Equality, Capability and Human Rights
Summary
TLDRThe speaker discusses the capability approach, developed by economist Amartya Sen, emphasizing its role in integrating equality and human rights. They introduce key concepts like substantive freedom and capability, and how it values individual lives over collectives. The talk covers the equality measurement framework, which uses this approach to assess inequality in various life areas. Criticisms such as individualism, idealism, and lack of specificity are addressed, along with the framework's strengths in promoting policy change.
Takeaways
- 📚 The capability approach is a framework for understanding and addressing injustice, focusing on what individuals are enabled to do and be.
- 👧 The approach captures various forms of injustice, such as a schoolgirl unable to participate in a trip due to financial constraints, highlighting inequality of outcome and opportunity.
- 👴 It also considers constraints on choice and control, like an elderly person receiving home care with no say in their meal choices or schedule.
- 🏢 The capability approach acknowledges discrimination and lack of respect, exemplified by a gay couple being refused a hotel room.
- 🌟 Developed by philosopher and economist Amartya Sen, the capability approach emphasizes substantive freedom, or the freedom to achieve important things in life.
- 🔑 The concept of 'capability' is central, referring to what an individual is enabled to be and do, influenced by personal characteristics, social context, resources, rights, and societal structures.
- 🔄 The approach promotes integration of equality and human rights by aligning values such as fairness, respect, equality, dignity, and autonomy.
- 📊 It accounts for variations in need between individuals, suggesting that different people may require different resources to achieve the same standard of living.
- 🌈 The capability approach is multidimensional, incorporating both objective and subjective outcomes, such as housing security and self-respect.
- 📈 The equality measurement framework applies the capability approach to monitor inequality and human rights, using international human rights frameworks to guide the selection of capabilities.
- 🏛 It critiques traditional income inequality measures for not considering differences in need and instead evaluates equality of outcome, autonomy, and process.
Q & A
What is the capability approach?
-The capability approach is a theoretical framework developed by philosopher and economist Amartya Sen. It focuses on evaluating individual well-being in terms of the range of valuable 'functionings' a person can achieve, rather than just their resources or utilities.
How does the capability approach differ from traditional economic measures of well-being?
-The capability approach emphasizes 'substantive freedom' or the real freedom to achieve important things in life, contrasting with traditional measures that focus on income or utility. It considers individual capabilities as the key to evaluating well-being.
What are the three types of inequality that the capability approach identifies?
-The capability approach identifies three types of inequality: inequality of outcome, inequality of process, and inequality of autonomy. These refer to disparities in what people achieve, how they are treated, and the degree to which they can shape their circumstances, respectively.
How does the capability approach integrate considerations of equality and human rights?
-The capability approach integrates equality and human rights by focusing on the actual capabilities people have to lead the lives they value. It aligns with human rights principles such as fairness, respect, equality, dignity, and autonomy, and can be used to monitor compliance with human rights standards.
What is the Equality Measurement Framework and how does it relate to the capability approach?
-The Equality Measurement Framework is an application of the capability approach that was developed to monitor inequality and human rights. It uses a set of capabilities derived from international human rights instruments to evaluate the state of equality and human rights in a given context.
Why is the capability approach considered both a strength and a weakness for its multi-dimensionality?
-The capability approach is considered a strength for its multi-dimensionality because it can incorporate both objective and subjective outcomes, reflecting the complexity of human well-being. However, it is also seen as a weakness because it requires a significant amount of data and information across various domains of life, which can be challenging to gather.
How does the capability approach address the criticism that it is too individualistic?
-While the capability approach focuses on individual well-being, it does not ignore the role of communities, groups, and structures. It acknowledges that individual capabilities are shaped by various social and environmental factors, including family, community, and national/global contexts.
What are some of the practical applications of the capability approach mentioned in the script?
-The capability approach has been used by various organizations such as the Equality and Human Rights Commission for Great Britain, government equalities offices, Children's Commission in England, local governments, public service organizations like the NHS, and local equality networks.
