Social Theory and Practice

Volume 37, Issue 2, April 2011

Suzy Killmister
Pages 227-255

Group-Differentiated Rights and the Problem of Membership

Justifications of group-differentiated rights commonly overlook a crucial practical consideration: if rights are to be allocated on the basis of group membership, how should we determine which individuals belong to which group? Assuming that social identities are fixed and transparent runs the risk of creating further injustices, whilst acknowledging that social groups are porous and heterogeneous runs the risk of rendering group-differentiated rights impracticable. In this paper, I develop a schema for determining group membership that avoids both horns of this dilemma.