Thomas Pogge argues that affluent people in the developing world have contribution-based duties to help protect the poor. And it follows from Pogge's most general thesis that affluent people are contributing to most, if not all, instances of global poverty. In this article I explore two problems with Pogge's general thesis. First, I investigate a typical way in which affluent people would be contributing to global poverty according to Pogge: that affluent countries use their superior bargaining power to get poor (...) countries to accept trading schemes that are unduly favourable to the affluent. I suggest that this type of relation is best understood as exploitation, and that Pogge's general thesis is better understood as a thesis about how affluent people exploit poor people rather than about how they contribute to poverty. Second, I argue that the exploitation does not have the normative content of doing harm. Although exploiting people is often morally wrong, it is not at all clear how demanding exploitation-based duties are. (shrink)

There are two opposing views concerning intuitive cases of wage exploitation. The first denies that they are cases of exploitation at all. It is based on the nonworseness claim: there is nothing wrong with a discretionary mutually beneficial employment relationship. The second is the reasonable view: some employment relationships can be exploitative even if employers have no duty towards their employees. This article argues that the reasonable view does not completely defeat defences of wage exploitation, because these do not rely (...) solely on the nonworseness claim. They also rely on the idea, popularised by Alan Wertheimer, that exploitation is a form of disequilibrium price occurring in defective markets. The article then proceeds to criticise Wertheimer’s account through neoclassical, new institutional, and Austrian economics. It concludes that considerations for economic efficiency are irrelevant to assessing intuitions regarding exploitation. (shrink)

ABSTRACTThe responsibility of the food and beverage industry for noncommunicable diseases is a controversial topic. Public health scholars identify the food and beverage industry as one of the main contributors to the rise of these diseases. We argue that aside from moral duties like not doing harm and respecting consumer autonomy, the food industry also has a responsibility for addressing the structural injustices involved in food-related health problems. Drawing on the work of Iris Marion Young, this article first shows how (...) food-related public health problems can be understood as structural injustices. Second, it makes clear how the industry is sustaining these health injustices, and that due to this connection, corporate actors share responsibility for addressing food-related health problems. Finally, three criteria are discussed as grounds for attributing responsibility, allowing for further specification on what taking responsibility for food-related health problems can entail in corporate practice. (shrink)

Whether an action is morally right depends upon the alternative acts available to the agent. Actualists hold that what an agent would actually do determines her moral obligations. Possibilists hold that what an agent could possibly do determines her moral obligations. Both views face compelling criticisms. Despite the fact that actualist and possibilist assumptions are at the heart of seminal arguments in business ethics, there has been no explicit discussion of actualism and possibilism in the business ethics literature. This paper (...) has two primary goals. First, it aims to rectify this omission by bringing to light the importance of the actualism/possibilism debate for business ethics through questions about the ethics of sweatshops. Second, it aims to make some progress in the sweatshop debate by examining and defending an alternative view, hybridism, and describing the moral and practical implications of hybridism for the sweatshop debate. (shrink)

This paper contributes to business ethics by focusing on consumption that is characterized by normative violence. By drawing on the work of Judith Butler this study of kajer lok—a female subaltern group of Indian domestic service providers—and their higher status clients shows how codes of status-based consumption shaped by markets, class, caste, and patriarchy create a social order that reduces kajer lok to “ungreivable” lives. Our study contributes to business ethics by focusing on exploitation and coercion in consumption rather than (...) in production and of woman rather than of men. It adds to consumer research by revealing how social distinctions not only manifest in status contests in which symbolic power is at stake but also may produce violent exploitation and ungrievable lives. (shrink)

