuals are entitled to a share of natural resources benefits that would satisfy their basic
needs whereas the surplus of such benefits should be distributed to further egalitarian ends.

Global distributive justice is without doubt an area of increasing academic interest. There have
been a series of debates about how to organize our shared transnational institutions in
accordance with the demands of distributive justice and also about what these demands are.
Some theorists insist on a statist or nationalistic approach to these issues, while others embrace
a more cosmopolitan outlook. Also, as the last section indicates, these debates are not merely
of theoretical interest, but also have practical implications.