How does the capability approach handle the criticism that it is too abstract or academic?
-The capability approach is grounded in a strong theoretical foundation, which allows it to be defended against charges of being arbitrary. However, there is an ongoing task to translate these abstract principles into concrete examples that are relevant to people's daily lives.
What are the potential radical implications of the capability approach if taken seriously?
-If the capability approach is taken seriously, particularly with an emphasis on equality of capability, it can highlight significant structural constraints on people's capabilities. This could lead to radical policy implications, challenging existing social and economic structures to ensure a more equitable distribution of capabilities.
Outlines
📚 Introduction to the Capability Approach
The speaker begins by introducing the capability approach and its potential role in integrating equality and human rights. They use hypothetical examples to illustrate different types of injustices such as a schoolgirl unable to afford a trip, an elderly person with limited choices in home care, and a gay couple denied a hotel room. These examples highlight issues of inequality, constraints on choice, and discrimination. The speaker then outlines the plan for the discussion, which includes an introduction to key concepts, using the capability approach to monitor inequality and human rights, its applications, addressing criticisms, and summarizing its strengths and weaknesses.
🌟 Key Concepts of the Capability Approach
The capability approach, developed by philosopher and economist Amartya Sen, is explained with a focus on substantive freedom, which is the freedom to achieve important things in life. This is contrasted with negative freedom, emphasizing the ability to participate in society and pursue personal goals. The term 'capability' is central, referring to what an individual is enabled to be and do, influenced by personal characteristics, social context, resources, rights, and societal structures. The approach is useful for thinking about equality and human rights as it promotes integration of values such as fairness, respect, equality, dignity, and autonomy.
🔍 The Equality Measurement Framework
The speaker discusses the equality measurement framework, an application of the capability approach, which involves identifying and prioritizing capabilities of concern. It accounts for variations in need between people, focusing on what individuals are enabled to do rather than just outcomes. The framework is multi-dimensional, incorporating both objective and subjective outcomes, and addresses three parts of equality: outcome, autonomy, and process. The framework uses characteristics protected under equality legislation for analysis and breaks down inequality into three components: outcome, process, and autonomy.
🌐 International Human Rights and Capabilities
The selection of capabilities in the equality measurement framework is guided by international human rights frameworks, resulting in 10 domains with extensive subdomains. These capabilities were identified through a deliberative consultation process involving the public, particularly groups at risk of discrimination. The capabilities were then translated into empirical measures, such as the percentage of different groups who have experienced violence. The framework has been used by various organizations to evaluate equality and human rights.
🤔 Criticisms and Interpretations of the Capability Approach
The speaker addresses criticisms of the capability approach, including its individualistic focus, potential distraction from wealth redistribution, and being seen as both idealistic and an apology for capitalism. They explain that while the approach is centered on individuals' lives, it does not ignore the role of communities and structures. The approach treats income as a means to an end, not an end in itself, and can have radical implications depending on its interpretation. The speaker emphasizes the importance of the analytical framework behind the capability approach in understanding how to expand capabilities.
🔗 Integrating Equality and Human Rights
The speaker summarizes the capability approach's potential for integrating equality and human rights. They acknowledge its informational demands, the potential weakening of the link to legally enforceable rights, and its academic and abstract nature. However, they also highlight its strengths, such as being multi-dimensional, grounded in theory, and adaptable to local contexts. The speaker concludes by inviting further discussion and providing a link for more information on the equality measurement framework.
Mindmap
Keywords
💡Capability Approach
💡Injustice
💡Substantive Freedom
💡Capabilities
💡Equality
💡Human Rights
💡Inequality of Outcome
💡Inequality of Process
💡Inequality of Autonomy
💡Disaggregation
💡Measurement Framework
Highlights
The capability approach is introduced as a tool for integrating equality and human rights approaches.
Three hypothetical examples are presented to illustrate different types of injustices.
The capability approach captures inequality of outcome, constraints on choice, and discrimination.
Substantive Freedom is defined as the freedom to achieve important things in life.
