Creating Capabilities — Nussbaum

Judging a society by what each person is actually able to do and be, rather than by its total or average wealth.

An average can rise while many stay poor, sick or unfree — wealth is only a means to a decent life, not the goal.

Every individual's life counts in its own right; you never average a person away for a group total.

Only indirectly — money is a tool; what counts is what people are actually able to do and be with it.

A country's average income can boom while many still can't read, get clean water or feel safe — so the average hides them.

Not 'how rich is this place?' but 'what is each person here actually able to do and to be?'

Kant's — 'treat each person as an end, never merely as a means' — scaled up into a test for a whole society.

One where each individual person is genuinely able to live a decent human life — not just a high average.

Nussbaum's list of ten things a life of dignity needs — from life, health and safety to thought, feeling, belonging and a say over your society.

A floor — everyone should reach a decent minimum of all ten; you can't trade a lot of one for none of another.

Life (a normal lifespan), bodily health (well-fed, sheltered), bodily integrity (safe from violence, free to move).

Being able to learn, think, imagine and create — supported by an education.

Being able to live with and for others, and to be treated with respect and dignity.

Practical reason and affiliation — they run through all the others, letting a person choose and share their life.

Being able to take part in politics, and to hold property and work on an equal footing with others.

So different cultures can fill in the specifics their own way — 'being able to be healthy', not one fixed diet.

The real opportunity or freedom to do or be something — being able to eat, learn, take part, be safe.

Actually doing or being that thing — actually eating, actually voting; the exercise of a capability.

Capability = being ABLE to; functioning = actually DOING it. The approach aims at capability.

To protect freedom — secure the opportunity for everyone, but leave it to each person to choose whether to use it.

Same body-state, opposite situations: one has no capability for food, the other has it and freely chooses not to use it.

The worth every person has simply as a human being; a life below the capabilities threshold is beneath that dignity.

Giving people real opportunities plus the freedom to use them treats them as dignified choosers, not mouths to feed.

For young children some functionings (like being educated) may be required, to protect their future capabilities as adults.

A society owes every member a decent minimum of the ten capabilities — a better measure than wealth or happiness.

A country's average wealth can rise while real individuals stay poor and unfree — GDP hides the people left out.

Happiness uses an average that can hide a suffering minority — and 'happy' people may simply have been taught to expect nothing.

Wanting less because you've been taught to expect less — so a deprived person can report contentment and the injustice hides.

That a Western philosopher writing one list of 'the good life' imposes her culture's values on others who see things differently.

The list is general (each culture fills it in), aims at freedom not forced functioning, and was built by listening across cultures.

It would stop you criticising real injustices like denying girls school — which most people do want to call unjust.

Open-book, 1 hour: (a) explain a concept [10] and (b) evaluate a claim [15]; quote the text to support your points.