1HABITS OF INEQUALITY:

A RADICAL VIEW OF INSTITUTIONS AND INEQUALITY

Karen WendlingDepartment of Philosophy

University of GuelphGuelph, Ontario N1G 2W1

Canada

e-mail: wendling@uoguelph.ca

Journal of Philosophical Research 29 (2004), pp. 353-373

Habits of Inequality:

A Radical View of Institutions and Inequality

Abstract

In this paper, I define and defend the radical egalitarian

distinction between individual acts and systemic or institutional

patterns. My intended audience is both radical and liberal

egalitarians; I assume that liberal and radical egalitarianism

are neither mutually exclusive nor theoretically incompatible. I

begin by sketching a liberal theory of institutions, and then

extend this theory in radical directions. I argue that there are

important informal as well as formal social institutions, such as

language, morality, customs and etiquette. Following that, I

argue that some forms of discrimination and privilege are

institutionalized, and that institutional forms differ in kind

from individual ones. Of course, I do not deny either the

existence or the wrongness of the individual forms. However, I

argue that the institutional forms both are more prevalent and

have worse moral and political effects than the individual ones.

Hence they are the proper focus of (radical) egalitarian concern.

(150 words)

Habits of Inequality:

A Radical View of Institutions and Inequality

Can an anti-racist consistently support affirmative action

programs against charges that such programs are simply “reverse

discrimination”? Can a feminist consistently both support women-

only schools or sports and oppose the exclusion of women from

men-only schools or sports? Is there a difference between racism

by a white person directed at people of color and racism by a

person of color directed at whites, or between sexism by a man

directed at women and sexism by a woman directed at men? Is there

a difference between groups that exclude women, people of color

or Jews, and groups that exclude men, white people or Gentiles?

Can discrimination against women, people of color and members of

other equality-seeking groups1 exist in the absence of either

formal rules permitting discrimination or individual intent to

discriminate?

Radical egalitarians answer “yes” to questions like these,

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often to non-radicals’ surprise and puzzlement.2 Our critics

claim we simply want to replace one set of injustices with a

different but equally unjust set. Isn’t that what we’re doing

when we deny that affirmative action programs are reverse

discrimination, when we favor women-only schools or sports but

oppose men-only schools or sports, or when we say that racism by

whites against people of color is different from racism by people

of color against whites? Don’t we undercut our own egalitarian

principles?

No, we don’t. What we’re opposed to, first and foremost, is

systemic or institutional discrimination and privilege. Racism by

whites against people of color is institutionalized in this

society, whereas racism by people of color against whites is not,

and the same is true of sexism by men against women compared to

sexism by women against men. The radical distinction between

individual acts and institutional patterns is crucial. Most radical

egalitarians accept, at least implicitly, that discrimination and

privilege operate most importantly at systemic or institutional

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levels, not at individual levels. Yet we have had difficulty

explaining what we mean by “systems” or “institutions” to the

satisfaction of even well-meaning liberal egalitarians. This

paper is an attempt to provide such an explanation.

In this paper, I define and defend the radical egalitarian

distinction between individual acts and systemic or institutional

patterns. My intended audience is both radical and liberal

egalitarians; I want to articulate what radicals mean both to

ourselves and to other egalitarians who do not fully agree with

us, and I want to correct some misuses of and misunderstandings

about “systems” or “institutions.” I assume that liberal and

radical egalitarianism are neither mutually exclusive nor

theoretically incompatible; on the contrary, in this paper I

ground a central aspect of radical egalitarianism on a liberal

egalitarian foundation. The proof of this pudding is in the

eating, though; a theoretical discussion of connections between

radical and liberal egalitarianism awaits another paper.

The argument takes the following form. I begin by sketching

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a liberal theory of institutions.3 Following that, I extend the

liberal theory of institutions in radical directions, and argue

that there are important informal as well as formal social

institutions. In the final section I argue that some forms of

discrimination and privilege are institutionalized, and that

institutional forms differ in kind from individual ones. Of

course I do not deny either the existence or the wrongness of the

individual forms. However, I argue that the institutional forms

both are more prevalent and have worse moral and political

effects than the individual ones, and hence are the proper focus

of (radical) egalitarian concern.

The wrongness and pervasiveness of discrimination against

people of color and women are widely accepted in North American

society. For this reason, and since this paper is addressed to

both liberal and radical egalitarians, most of the examples in

this paper focus on race and sex. These examples should allow the

reader to focus on the main philosophical point, whereas examples

highlighting other forms of discrimination might prove a

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distraction. This should not be taken to indicate that I believe

racism and sexism are the only institutionalized forms of

discrimination, however. They are simply the best understood

forms.