Capability is described as what an individual is enabled to be and do, influenced by personal characteristics, resources, rights, and societal structures.
The capability approach promotes the integration of equality and human rights by aligning values such as fairness, respect, and autonomy.
The approach accounts for variations in need between individuals, such as additional income for disabled persons.
Both objective and subjective outcomes are incorporated, such as housing and self-respect.
The concept of equality in the capability approach includes equality of outcome, autonomy, and process.
The equality measurement framework is an application of the capability approach for monitoring inequality and human rights.
The framework uses international human rights frameworks to guide the selection of capabilities.
The capability to live in physical security is translated into empirical measures, such as the percentage of people who've been victims of violence.
The equality measurement framework has been used by various organizations to evaluate equality and human rights.
Critics argue that the capability approach is too individualistic, ignoring the importance of groups and communities.
The approach is also criticized for potentially reducing the focus on wealth redistribution.
The capability approach is accused of being both hopelessly idealistic and an apology for capitalism.
The approach is informationally demanding, requiring extensive data gathering across various domains of life.
The capability approach is seen as both a weakness and strength for its lack of a pre-specified list of capabilities, allowing for adaptation.
Transcripts
I've been invited to talk about the
capability approach and what role it
might play in helping to integrate
equality and human rights approaches but
I thought it might help to start by
motivating our discussion with some
hypothetical examples of the types of
Injustice we might be interested in
trying to capture and indeed to
tackle the first example is a school
girl who's unable to participate in a
school trip but because her parents are
unable to afford it the second example
is an elderly person receiving home care
services but given no choice over what
the meal is that he receives or when he
receives it perhaps only being helped to
get out of bed in the morning uh as late
as 10:00 and then having the lunch
delivered at halfast
11 the third example a gay couple being
refused a double room in a hotel on the
grounds of not being married three very
different examples of injustices but all
ones that would be captured by a
capability approach in the first case
inequality of outcome and inequality of
opportunity for the school GR in the
second case constraints on choice and
control for the Home Care user and in
the third case a clear instance of
discrimination and a lack of respect on
grounds of
sexuality so what I'm I'm going to try
and cover today is the following first
of all an introduction to some of the
key Concepts in the capability approach
secondly how we might use the capability
approach to monitor inequality and human
rights through an application of the
equality measurement framework which
I'll say more about in a
minute thirdly some ways in which the
equality measurement framework in
particular and the capability approach
in general have been used in monitoring
equality and human
rights fourthly of course the capability
approach has its critics and its
weaknesses and I will discuss some of
those and what possible responses there
might
be finally I will summarize by talking
about the overall strengths and
weaknesses of the capability approach as
I see
it so first of all some of the key
Concepts the capability approach was
developed by philosopher and Economist
the mar sen who was subsequently awarded
a Nobel
Prize and the foundational concept is
the idea of substantive
Freedom substantive Freedom meaning
freedom to be able to achieve important
things in
life and the term substantive is used to
contrast it with negative Freedom or
mere Liberty so it's not about fre
freedom from interference it's not about
freedom from the state it's not about um
civil and political Liberties
alone it's about the freedom to be able
to participate in society and to pursue
your own
goals indeed it's sometimes been
described as flourishing or as having a
wide range of
capabilities the term capability itself
is of course key to understanding the
approach the capability is what you're
enabled to be and
do and that depends on your own
characteristics on the people around you
on the resources and services that you
draw on the rights you can access and
more broadly the institutions structures
and legal framework of
society so we might think about an
example the example of being able to
participate fully in school life being
able to decide what and when to eat
being able to go on holiday with your
partner without fear of being harassed
these would all be
capabilities so why might the capability
approach be a useful starting point for
thinking about equality and human rights
well first of all I think it does serve
as one tool to promote the integration
of equality in human human rights we can
see this at the integration of the level
of
values so the Freeda principles are
sometimes used in connection with human
rights the principles of fairness
respect equality dignity and
autonomy and those apply equally to the
human rights approach as to the
capability
approach secondly there's potential for
