A brief note on demandingness
A friend of mine related the following example to me:
Imagine a moral theory that does not require any agent to give away all of their money to help those in poorer countries. So such a theory seems not to be too demanding. But now imagine that this theory also morally permits governments (or, I suppose, anyone) to force (tax) agents to give their money away to poorer countries.
One objection to such a theory might be the limits that it places on autonomy. But is there an additional objection to it: a demandingness objection?
Both answers are here tempting. It's tempting to say yes, because agents are possibly going to give all their money away, and this is what's apparently wrong with overly-demanding theories.
On the other hand, demandingness seems to be about what's required of agents, and in this example the moral theory generates no requirements, only permissions. How can the existence of permissions make a theory demanding?
Any thoughts?
One way the demandingness objection is sometimes cast is in terms of loss of welfare for the agent who must give up so much. But this looks to be a very odd way to cast the objection. For the demandingness objection ought to apply to utilitarians if it applies to anyone. Yet, the utilitarian has an apparently sound reply to this objection: They are well aware that such actions lower the welfare of agents in the west, and this is indeed to be regretted. But their entire point is that if welfare concerns us, the loss of welfare for western agents is less than the gain for agents elsewhere. Casting the demandingness objection in terms of welfare is going to be tricky (unless we just allow the demandingness objection to collapse into the objection that certain theories cannot account for partial concerns).
Here's another way to phrase the utilitarian reply to the demandingness objection: Sure, utilitarianism demands a lot of rich agents. But opposing theories demand far far more of poorer agents. It demands that they die. So the demandingness objection applies more strongly to theories that are not (say) act-consequentialist.
Can the demandingness objection be sucessfully characterised?
Surely this theory is
Surely this theory is demanding because it requires us to give away an amount of resources over which we have no control to a government over which we have very little control. We may not be forced to give money to the poor but we are forced to give it to the greedy.
I would also question whether Utilitarianism makes such great demands on the rich, unless you couple it with Socialism. I don't suppose that western aid to Africa has done anything but cause utility on that continent to plunge.
more on demandingness
Well, the point in question is a thought experiment, and as such, one could suppose for the sake of the example that aid did help those in poorer countries, and that the government in question provided aid in a sensible manner.
Further, the demandingness of utilitarianism certainly does not depend on socialism. Any plausible factual political view is going to claim that your time and money is going to produce welfare best when spent on people needier than yourself. If your factual views claim that governments and charities tend to squander those resources, then a utilitarian in your position should instead, say, go and work in those countries distributing aid yourself, so as to maximise what you contribute. I might put it like this: The problem for utilitarianism arises because of demandingness generally, not in precisely how your time is demanded.
(Factually speaking, I can't imagine that anti-aids drugs, the elimination of polio and so on that some charities provide don't benefit their recipients more than the £10 or so it costs you. So at least some charities provide benefits, and I imagine that it's perfectly possible for governments to distribute money for aid directly to those charities)
Al
What I was trying to get at
What I was trying to get at is this: you ask how a theory giving only permissions can be demanding but you pre-suppose the demand that we do everything government asks of us. It doesn't matter whether the aid is effective or not, the demandingness comes from the obligation we have to obey the government.
Your observation that :'Any plausible factual political view is going to claim that your time and money is going to produce welfare best when spent on people needier than yourself' is a reflection of the total victory of socialism in modern Britain. Try very hard to imagine how it might be more constructive to encourage people to improve their own welfare by setting them an example in your own case and rewarding them for success when they achieve it. The society around you ought to make it obvious that spending time and money on the needy does not, in fact, help them very much at all.
Ah, I see the confusion now.
Ah, I see the confusion now. I didn't suggest that we had an obligation to obey the government. The objection goes through (all the stronger, in fact) with only the assumption that the moral theory in question also permits governments to send people to jail for failing to obey them. This moral theory hasn't specified any obligations at all, only permissions. And yet the things it permits - putting people in jail unless they give vast sums of money to charity - seem to make it demanding (on citizens) nonetheless. The conclusion to draw, it seems, is that permissions can be demanding.
As to the final point, we're going off-topic here, but you seem to be suggesting that the most beneficial thing that I can do, out of the many thousands of courses of action available to me, is to be a role model. Obviously, being a role model can be a good thing, and can make the world a better place. But do you really think that a starving child in some third-world country is going to benefit more from that than the elimination of polio?
Al
OK. I think the difference
OK. I think the difference between permissions and demands here is a purely semantic one. Giving someone permission to make demands on me and permission to back them up with physical force isn't really any different from giving me an obligation to do what they want. so, yes, permissions can be demanding.
On the other point, you jump to conclusions. I didn't say that I thought being a role model was the best course of action, only that such a theory could be given reasonable consideration. It seemed to me that you, in common with many others, assume that because utilitarianism has to do with overall utility of a community, that it implies some sort of redistribution system, shifting utility from those who have it to those who don't. That may be the best way to improve overall utility but it may not. This left of centre approach is not implicit in utilitarianism.
Finally, of course, 'a starving child' will benefit more from direct help. But we are not concerned with one child, we are concerned with all children and adults, presumably, in the long run. If my example helps to motivate many people to improve the quality of their lives then providing it may indeed be the best course of action.