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14 Res Publica 1 (2008)

handle is hein.journals/respub14 and id is 1 raw text is: Res Publica (2008) 14:1-18 DOI 10.1007/s 1158-008-9047-1 Duties and Responsibilities Towards the Poor Robert Huseby Published online: 17 April 2008 © Springer Science+Business Media B.V. 2008 Abstract Thomas Pogge has argued that we have strong negative duties to assist the global poor because we harm them through our contribution to the global eco- nomic order. I argue that Pogge's concept of harm is indeterminate. The resources of any group will typically be affected by at least two economic schemes. Pogge sug- gests that the responsibility for any affected group's shortfall from a minimum standard ought to be shared between the contributing schemes. I argue that shared responsibility can be interpreted in two different ways. Unfortunately, both inter- pretations are problematic. Lastly, I suggest a strategy for amending this problem. Keywords Distributive justice - Global economic schemes - Harm International justice - Negative duties - Thomas Pogge - Positive duties Sufficiency Introduction' A large proportion of contemporary humans suffer from chronic severe poverty. Almost half the global population is poor or extremely poor. Meanwhile, the rich control a stunning amount of the world's total resources. These facts have in recent Earlier versions of this paper were presented at the Nordic Network in Political Theory in Stockholm, 2004; The Annual Norwegian Conference in Political Science in Hurdalssjoen, 2005; The Brave New World Conference in Manchester, 2005; and at the Colloquium in Political Theory at the University of Oslo, 2005. I thank all participants. In particular, I am grateful to Lene Bomann-Larsen, Cornelius Cappelen, Jakob Elster, Asgeir Eriksen, Eli Feiring, Kasper Lippert-Rasmussen, Raino Malnes, Andras Miklos, Thomas Pogge, Jonathan Quong, Bjsrn-Erik Rasch, Attila Tanyi, Dag Einar Thorsen, Andrew Williams, Jorgen Odalen, and Gerhard Overland. R. Huseby (E) The Ethics Programme, Department of Political Science, University of Oslo, P.O. Box 1097, Blindern, 0317 Oslo, Norway e-mail: roberthu@stv.uio.no I Springer

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