Hostname: page-component-cd9895bd7-p9bg8 Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-12-18T05:41:50.259Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Contractualism and risk preferences

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  26 October 2020

Tobey K. Scharding Open the ORCID record for Tobey K. Scharding [Opens in a new window]
Tobey K. Scharding*
Affiliation:
Rutgers Business School – Newark and New Brunswick, Piscataway, New Jersey, USA
*
Email: [email protected]
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

I evaluate two contractualist approaches to the ethics of risk: mutual constraint and the probabilistic, ex ante approach. After explaining how these approaches address problems in earlier interpretations of contractualism, I object that they fail to respond to diverse risk preferences in populations. Some people could reasonably reject the risk thresholds associated with these approaches. A strategy for addressing this objection is considering individual risk preferences, similar to those Buchak discusses concerning expected-utility approaches to risk. I defend the risk-preferences-adjusted (RISPREAD) contractualist approach, which calculates a population’s average risk preference and permits risk thresholds below that preference, only.

Keywords

riskcontractualismScanlonrisk-weighted expected utility (REU) theory
Type
Article
Information
Economics & Philosophy , Volume 37 , Issue 2 , July 2021 , pp. 260 - 283
Check for updates
Copyright
© The Author(s), 2020. Published by Cambridge University Press

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Birsch, D. 1994. Introduction: The Pinto controversy. In The Ford Pinto Case, ed. Birsch, D. and Fielder, J.H., 5–10. Albany, NY: State University of New York Press.Google Scholar
Borenstein, S. 2015. AP analysis: Dozens of deaths likely from VW pollution dodge. Associated Press. http://bigstory.ap.org/article/a6925f0af82e44aaa1a1ed4b55d030f6/ap-analysis-dozens-deaths-likely-vw-pollution-dodge.Google Scholar
Buchak, L. 2013. Risk and Rationality. New York, NY: Oxford University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Buchak, L. 2016. Why high-risk, non-expected-utility-maximizing gambles can be rational and beneficial: the case of HIV cure studies. Journal of Medical Ethics 43, 90–95.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Buchak, L. 2017a. Precis of Risk and Rationality . Philosophical Studies 174, 2363–2368.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Buchak, L. 2017b. Taking risks behind the veil of ignorance. Ethics 127, 610–644.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Buchak, L. 2019. Weighing the risks of climate change. Monist 102, 66–83.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Chossière, G.P., Malina, R., Ashok, A., Dedoussi, I.C., Eastham, S.D., Speth, R.L. and Barrett, S.R.H. 2017. Public health impacts of excess NOx emissions from Volkswagen diesel passenger vehicles in Germany. Environmental Research Letters 12, 1–14.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Dowie, M. 1977. Pinto madness. Mother Jones. https://www.motherjones.com/politics/1977/09/pinto-madness/.Google Scholar
Frick, J. 2015. Contractualism and social risk. Philosophy & Public Affairs 43, 175–223.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Fried, B.H. 2012a. Can contractualism save us from aggregation? Journal of Ethics 16, 39–66.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Fried, B.H. 2012b. The limits of a nonconsequentialist approach to torts. Legal Theory 18, 231–262.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hansson, S.O. 1993. The false promises of risk analysis. Ratio 6, 16–26.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hansson, S.O. 2003. Ethical criteria for risk acceptance. Erkenntnis 59, 291–309.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hayenhjelm, M. and Wolff, J. 2011. The moral problem of risk impositions: a survey of the literature. European Journal of Philosophy 20, e26–e51.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hill, T.E. Jr 2005. Assessing moral rules: Utilitarian and Kantian perspectives. Philosophical Issues 15, 167–170.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
James, A. 2012. Contractualism’s (not so) slippery slope. Legal Theory 18, 263–292.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Kumar, R. 1999. Defending the moral moderate: contractualism and common sense. Philosophy & Public Affairs 28, 275–309.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Kumar, R. 2015. Risking and wronging. Philosophy & Public Affairs 43, 27–49.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Lenman, J. 2008. Contractualism and risk imposition. Politics, Philosophy & Economics 7, 99–122.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Lucile Packard Foundation for Children’s Health 2015. Demographics of California’s children. Kidsdata. http://www.kidsdata.org/export/pdf?cat=7.Google Scholar
National Highway Safety Administration 2007. Traffic safety facts: 2007 data. https://crashstats.nhtsa.dot.gov/Api/Public/ViewPublication/810993.Google Scholar
Nozick, R. 1974. Anarchy, State, and Utopia. New York, NY: Basic Books.Google Scholar
Nussbaum, M. and Sen, A. 1995. The Quality of Life. New York, NY: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Oberdiek, J. 2004. The ethics in risk regulation: towards a contractualist reorientation. Rutgers Law Journal 36, 199–204.Google Scholar
Reibetanz, S. 1998. Contractualism and aggregation. Ethics 108, 296–311.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Savage, L.J. 1954. The Foundations of Statistics. New York, NY: John Wiley and Sons.Google Scholar
Scanlon, T.M. 1975. Preference and urgency. Journal of Philosophy 72, 655–669.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Scanlon, T.M. 1998. What We Owe to Each Other. Cambridge, MA: The Belknap Press of Harvard University Press.Google Scholar
Thomson, J.J. 1986. Imposing risks. In Rights, Restitution, and Risk: Essays in Moral Theory, ed. Parent, W., 173–191. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.Google Scholar
US Census Bureau 2015. QuickFacts: California. URL: https://www.census.gov/quickfacts/CA.Google Scholar
Wagner, I. 2020a. Licensed drivers in the U.S. – total number by state 2018. Statista. https://www.statista.com/statistics/198029/total-number-of-us-licensed-drivers-by-state.Google Scholar
Wagner, I. 2020b. U.S. motorcycle registrations by state 2018. Statista. https://www.statista.com/statistics/191002/number-of-registered-motorcycles-in-the-us-by-state/.Google Scholar