Here are links to my published and working papers
Published Papers
Parental Licensing as Harm Reduction, Health Care Analysis, 28, 2020, 424-433. OPEN ACCESS
Sufficientarianism, Philosophy Compass, 15 (11), 2020, 1-10. OPEN ACCESS
Sufficiency Principle, International Encyclopedia of Ethics, LaFollette, Hugh (ed.) (2013). The International Encyclopedia of Ethics. Wiley-Blackwell. Wiley Online Library: https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/book/10.1002/9781444367072
“Parental Rights and the Importance of Being Parents”, Critical Review of International Social and Political Philosophy, 22 (2), 2019, 119-133.
Author’s version for download Link to published version
“Reply to Critics”, Law Ethics and Philosophy, 5 (2018), 210-230.
Link to open access published version
“Private School, College Admissions and the Value of Education”, forthcoming in Journal of Applied Philosophy, 35 (2), 2018.
Author’s version for download Link to published version
“How Bad Can a Good Enough Parent Be?”, Canadian Journal of Philosophy, 46 (2), 2016
Author’s version for download Link to published version
“Some Questions (and Answers) for Sufficientarians” in Fourie, C. and Rid, A. (ed.s) How Much Is Enough? Sufficiency and Thresholds in Health Care, Oxford University Press, 2016
Authors version for download Link to published version
“From Rawlsian Autonomy to Sufficient Opportunity in Education”, Politics, Philosophy & Economics 14.1 (2015): 53-66. DOI: 10.1177/1470594X13505413
Author’s version for download Link to published version
“The Prospects for Sufficientarianism”, Utilitas 24.1 (2012): 101-117
Author’s version for download Link to published version
Book Reviews
“Review of Harry G. Frankfurt’s ‘On Inequality'”, Disputatio
Working Papers
Abstract: in this paper I argue that upper-limit sufficientarianism suffers from a major problem stemming from its distinctive indifference to supra-threshold distributions. I argue that supra-threshold distributions must either be relevant justice or irrelevant to justice, but facing up to this distinction shows that upper-limit sufficientarian face a dilemma. Either supra-threshold distributions are relevant to justice, and the indifference to those distributions is incoherent or supra-threshold distributions are irrelevant to justice, and indifference to those distributions is trivial as it is not a matter of justice nor is it a contested claim.
Children as Public Goods at what cost
Abstract: The question of whether and how the costs of public goods should be shared has pre-occupied scholars in politics, philosophy, and economics. One set of scholars looking at normative cost-sharing arguments has focused on the principle of fair play as the basis for cost sharing. So far political philosophers have focused on the question of who, and more precisely, the question of whether non-producer beneficiaries can be required to share these costs. However, the neglected question of How much? is at least as important, since it determines how generous sharing, and therefore how extensive taxation and transfer policies can be. In this paper I examine this approach to sharing the cost of public goods in terms of how it leads us to answer the question of How much? I argue that the producer-beneficiary logic of the approach places strict limits on the total costs to be fairly shared by non-producers, and casts doubt on the prospects of grounding generous support via a welfare state. I suggest that those who wish to defend generous support for public goods must look elsewhere for arguments.
Fairness, University Admissions, and Contextual Data
Abstract:The fairness of university admissions is a hotly debated topic, but there is an important gap between philosophical theories of equality of opportunity that might ground fairness, empirical studies that measure it, and practical policies that might advance it. In this paper, I ask what normative principle could underpin fairness in university admissions and justify the increasing use of contextual data at British universities. I will argue that the use of contextual data in university admissions is best grounded in a revised version of Rawls principle of Fair Equality of Opportunity, which I call Non-Ideal Fair Equality of Opportunity, and based on this principle I suggest changes to the way contextual data is currently used by UK universities. The paper contributes to our understanding of the grounds of an important feature of the UK higher education policy landscape and sets out a novel understanding of equality of opportunity for addressing real world injustices.