integration at the level of which areas
of life are of concern I'll explain a
bit more in a minute how that might work
but it's to do with the selection and
prioritization of which uh capabilities
we might be concerned
with another reason why the capability
approach is attractive I think is
because it takes account of variations
in need between
people because it focuses on what you're
enabled to do the
outcomes even if one person needs more
resources than
another that will be taken into into
account so a disabled person may need
additional income in order to achieve
the same standard of living as a
non-disabled
person capability equality is assessed
in terms of their achieved standard of
living the actual outcome that's of
importance to them a more traditional
focus on income inequality without
making allowance for differences in need
would in this case produce the wrong
answer so taking account of variations
in need I think is one of the attractive
features of the capability
approach another important feature is
the ability of the approach to
incorporate both objective and
subjective
outcomes so some valuable capabilities
are subjective happiness or self-respect
for example whilst others are more
objective like having somewhere warm and
dry to
live the capability approach doesn't
attempt to wrap everything up into a
single measure of well-being
it's inherently
multi-dimensional and that gives it the
potential to incorporate both both
objective and subjective
components another strength is the three
parts of the concept of equality which
we work with in the capability approach
and the measurement framework in
particular equality of outcome equality
of autonomy and equality of process the
three examples the three injustices that
I started with are examples of each of
those types of of
inequality and finally the capability
approach has a strong theoretical basis
which means that it can be non
arbitary it's easier to defend an
approach based on something like the
capability approach uh because it draws
on a very wide uh academic basis an
academic
Foundation
the equality measurement framework is an
application of the capability approach
developed by Polly vizard and myself in
collaboration with many others including
the equality and Human Rights Commission
for
Britain and this slide shows a number of
building blocks of the equality
measurement
framework in the first case are the
characteristics that we disaggregate or
all analysis uh as far as possible
by these are six of the characteristics
protected under equality legislation
plus social class one might also want to
look at particular intersections between
these characteristics and of course the
list can be expanded depending on the
particular focus of the analysis or the
context so in some instances it would be
very relevant to consider pregnancy for
example as an additional characteristic
for disaggregation
systematic disaggregation of this kind
is required for human rights monitoring
um as in the ohchr best practice on
monitoring human rights and that's
following on from the general
prohibition on discrimination embedded
in many human rights
instruments so that's the first building
block secondly we've got the concept of
inequality as I described just
previously the foundational concept is
one of substantive Freedom or a wide
capability set but of course you can't
directly monitor or evaluate substantive
Freedom what could that possibly really
mean in practice so in order to unpack
that we talk about three components of
inequality inequality of outcome
inequality of process and inequality of
autonomy outcome I think are reasonably
self-explanatory but by equality of
process we mean how people are treated
are they treated with dignity and
respect or are they subject to
discrimination the third component
autonomy and it's really about the
degree to which the individual
themselves has had a chance to shape
their
circumstances and the extent to which
they're consulted and have uh decisions
made with them and including them rather
than for
them there's of course a significant
question about which capabilities we
should include in an
analysis so the equality measurement
framework looked to the international
human rights Frameworks the
international human rights covenants in
order to guide the selection of
capabilities this produced the 10 Dem
domains listed on the slide and an
extensive list of subdomains under each
so for example we might take from the
human rights uh framework the
international Covenant on civil and
political rights the right to Liberty
and security of the person article
9 that then is translated into a
capability which is the capability to
live in physical
security and that translation took place
through a process of deliberative
consultation with around 200 uh
individuals members of the public so
those were uh both uh drawn randomly
from the
population and also oversampled uh
groups at particular risk of
discrimination and
disadvantage and we invited those people
in small groups to reflect on and
consider what they regarded as the most
important
capabilities to include in an evaluation
of equality and human rights in Britain
in the 21st
century and through a process of
iteration between the human rights
framework and the initial list of
capabilities we drawn up from that
framework and the deliberative
consultation we arrived at a
comprehensive list of
capabilities that goes to make up the uh
set of capabilities included in the
