Sex, Culture, and Justice: The Limits of Choice (16 page)

rejects any possibility of state neutrality, arguing that any supposedly neutral state will actually represent and enforce the dominant group’s perception. As such, she rejects Okin’s interpretation of Rawls’s origi- nal position as the view from everywhere, a place in which we imagine the position of every individual and, in taking it into account in our deliberations about justice, affirm its worth. This approach fails, for Young, because it is impossible for us to do: the assumption that one can ‘‘empathize with the feelings and perspectives of others differently situated . . . denies the difference among subjects. To be sure, subjects are not opaque to one another, their difference is not absolute. But especially when class, race, ethnicity, gender, sexuality, and age define different social locations, one subject cannot fully empathize with an- other in a different social location, adopt her point of view.’’
69

Young is right to point out that it is difficult for us to empathize with others when we are embedded in our particular experiences. How- ever, it is much easier to take on another’s point of view for the pur- poses of designing fair political institutions than it is to affirm and value their different, alien experiences and culture. The former simply requires that we say ‘‘imagine if I were a person with way of life X; I would want the state to enable me to pursue X.’’ We can do this no matter our normative view of X: even a repugnant X can be thought through in this way. Thus, barring fanaticism,
70
even someone with a strong religious view that homosexuality is wrong, for example, can see that
if
they were a homosexual person without such a religious belief,
then
they would want the state to allow homosexuality and outlaw dis- crimination. It would surely be much harder (though not impossible) for such a person to prioritize fairness and conclude that such state action would be desirable, and even more difficult for that person to recognize and affirm the
value
of homosexuality over and above main- taining a tolerant attitude toward it. The empathy that liberal neutrality requires is technical or philosophical, a matter of conducting a thought-experiment; Young’s affirmative empathy requires that we place our hearts and minds behind ways of life that we might find at best unfamiliar and at worst repugnant, and is thus much more implausible.
71

69. Ibid., 105.

1. The canonical discussion of fanaticism is found in R. M. Hare,
   Moral Thinking.
   

2. Jean Cohen similarly distinguishes between affirming the value of the substance of others’ ways of life and respecting the equal basic liberties and equal citizenship status of
   

   Second, it is both impossible and undesirable for us to affirm pub- licly all group experiences over and above stating that we allow them to persist (the claim of liberal state neutrality). It is impossible because, in order to have any meaning, affirmation must be based on a set of values that are substantive and thus exclusionary. We are not affirming anything if we say ‘‘I affirm your experience because I have to,’’ or ‘‘I affirm your experience because I affirm all experiences.’’ In order for the affirmation to be meaningful, it must have reasons attached: ‘‘I affirm your culture because it produces beautiful art forms,’’ or ‘‘be- cause it contributes to the flourishing of its members,’’ or ‘‘because you have chosen it and I value your capacity to choose,’’ for example. In providing such reasons, we necessarily imply that we do not value cultures that do not have these valuable attributes, or to the extent that they do not: we will have to be less affirming of those cultures which produce no art, impede their members’ flourishing, and impose them- selves on their members.
   72
   Of course, it is also
   desirable
   that we are less affirmative of such cultures, for human flourishing, choice, and art are of central importance to any society.
   

   As I argued earlier, the fact that a standpoint is not and cannot be neutral does not mean that it has no relevance outside the context of its origin. Any theory of what we should do about the fact of difference must in one sense deny difference, for it must exclude other such theo- ries. Even Young’s politics of difference excludes, and thereby fails to affirm, the politics of assimilation, along with the attitude toward dif- ference of such politics as fascism or religious fundamentalism. These theories could be cashed out in the currency of group differences: we could talk about the culture and experiences of comprehensive liberals, Nazis, or the Taliban, all of which the politics of difference fails to affirm. It cannot be a criticism of a theory simply to say that it excludes some alternatives. Thus Young’s observation that state neutrality is not neutral but in fact represents a particular standpoint does not in itself suffice to show that all attempts to combine universal values with a concern for fairness must necessarily fail. Instead, we need to recog- nize the political and public significance of group difference while
   

   

   others. As I do, Cohen argues that the latter and not the former is a requirement of justice (
   Regulating Intimacy
   , 82).
   

3. Charles Taylor makes a similar argument in ‘‘The Politics of Recognition,’’ 68–70. He concludes: ‘‘In this form, the demand for equal recognition is unacceptable’’ (71).
   

   maintaining a critical standpoint. Not all difference is compatible with justice, and not all cultural experiences can be affirmed.
   

   Fraser and Transformative Group Identities
   

   The question of group difference has not, then, been resolved. On the one hand, it is crucial to recognize that injustice can be group-based, such that a simple focus on individual outcomes is insufficient. On the other hand, it is individuals who must be the unit of ultimate concern, and who must be protected from their groups where necessary.
   

   Nancy Fraser suggests a solution to this dilemma. She criticizes both the purely redistributive concerns of many liberals and the exclu- sive focus on recognition of many multiculturalist theorists. Fraser points out that injustice can be either socioeconomic (as is suffered by the working class, for example) or cultural/symbolic (as is suffered by homosexuals). Moreover, these forms of injustice can be intertwined, as in the case of gender: women suffer from both socioeconomic disad- vantage, often related to women’s supposedly greater responsibility for childcare, and symbolic disadvantage, related to the representation of women as inferior in various ways. However, Fraser points out that groups who suffer from both forms of injustice (she terms such groups ‘‘bivalent’’) face serious problems in remedying that injustice: while the solution to socioeconomic injustice is to minimize differences between groups, the solution to cultural/symbolic injustice is to emphasize and affirm those differences.
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   If we attempt to remedy gender injustice, then, we face a dilemma: do we emphasize that women are just the same as men and so deserve equal socioeconomic rights, or do we stress that women have different qualities from men, qualities that merit respect? The former is prob- lematic because it takes the male as norm and regards as inferior every- thing that is not male, the latter risks justifying persistent unequal treatment of women in the workplace and elsewhere.
   

