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Beckerman, Wilfred --- "The impossibility of a theory of intergenerational justice" [2006] ELECD 480; in Tremmel, Chet Joerg (ed), "Handbook of Intergenerational Justice" (Edward Elgar Publishing, 2006)

Book Title: Handbook of Intergenerational Justice

Editor(s): Tremmel, Chet Joerg

Publisher: Edward Elgar Publishing

ISBN (hard cover): 9781845429003

Section: Chapter 3

Section Title: The impossibility of a theory of intergenerational justice

Author(s): Beckerman, Wilfred

Extract:

3 The impossibility of a theory of
intergenerational justice
Wilfred Beckerman


Introduction
Whereas the problem of justice within any given society at any point in time
has occupied philosophers for over 2000 years, its extension to intergener-
ational justice is relatively recent.1 It has no doubt been provoked by the
increasing concern, over the last three or four decades, with the possibility
that we are seriously depleting the Earth's resources and damaging the
environment. In this way, it is often believed, we are violating the `rights' of
future generations in a manner that violated some principles of distributive
justice between generations
The general status of moral `rights' is a central topic in ethics. Indeed,
some philosophers see `rights' as the foundation of political morality and
possibly of morality in general (Dworkin 1984; Mackie 1984). It is not
surprising, therefore, that all our moral obligations to future generations
are often thought of as being simply the counterpart of their `rights'.
Nevertheless I shall argue here that any attempt to establish our moral
obligations to future generations on the basis of their rights is a futile enter-
prise. It is argued that this is because future generations cannot be said to
have any rights. And, as is then argued, this means that it is difficult to con-
struct any coherent theory of intergenerational justice.
There are many different conceptions of `rights' and of `justice' as well
as of the relationship between them. It would be beyond the scope of this
...