2023/07/15 by Jordan David Thomas Walters · 1 voice
Arts and Humanities · Social Sciences · #Hannah Arendt's Political Philosophy #Philosophical Ethics and Theory #Political Philosophy and Ethics
paper · pdf · doi:10.1111/ajps.12805
openalex publication_date 2023/07/15 · openalex created_date 2025/10/10 · openalex updated_date 2026/07/28
Abstract Are demands for equality motivated by envy? Nietzsche, Freud, Hayek, and Nozick all thought so. Call this the Envy Objection . For egalitarians, the Envy Objection is meant to sting. Many egalitarians have tried to evade the Envy Objection. But should egalitarians be worried about envy? In this article, I argue that egalitarians should stop worrying and learn to love envy. I argue that the persistent unwillingness to embrace the Envy Objection is rooted in a common misunderstanding of the nature of the charge, what it reveals, and what can be said in response to it. I develop what Bernard Williams might call a vindicatory genealogy of envy, thereby allowing us to see that envy, rather than undermining egalitarian intuitions, can in fact play a distinct justificatory role (when it is fitting), which undermines the Envy Objection.