Health and justice in our non-ideal world

Gopal Sreenivasan
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Gopal Sreenivasan: University of Toronto, Canada, gopal.sreenivasan@utoronto.ca

Politics, Philosophy & Economics, 2007, vol. 6, issue 2, 218-236

Abstract: In this article, I explore some advantages of viewing well-being in terms of an individual's health status. Principally, I argue that this perspective makes it easier to establish that rich countries at least have an obligation to transfer 1 percent of their GDP to poor countries. If properly targeted at the fundamental determinants of health in developing countries, this transfer would very plausibly yield a disproportionate `bang for the buck' in terms of individual well-being. This helps to explain how the obligation can be both light enough in its burden on the rich to avoid being `too demanding' and yet also bountiful enough in its effects to be worthy of the status of a `minimum obligation'. The advantages I enunciate are particularly relevant to establishing an obligation in the context of a non-ideal theory of international justice, which aims to set interim targets for practical action before an ideal theory has been settled.

Keywords: health; international justice; foreign aid; determinants of health; non-ideal theory (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2007
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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:sae:pophec:v:6:y:2007:i:2:p:218-236

DOI: 10.1177/1470594X07077273

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