1. A Liberal Theory of Institutions4

In his early article “Two Concepts of Rules,” Rawls defines

an institution as “a system of rules,” and in A Theory of Justice he

defines it as “a public system of rules.”5 The economist Andrew

Schotter defines a social institution as “a regularity in social

behavior that is agreed to by all members of society, specifies

behavior in specific recurrent situations, and is either self-

policed or policed by some external authority.”6 I shall combine

these definitions and say that an institution is a public system of

rules that creates regularities in social behavior, specifies behavior in recurrent

situations, and is either self-policed or policed by an external authority. (In less

technical language, we can say that an institution is a public

pattern of rule-following behavior.) Some institutions such as the

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federal government and the economic system are society-wide,

while others such as school boards and municipal governments

exercise their authority within particular local jurisdictions.

Institutions are social and not individual phenomena, though. We

can distinguish society-wide and local institutions from

individual patterns of behavior in the same way that linguists

distinguish language, dialect and idiolect: by their persistence

and their publicity, that is, their adoption and continued use by

most of the people in a society, by most of the people in a

particular area or group, or by particular individuals.

Institutional rules may be created in a variety of ways.

Some rules are created by the whole society, at least in

principle, as the law is in democratic societies. Rules may be

created by members of a particular group, such as a trade or

community association. Other rules are created unilaterally, for

example, by the inventor of a particular game, or by a tyrant or

a bully. Institutional rules also take many different forms. For

example, governments operate through laws, acts, bylaws and the

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like; some companies operate through charters granted by

governments (e.g., public utilities); many organizations operate

according to bylaws and rules of order; and the rules of games

are determined by their inventors (and sometimes modified, over

time, by others, as they have been in baseball). Alternatively,

institutional rules may consist of a combination of explicit

codes and implicit practices. The modern institution of the

family, for instance, contains a mixture of explicit rules (laws

regulating marriage, inheritance, support and education of

children, and so on) and implicit rules (the sexual division of

labor, the expectation of monogamy, conventions for celebrating

rites of passage, and so on). However and by whomever

institutional rules are created, though, their function is the

same: to guide the behavior of members of the institution.

Institutional rules are followed most of the time by most of the

participants in the institution. This is part of what it means to

be a participant in a particular institution: participants

understand and follow the relevant rules, and expect other

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participants to do so also.

Social institutions help individuals attain the benefits of

cooperation, and make non-cooperation costly rather than

profitable. The benefits of cooperation provided by institutions

are easy to detail. Families, for example, provide companionship

and mutual support for their members and raise the next

generation of citizens; economic systems guide the production and

exchange of goods; governments provide services to citizens

(public roads, schools, hospitals, old age security pensions,

policing and courts of law, etc.) that are too complicated or

costly for individuals to obtain privately, and they ensure (or

at least promise) fair administration of these services.

Institutions make non-cooperation costly rather than profitable

through various external sanctions, ranging from individual

disapproval (such as loss of a loved one’s esteem), to social

disapproval (e.g., the treatment of people considered to be

social deviants), to the penalties of the civil and criminal

law.7 It is more efficient, however, if participants in

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institutions police themselves by internalizing the norms of the

institution; then sanctions can be reserved for those relatively

rare times when self-policing fails.

Individuals derive significant benefits from social

institutions; institutional rules facilitate their abilities to

make decisions. In any social system, individuals interact with

many others in a variety of different contexts, and they make

large numbers of decisions, some involving only themselves, but

many involving other people, both directly and peripherally. If,

each time they interacted with others or made a decision,

individuals had to first determine and then rank their

preferences according to every possible or even likely

configuration of outcomes based on the specific context and the

particular individuals involved, they would be paralyzed.

Institutional rules greatly reduce the costs (in terms of time,

effort and lost opportunities) required to assess situations and

make decisions. Thus parents do not ask themselves each day,

“Will I feed my children today? Should they go to school? Do I

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want to listen to them? Are they worth the effort?” And

professors do not ask themselves, “Should I ignore my alarm and

sleep in? Why bother with students who are struggling with the

material? Would I rather teach logic or gardening methods today?”

Individuals make those decisions (with some individual

variations, but still as variations on a theme) when they adopt

the roles of “parent” and “professor” in the institutions of the

family and the university.8

Institutions make social complexity manageable for

individuals; they guide individuals’ behavior, and they create

predictable, albeit imperfect, regularities in social behavior.

Families, workplaces, religious organizations, schools and

governments – each has its own rules for behavior, and for proper

treatment of members and non-members. Familiarity with the

relevant rules leads us to expect particular behaviors in

particular situations; we are surprised only when the rules are

broken, not when they are followed. Institutions simplify the

social world, reducing a potentially infinite number of possible

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individual behaviors in any situation to a finite, predictable

number. They create social order out of a potentially chaotic

array of individual actions and interactions; they help us obtain

the benefits of social cooperation. Familiarity breeds

contentment.