The concept of exploitation and potentially exploitative real-world practices are the subject of increasing philosophical attention. However, while philosophers have extensively debated what exploitation is and what makes it wrong, they have said surprisingly little about what might be required to remediate it. By asking how the consequences of exploitation should be addressed, this article seeks to contribute to filling this gap. We raise two questions. First, what are the victims of exploitation owed by way of remediation? Second, who ought (...) to remediate? Our answers to these questions are connected by the idea that exploitation cannot be fully remediated by redistributing the exploiter's gain in order to repair or compensate the victim's loss. This is because exploitation causes not only distributive but also relational harm. Therefore, redistributive measures are necessary but not sufficient for adequate remediation. Moreover, this relational focus highlights the fact that exploitative real-world practices commonly involve agents other than the exploiter who stand to benefit from the exploitation. Insofar as these third parties are implicated in the distributive and relational harms caused by exploitation, there is, we argue, good reason to assign part of the burden of remediation to them. (shrink)

Many believe that employment can be wrongfully exploitative, even if it is consensual and mutually beneficial. At the same time, it may seem third parties should not do anything to preclude or eliminate such arrangements, given these same considerations of consent and benefit. I argue that there are perfectly sensible, intuitive ethical positions that vindicate this ‘Reasonable View’. The view requires such defense because the literature often suggests that there is no theoretical space for it. I respond to arguments for (...) the clearest symptom of this obscuration: the so-called nonworseness claim that a consensual, mutually beneficial transaction cannot be ‘morally worse’ than its absence. In addition to making space for the Reasonable View, this serves my dialectical goal of encouraging distinct attention to first- and third-party obligations. (shrink)

Research Articles Matt Zwolinski, Social Philosophy and Policy, FirstView Article.

In this review, I survey theoretical accounts of exploitation in business, chiefly through the example of low wage or sweatshop labor. This labor is associated with wages that fall below a living wage standard and include long working hours. Labor of this kind is often described as self-evidently exploitative and immoral (Van Natta 1995). But for those who defend sweatshop labor as the first rung on a ladder toward greater economic development, the charge that sweatshop labor is self-evidently exploitative fails (...) adequately to explain the nature of the alleged wrongdoing. While all sides might agree that poor working conditions are unfortunate and undesirable, defenders of sweatshop labor argue that they provide the best available employment alternative for some workers and the best chance at economic development for many low and middle income countries (LMICs). Some defenders of sweatshop labor even embrace the label of exploitation. <br><br>Unless there is a clear, widely understood account by which exploitation is a moral wrong, then charging a practice as exploitative will do little to advance debates over whether and why a practice is morally problematic. A considerable body of work has been developed applying a growing literature on exploitation to sweatshop labor. While many forms of moral wrong are associated with sweatshop labor, I will focus specifically on the worry that low wages allow relatively wealthy employers wrongfully to take advantage of or gain from relatively poor workers, especially in LMICs. In particular, I will focus on instances of alleged exploitation in employment relationships that are voluntary and mutually beneficial. I have two reasons for doing so. First, by restricting this review to voluntary and mutually beneficial instances of exploitation, I can isolate the moral wrong of exploitation from other moral wrongs, especially the wrongs of coercion and outright harms to workers. Second, the focus on mutually beneficial and voluntary relationships will allow for arguments that sweatshop labor is not only not exploitative, but is a morally praiseworthy means of helping to encourage economic growth in poor areas of the world and to provide jobs that pay better and are more stable than any existing alternatives.<br><br>In this review, I aim to accomplish three goals. First, I will provide an overview of the many different uses of the charge of exploitation in business practice through an examination of the uses of the term in the literature on sweatshop labor. While it is often not clear what kind of moral wrong is assumed to take place when the charge of exploitation is used, I will demonstrate that many distinct types of exploitation, connected to distinct moral wrongs, are used in the literature on sweatshop labor and elsewhere in business ethics. Specifically, I will identify two broad categories of exploitation—exploitation as unfairness and exploitation as the mere use of others—with subgroups under each main category of exploitation. Second, I will discuss which of these senses of exploitation are defensible as identifying clear moral wrongs that take place in the context of business and, specifically, sweatshop labor. As I will argue, not all uses of the charge of exploitation are capable of persuasively identifying clear moral wrongs. Moreover, there is not a single, clear type of exploitation that takes place in business but, rather, several distinct forms. Third, I will apply the lessons learned from my exploration of exploitation in sweatshop labor to other specific areas of business. As I will argue, there are multiple viable models of exploitation in the sweatshop literature that can illuminate exploitative practices of relatively well compensated employees, customers, suppliers, and entire communities. <br><br>While discussions of theories of exploitation tend to argue for a single, correct account of this moral wrong, my review of the literature on exploitation in sweatshop labor supports the conclusion that there are multiple defensible accounts of the moral wrong of exploitation. For this reason, those who would charge that a relationship is exploitative should specify the form of exploitation that they believe is taking place. (shrink)

