Philosophy › Contemporary › John Rawls, A Theory of Justice
The capabilities approach (Sen and Nussbaum)
1979 onward· Idea or argument· Politics, society & justice
Well documentedSolid records, texts or physical evidence.
The view that justice and development should be judged by what people are actually able to do and be, not by income alone.
See it on the Philosophy map →The idea
Idea: measure well-being by capabilities, real freedoms such as being healthy, educated, safe and taking part in community life. Amartya Sen asked 'Equality of what?' (1979): equal incomes do not mean equal lives if one person uses a wheelchair and needs more to get around. Rawls's 'primary goods' miss differences in how people turn resources into well-being. Martha Nussbaum drew up a list of ten central capabilities every society owes citizens. Main objection: who decides which capabilities count, and how to weigh them?
Why it matters
It underpins the United Nations Human Development Index (1990), which ranks countries by health and education as well as income.
Think of it like
Like judging a building by usable, rentable space rather than gross square footage: what counts is what you can actually do with it.
Where it comes from
Sen's Tanner Lecture 'Equality of What?' (1979) and Development as Freedom (1999); Nussbaum's Women and Human Development (2000). Sen won the 1998 Nobel Prize in economics.
Still debated
Sen refuses to fix a list; Nussbaum insists on one. Whether a universal list respects cultural differences is still argued.
Connections (2)
▸John Rawls, A Theory of Justice was critiqued and extended by The capabilities approach (Sen and Nussbaum)Well documented
The connection
Rawls measured who is worst off by 'primary goods' such as income, rights and opportunities. Sen argued that goods matter only for what they let people do: a disabled person needs more resources for the same freedom. The capabilities approach kept Rawls's concern for the worst-off but changed what is measured.
When and how
Sen's Tanner Lecture 'Equality of What?', Stanford, May 1979; Martha Nussbaum developed her version through the 1980s and 1990s.
How we know
Sen addresses Rawls directly, and Rawls replied in Justice as Fairness: A Restatement (2001), arguing that primary goods could absorb the concern.
Debates and open questions
Rawls argued primary goods are easier to measure publicly; whether capabilities are too vague to guide policy is still discussed.
▸The capabilities approach (Sen and Nussbaum) draws on Virtue ethics and eudaimonia (Nicomachean Ethics)Well documented
The connection
Nussbaum based her list of central capabilities on Aristotle's idea that a good life is one of flourishing (eudaimonia), using distinctively human powers well. Government's job, as Aristotle also held, is to give citizens the conditions to flourish. Sen draws on Aristotle too, and on Adam Smith.
When and how
Nussbaum's 'Nature, Function, and Capability: Aristotle on Political Distribution' (1988), and later Women and Human Development (2000).
How we know
Nussbaum, a leading Aristotle scholar, cites him explicitly as the source of her approach.
Debates and open questions
Critics ask whether an Aristotelian list of the good life fits diverse societies; Nussbaum later reframed her list within political liberalism rather than full Aristotelianism.