equality measurement framework
then in a final stage those capabilities
were translated through expert and
stakeholder consultation into specific
empirical measures so for example the
capability to live in physical security
identified from the international human
rights instruments and then subject to
the process of deliberative
consultation was translated amongst
other things into a measure of the
percentage of different gender ethnic
and social class groups who've been the
victims of violence uh over the past 12
months so this slide gives one example
of such a
measure and we can see that the types of
violence have been broken down into
mugging stranger violence acquaintance
violence and domestic violence and in
this case by uh social class
groups the those who've never worked and
who are long-term
unemployed have a much higher likelihood
of having experienced physical violence
in the past year than do those in the
higher managerial and professional
social
classes but the types of violence have
different patterns across the different
social class groups that's of course
also important to take into account the
data source here is the British crime
survey so it's not Reliant purely on
reported crime uh to the police the
equality measurement framework has a
number of applications and uses perhaps
perhaps the most significant is the
equality and Human Rights Commission for
Great Britain who've used the
measurement framework in their trienal
review and their quinquennial review to
report on the uh development of equality
and human rights the state of equality
and human rights in
Britain it's also been used by the
government equalities office uh under
the previous administration in
Britain by the Children's Commission in
England by local governments evaluating
equality in human rights at a local
level by some Public Service
organizations such as the uh NHS in some
areas of
England and by local equality networks
and pressure
groups but its wide use doesn't mean to
say it's without its criticisms or
weaknesses
and I'm going to go through now a number
of the key critiques of the capability
approach one that recurs very frequently
is the idea that the capability approach
is too
individualistic and there are perhaps
two variants of this
criticism the first is that the
capability approach ignores the
importance of groups and
communities the second version of the
individualism critique is that the
capability of approach ignores the
significance of structures and
institutions and I think the reason why
this criticism is recurrent is because
the capability approach does have a very
strong focus on the individual but what
I mean by that is that the capability
approach has at its heart the idea that
what's of value is the lives that
individuals are able to
lead and it puts that ahead of valuing
groups in themselves or communities or
cultures or any of the other
collectivities to which we belong but it
is in no sense individualistic in
ignoring the role that communities
groups families cultures have in shaping
the capabilities that individuals have
so yes the capability approach is
individualistic in terms of the holders
of value individuals uh but no it's not
individual istic in terms of its
analysis of what shapes individuals
lives so we can see this on the onion
diagram as I like to call it the
individual there right in the middle and
their characteristics are one of the
important Shapers of their capability
set but around them uh may be
family and that is both an enabler and a
constraint on
capabilities in different ways in
different cases around the family there
is a
community again that can be an enabler
or acting as a constraint on different
capabilities and we can think about the
community both in terms of uh religious
groups or other identity groups to which
the individual belongs but also a
geographical community in terms of local
Services more generally the local labor
market the infrastructure available to
an individual is a key determin
of their
capabilities beyond that of course the
national picture and indeed the global
where we need to take into account for
example migration flows trade agreements
indeed climate change so the individual
is nested within a whole series of
different layers of um capability
enhancers and capability constraints and
taking that into account when we unpick
and analyze observed differences in the
capability set of of different
individuals is of course entirely
crucial a different criticism of the
capability approach is that by through
its
multi-dimensionality it reduces the
focus on redistribution of wealth or
income from the rich to the poor so one
line of criticism is that it's a
distraction and that it allows wriggle
room for policy makers and others to um
reduce the focus on the hard objective
facts of the income
distribution I think there is a real
risk there and perhaps particularly in
times of austerity um with very
significant changes in the income
distribution it's important to retain a
clear focus on um
income but the capability approach I
think is useful in reminding us that
that income is a means to an end rather
than an end in itself and just as I
explained in relation to the example
earlier of the disabled person who may
need more resources in order to achieve
the same standard of living as a
non-disabled person so here when we're
talking about income I think it's
important to remember uh that different
incomes are needed by different people