There are two opposing views concerning intuitive cases of wage exploitation. The first denies that they are cases of exploitation at all. It is based on the nonworseness claim: there is nothing wrong with a discretionary mutually beneficial employment relationship. The second is the reasonable view: some employment relationships can be exploitative even if employers have no duty towards their employees. This article argues that the reasonable view does not completely defeat defences of wage exploitation, because these do not rely (...) solely on the nonworseness claim. They also rely on the idea, popularised by Alan Wertheimer, that exploitation is a form of disequilibrium price occurring in defective markets. The article then proceeds to criticise Wertheimer’s account through neoclassical, new institutional, and Austrian economics. It concludes that considerations for economic efficiency are irrelevant to assessing intuitions regarding exploitation. (shrink)

Politics, Philosophy & Economics, Volume 21, Issue 3, Page 249-268, August 2022. When skilled individuals emigrate from developing states to developed states, they leave a burdened state behind and bring their valuable human capital to a state that enjoys vast advantages by comparison. Most of the normative debate to date on this so-called ‘brain drain’ has focused on the duties that skilled emigrants owe to their home state after they emigrate. This article shifts the focus to the question of whether (...) their host state acquires special duties toward their home state and argues for an affirmative answer to that question. After identifying the conditions under which ‘exploitative free-riding’ can occur, the article shows that the brain drain is a case of exploitation that gives rise to special duties of compensation for developed host states. (shrink)

Mutually beneficial exchanges in markets can be exploitative because one party takes advantage of an underlying injustice. For instance, employers of sweatshop workers are often accused of exploiting the desperate conditions of their employees, although the latter accept the terms of their employment voluntarily. A weakness of this account of exploitation is its tendency for over-inclusiveness. Certainly, given the prevalence of global and domestic socioeconomic inequalities, not all exchanges that take place against background injustices should be considered exploitative. This paper (...) offers a framework to identify exploitation in mutually beneficial exchange, focusing on the case of sweatshop labor. It argues that an employer can be viewed as taking unfair advantage of an underlying injustice if and only if the employer’s surplus from the exchange in the unjust state of affairs exceeds the surplus it could maximally obtain in a just state of affairs. The paper illustrates the applicability of this framework using three different conceptions of justice and argues that it is superior to microlevel accounts of exploitation that regard background justice as irrelevant. The paper concludes by describing some normative implications that follow from judging an exchange exploitative. (shrink)

Sweatshop labour is sometimes defended from critics by arguments that stress the voluntariness of the worker’s choice, and the fact that sweatshops provide a source of income where no other similar source exists. The idea is if it is exploitation—as their opponents charge—it is mutually beneficial and consensual exploitation. This defence appeals to the non-worseness claim (NWC), which says that if exploitation is better for the exploited party than neglect, it cannot be seriously wrong. The NWC renders otherwise exploitative—and therefore (...) morally wrong—transactions permissible, making the exploitation of the global poor a justifiable path to development. In this paper, I argue that the use of NWC for the case of sweatshops is misleading. After reviewing and strengthening the exploitation claims made concerning sweatshops, most importantly by refuting certain allegations that a micro-unfairness account of exploitation cannot evaluate sweatshop labour as exploitative, I then argue that even if this practice may seem permissible due to benefits otherwise unavailable to the global poor, there remains a duty to address the background conditions that make this form of wrong-doing possible, which the NWC cannot accommodate. I argue that the NWC denies this by unreasonably limiting its scope and is therefore incomplete, and ultimately unconvincing. (shrink)

