This article presents a dilemma for luck egalitarians.1 The dilemma is that luck
egalitarians can either allow secession and emigration to regimes that do not
enforce egalitarian outcomes or prohibit secession from political regimes crafted
in accordance with luck egalitarian principles.2 If the luck egalitarian allows such
secession, she must abandon her commitment to the claim that luck egalitarianism
(LE, henceforth) is the only accurate theory of justice. If the luck egalitarian
prohibits secession, she must abandon a commitment to many of the concerns
motivating liberalism in general and LE in particular. The paper concludes by
considering and rejecting some responses on behalf of the luck egalitarian.
Two notes are necessary before moving on. First, I confine my remarks to a
very specific version of LE. The version I focus on is comprehensive in that it
identifies the underlying commitments of LE as the only principles of justice. This
version of LE is contrasted with a hybrid theory that upholds a commitment to
eliminating the role undeserved bad luck plays in an individual’s life with some
other principles of justice. One might see Richard Arneson as a proponent of the
comprehensive form of justice while John Rawls might be something like the
latter.
Second, the comprehensive LE I focus on is global in nature. It is global in that
it applies to all individuals, even if they never interact with one another. I can have
an obligation to offset the bad luck an individual in some remote village endures,
even if I do not interact with that individual. This is distinct from a socialinteractionist theory that holds that, whatever obligations of justice exist, they exist
only when individuals interact in justice-initiating ways. Trade is the most obvious
means of social interaction, but it is by no means the only one. This paper will focus on the global comprehensive variant of LE