in order to achieve the same valuable
outcome the same capability in the way
of standard of
living so the cap ility approach doesn't
ignore income but it treats income as a
means to an end a very important means
to an end and one that feeds into a very
wide range of capabilities in fact not
just that in the standard of living
domain the final two criticisms of the
capability approach that I want to
Canvas are in a sense Polar Opposites so
the capability approach is sometimes
accused of being hopelessly
idealistic and on the other hand it's
sometimes accused us of being an apology
for
capitalism and again there is Justice in
some ways in both of these
criticisms the capability approach
itself as developed by Martia sen is
open to quite a wide range of different
interpretations and it can be used to
justify some market-based inequalities
for
example in that sense it's correct that
it doesn't automatically in imply a
criticism of capitalism
itself on the other hand in other
interpretations if we take seriously an
idea of equality of capability and if we
look at the kinds of structural
constraints that operate on people's
capabilities it can have really quite
radical
implications so I think the important
thing to note here is that it's all in
the interpretation and that as with any
tool it can be put to a range of uses
some more radical than others the
analytical framework that lies behind
the capability approach our
understanding of what constrains
capabilities and what levers we can pull
in order to expand capabilities is key
in understanding how the approach can be
taken forward in policy
terms so to try and summarize some of
what I've said today then about the
capability approach and its potential
for integrating equality and human
rights approaches
is one weakness is that the capability
approach is informationally demanding by
which I mean that if one is to take a
very multi-dimensional approach and look
for evidence across a whole different
range of domains of an individual's life
then look to disaggregate that
systematically by gender age disability
religion and belief and so on that means
an awful lot of of data Gathering an
awful lot of information is requ re ired
and that can be
challenging but I think on the other
side the fact that it is genuinely
multi-dimensional and doesn't seek to
combine apples and pears into an overall
index something called subjective
well-being say or simply a measure of uh
GDP or resources is itself a
strength particularly people coming from
a human rights background and especially
a legal human rights background are
sometimes concerned that using a
capability approach weakens the link
with legally enforcable and specific
rights and again I think to a certain
extent that is true although some uh
some human rights are at least in in
principle enforcable under domestic and
international law capabilities are not
linked article by article and hence are
not directly actionable it moves us one
step away from a purely legal
framework I think there are ways in
which one can link it back through two
specific legal uh rights and indeed the
human rights measurement framework uh
that poly vizard developed alongside the
equality measurement framework uh has
done exactly that but by itself
capabilities are not do not have share
that that direct link uh to legally
enforcable
rights
on the other hand because it does draw
both on human rights principles human
rights values and on human rights
Frameworks in terms of identifying the
capabilities that should be a priority
some versions of the capability approach
specifically for example the equality
measurement framework do I think serve
to help to integrate equality and human
rights thinking and
perspectives another weakness of the cas
capability approach that may be seen is
that it's too academic too abstract too
far removed from people's daily
lives the the flip side of that I think
is that it is well grounded
theoretically and so can be defended
against charges of being arbitrary
perhaps more easily than some other
approaches but there is a task to be
done in terms of translating these more
abstract principles into really concrete
examp examples such perhaps as those
that I started the talk with
today finally it may be seen as a
weakness of the capability approach that
it's underspecified Although our
application the equality measurement
framework has developed a comprehensive
list of capabilities and indeed measures
to set against those
capabilities the capability approach
itself in a Martis s's version has no
spec pre-specified list of
capabilities and in that case it is open
to a number of different
interpretations but that very openness
does mean that there's plenty of room
for adaptation to local context and
indeed more participatory bottom up
approaches to uh defining a capability
list uh and putting the capability
approach to pract into practice in a
particular setting and
circumstances well thank you very much
for watching and thank you for your time
please do feel free to get in touch with
me to follow up and continue the
discussion I'd love to hear what your uh
questions and comments are uh and I hope
I may have a chance to do so in the
future if you want more information uh
there are Publications and further
details of the equality equality
measurement framework um at this link
here or you can simply search for
equality capability and human rights
Thank you very very
much
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