   As a solution to this conundrum, Fraser argues that we must distin- guish between affirmative and transformative remedies for injustice. Affirmative remedies tackle inequality between groups without under- mining the differences between those groups. What Fraser terms ‘‘mainstream multiculturalism’’ is a good example of this approach, as
   

4. Fraser,
   Justice Interruptus
   , 16.
   

it ‘‘proposes to redress disrespect by revaluing unjustly devalued group identities, while leaving intact both the contents of those identities and the group differentiations that underlie them.’’
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Transformative reme- dies, on the other hand, tackle injustice precisely by reconfiguring the group differences that generate the injustice. As such, all group and individual identities are adjusted. Queer politics, for example, aim to destabilize fixed categories of sexuality and replace them with a more fluid, indeterminate notion of sexual desire.

Fraser argues that, for bivalent groups, injustice is best tackled through transformation, as transformation is the method best able to cope with the competing demands of redistribution and recognition. Fraser’s work thus directly calls into question the desirability of the affirmation of group differences, even when the relevant groups are not in themselves problematic from a liberal normative point of view (that is, even when groups do not threaten the equality and autonomy of their members). Fraser points out that, if groups are to achieve both kinds of equality, then it is to their own detriment if they emphasize their difference, for this emphasis calls into question their socioeco- nomic equality. To take an example: in Chapter 4, I consider Barry’s argument that women might simply choose disproportionately to enter lower-paid jobs and that if they did so, there would be no need to at- tempt to equalize the salaries of women and men. Fraser’s work sug- gests that this argument could be understood as a claim for recognition undermining a claim for redistribution: if we emphasize women’s dif- ference, and thus their tendency systematically to make different choices, it is harder to resist the conclusion that subsequent socioeco- nomic inequality is just.

Fraser’s analysis is helpful because it enables us to deconstruct argu- ments such as Barry’s and to see the limits of attempts to affirm group differences. It also provides a critique of Young, in two ways. First, Fraser points out that ‘‘the politics of difference may be less globally applicable than Young thinks’’
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—only groups that suffer from pure injustice of recognition will best be served by it, and there are relatively few such groups (homosexuals are Fraser’s paradigmatic example). Second, Fraser shows that Young’s account focuses on redistribution much more than Young explicitly admits, so that Young does not in

74. Ibid., 24. 75. Ibid., 200.

fact want to confine her approach to cases of pure recognition, and the politics of difference will fail to achieve the goal it sets itself of rectify- ing all forms of injustice.

Fraser’s account is useful and insightful. It is also suggestive, and has formed the basis for much feminist research, perhaps in part be- cause her own prescriptions are relatively vague.
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One potential prob- lem is that we have good reasons to suspect that a suitably eclectic and transformational solution to injustice may not work: by its nature, any solution will be complex, radical, unfamiliar, and difficult to put into practice. Fraser is aware of this problem. Thus she states that if the transformation of group identities she advocates is to be ‘‘psychologi- cally and politically feasible,’’ then ‘‘all people [must] be weaned from their attachment to current cultural constructions of their interests and identities.’’
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As Fraser observes in a footnote: ‘‘This has always been the problem with socialism. Although cognitively compelling, it is ex- perientially remote.’’
78
It is indeed difficult to see how we could put Fraser’s prescriptions into practice, for they seem to imply that all group identities must be broken down, and all human experience be reconceptualized as a shifting, unstable, unordered collection of per- formances or experiments. Such a vision has a family resemblance to the notion of universal autonomy, but is much less plausible and possi- bly desirable than even the Socratic notion of constant and active self- scrutiny of which liberals such as Barry and Nussbaum are suspicious. It is a world away from the notion of autonomy as the genuine ability to choose and assess one’s way of life that informs this book.

Another problem with Fraser’s approach is that it contains incon- sistencies—perhaps unsurprisingly, given that it aims to reconcile competing paradigms. Thus her advocacy of the transformation of identities just described conflicts with her defense of subaltern count- erpublics in the context of democratic deliberation. As regards the lat- ter, Fraser argues that stratified multicultural societies best meet the requirements of justice by accommodating competing minority groups. Moreover, these groups must be allowed to form their own spheres of deliberation, ‘‘arenas for deliberation among themselves about their needs, objectives, and strategies.’’
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Such counterpublics

1. See, for example, Fraser,
   Justice Interruptus
   , 204, and Fraser, ‘‘Pragmatism, Feminism, and the Linguistic Turn,’’ 166–68.
   

2. Fraser,
   Justice Interruptus
   , 31. 78. Ibid., 39 n. 46.
   

79. Ibid., 81.

clearly serve to entrench, not transform, group identity and difference. Moreover, Fraser is not contrasting the use of subaltern counterpublics in cases of recognitional injustice with the use of transformation in cases of combined recognitional/redistributive injustice, for she cites women as an example of both a paradigmatic group facing intertwined injustice and a group that has benefited from the use of the feminist subaltern counterpublic. We are thus left with a contradiction.