Intergenerational Justice

Is it fair to leave the next generation a public debt? Is it defensible to impose legal rules on them through constitutional constraints? From combating climate change to ensuring proper funding for future pensions, concerns about ethics between generations are everywhere. In this volumesixteen philosophers explore intergenerational justice. Part One examines the ways in which various theories of justice look at the matter. These include libertarian, Rawlsian, sufficientarian, contractarian, communitarian, Marxian and reciprocity-based approaches. In Part Two, the authors look morespecifically at issues relevant to each of these theories, such as motivation to act fairly towards future generations, the population dimension, the formation of preferences through education and how they impact on our intergenerational obligations, and whether it is fair to rely on constitutionaldevices.

Axel Gosseries is a Permanent Research Fellow at the Belgian Fund for Scientific Research (FRS), based at the Chaire Hoover d'ethique economique et sociale (Université catholique de Louvain). He also lectures at the universities of Louvain and St-Louis (Brussels).

Lukas Meyer is Assistenzprofessor fur Praktische Philosophie at the University of Bern, Switzerland.

Introduction: Intergenerational Justice and Its Challenges, Axel Gosseries and Lukas H. Meyer
Part I : Theories
1. Identity and Obligation in a Transgenerational Polity, Janna Thompson
2. Libertarian Theories of Intergenerational Justice, Hillel Steiner & Peter Vallentyne
3. A Contract on Future Generations?, Stephen M. Gardiner
4. Three Models of Intergenerational Reciprocity, Axel Gosseries
5. Exploitation and Future Generations, Christopher Bertram
6. A Value or an Obligation? Rawls on Justice to Future Generations, David Heyd
7. A Trans-Generational Difference Principle, Daniel Attas
8. Enough for the Future, Lukas H. Meyer and Dominic Roser
Part II : Specific Issues
9. Wronging Future People, Rahul Kumar
10. What Motivates Us to Care for the (Distant) Future?, Dieter Birnbacher
11. Preference Formation and Intergenerational Justice, Krister Bykvist
12. Egalitarianism and Population Change, Gustaf Arrhenius
13. Intergenerational Justice, Human Needs, and Climate Policy, Clark Wolf
14. The Problem of a Perpetual Constitution, Victor M. Muniz-Fraticelli