One common objection to establishing regulated live donor organ markets is that such markets would be exploitative. Perhaps surprisingly, exploitation arguments against organ markets have been widely rejected in the philosophical literature on the subject. It is often argued that concerns about exploitation should be addressed by increasing the price paid to organ sellers, not by banning the trade outright. I argue that this analysis rests on a particular conception of exploitation, and outline two additional ways that the charge of (...) exploitation can be understood. I argue that while increasing payments to organ sellers may mitigate or eliminate fair benefits exploitation, such measures will not necessarily address fair process exploitation or complicity in injustice. I further argue that each of these three forms of wrongdoing is relevant to the ethics of paid living organ donation, as well as the design of public policy more generally. (shrink)

Preventing exploitation in human subjects research requires a benchmark of fairness against which to judge the distribution of the benefits and burdens of a trial. This paper proposes the ideal market and its fair market price as a criterion of fairness. The ideal market approach is not new to discussions about exploitation, so this paper reviews Wertheimer's inchoate presentation of the ideal market as a principle of fairness, attempt of Emanuel and colleagues to apply the ideal market to human subjects (...) research, and Ballantyne's criticisms of both the ideal market and the resulting benchmark of fairness. It argues that the criticism of this particular benchmark is on point, but the rejection of the ideal market is mistaken. After presenting a complete account of the ideal market, this paper proposes a new method for applying the ideal market to human subjects research and illustrates the proposal by considering a sample case. (shrink)

During the last decade, scholarly criticism of sweatshops has grown increasingly sophisticated. This article reviews the new moral and economic foundations of these criticisms and argues that they are flawed. It seeks to advance the debate over sweatshops by noting the extent to which the case for sweatshops does, and does not, depend on the existence of competitive markets. It attempts to more carefully distinguish between different ways in which various parties might seek to modify sweatshop behavior, and to point (...) out that there is more room for consensus regarding some of these methods than has previously been recognized. It addresses the question of when sweatshops are justified in violating local labor laws. And it assesses the relevance of recent literature on coercion and exploitation as it applies to sweatshop labor. It concludes with a list of challenges that critics of sweatshops must meet to productively advance the debate. (shrink)

When skilled individuals emigrate from developing states to developed states, they leave a burdened state behind and bring their valuable human capital to a state that enjoys vast advantages by comparison. Most of the normative debate to date on this so-called ‘brain drain’ has focused on the duties that skilled emigrants owe to their home state after they emigrate. This article shifts the focus to the question of whether their host state acquires special duties toward their home state and argues (...) for an affirmative answer to that question. After identifying the conditions under which ‘exploitative free-riding’ can occur, the article shows that the brain drain is a case of exploitation that gives rise to special duties of compensation for developed host states. (shrink)

Food-related non-communicable diseases such as obesity, type 2 diabetes and cardiovascular diseases are key threats to public health. Yet, the responsibility for food-related health harms is contested. While traditionally viewed as mainly an individual responsibility or a governmental responsibility, fingers are nowadays also pointed at the food and beverage industry, as many firms are producing and marketing unhealthy products that contribute to the rise of obesity and other food-related NCDs. Yet, does the behaviour of the industry and the impact its (...) products have on public health also give reason for moral concern? Are these firms doing anything wrong? Are there normative considerations on the basis of which it can be argued that food and beverage firms have a responsibility for public health? This thesis explores the moral grounds for firms in the food and beverage industry to address food-related public health problems, and simultaneously reflects upon what taking responsibility for these problems could entail in practice. Drawing on debates in business ethics, political philosophy, and public health ethics, it is argued that food and beverage firms have distinct responsibilities for food-related health problems, and that these responsibilities spring from considerations of _non-maleficence_, _respect for autonomy _and _justice_. The thesis makes clear how responsibility for public health can be understood as an essentially shared responsibility, and outlines what taking responsibility could entail for various firms in the food and beverage industry and makes recommendations on what kind of behaviour firms should no longer engage in. (shrink)