Liberal theorists have tended to focus on a “holy dyad” of

institutions, the state and the economy. Liberal feminists have

convinced some contemporary liberal theorists such as Rawls to

expand this dyad, and to include the family in their

prescriptions.9 Notice two important features of these liberal

institutions, however. First, while many of the rules of states,

economies and families are formally codified, particularly in the

form of laws, even these three quite formalized institutions

contain significant informal rules for participants.10 Political

representatives are expected to behave responsibly and

responsively toward citizens seeking their help, and to avoid

even the appearance, and not simply the reality, of conflicts of

interest. Workplaces often have unwritten but widely understood

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dress codes and standards of acceptable behavior, such as

politeness to customers or fellow employees, or appropriate forms

of address based on people’s ranks in the institutional

hierarchy. People generally expect emotional support from family

members, and understand that certain occasions such as birthdays,

anniversaries and some holidays are considered “family time.”

Participants learn these informal rules by observing, interacting

with and asking other participants, and they are enforced by peer

pressure, not by the application of codified rules.

Second, the state, the economy and the family are not

discrete; they influence, overlap and reinforce each other. The

state, for example, regulates economic institutions and the

institution of the family through the civil and criminal laws.

Even the staunchest defenders of the free market and the privacy

of the family want access to impartial courts for adjudication of

disputes, and they accept the state’s right to make laws

forbidding extortion and murder, and to apply them even if

violations occur in the market or the family. Governments also

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promote particular trade policies (economic functions), and make

laws governing inheritance, divorce or marriage (family

functions). The influences go in the other directions too. The

influence of economic institutions on the state is particularly

obvious in libertarian theories, which derive the state’s

justification and limits from the free market; in practice, many

governments use gross national product and other economic

indicators as measures of citizens’ well-being.11 It is widely

accepted that the economic shift from feudalism to capitalism

brought about significant changes in the structure of the family.

Families influence the state through inherited rights of rule, or

conversely, through rules and laws against nepotism, and the

arguments for a “family wage” are an example of the family’s

influence on economic institutions. All three liberal

institutions overlap and reinforce each other in inheritance

laws: here we have an economic function which is located in the

family and regulated by the state.

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2. Informal Rules and Institutions: Developing the Radical Theory

The latter two features of institutions – the importance of

informal rules and the interconnectedness of institutions – are

crucial to the radical understanding of institutions. In addition

to the institutions of the state, the economy and the family,

societies contain many less formally codified, but no less

socially important, institutions. In this section I examine some

of the less contentious informal social institutions, and sketch

elements of their radical critique. I leave the argument for the

claim that some forms of discrimination are institutionalized for

the next section.

The most important formal institutions in any society have

developed, over time, from informal institutions.12 Some social

functions, such as child rearing and relations between members of

a group or the whole society, are too important to be left to the

vagaries of individual choice and chance. Thus institutions, with

rules for adequate performance, gradually develop to guide and

correct family members’, group members’ and citizens’ actions,

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and to maintain social stability. Schotter likens institutional

development to the evolution of species. He writes:

Economic and social systems evolve the way species do. To

ensure their survival and growth, they must solve a whole

set of problems that arise as the system evolves. Each

problem creates the need for some adaptive feature, that is,

a social institution. . . . For instance, the problem of

multilateral exchange in neoclassical economies (economies

satisfying all of the “proper” neoclassical assumptions) is

solved by the creation of competitive markets.13

Ontology is not justification, however. Social systems, unlike

species, are teleological, purposive and normative; they can be

changed, or at least directed, by human effort in ways that

evolution cannot. Our task as moral and political philosophers is

prescriptive, not descriptive. Thus we must not only account for

the existence of the particular social institutions in a given

society, but also provide tools for their critique or

justification. (Theoretical explanations are still necessary,

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though, because we cannot evaluate what we cannot recognize.)

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All societies contain not only formally codified

institutions and rules, but also informal ones. The clearest

example of a largely informal institution with mostly informal

rules is language. Of course we have dictionaries, grammar rules,

manuals of style and so on. But these are latecomers to language,

and many languages function perfectly well in their absence.

While dictionaries and manuals of style may stipulate as well as

report language use, their effectiveness depends on the actual

practices of language users, not on any authority gained through

formal codification. Moreover, their importance lies at least as

much in their accurate portrayal of actual language use as it

does in their stipulation of the rules of use. (How many people,

in response to a friend’s “Who’s there?,” give the grammatically

proper answer “It is I” rather than ungrammatical but much less

stuffy “It’s me”?) Language users can, and until relatively

recently did, communicate effectively without any formal

codification of rules.

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Despite the informality of its rule structure, though,

language clearly fits the definition of an institution. It is a

“public system of rules”: language is most certainly rule-

governed, and the rules are publicly known though not legally

mandated. (Moreover, there are no private languages, as

Wittgenstein pointed out.) Language “creates regularities in

social behavior and specifies behavior in recurrent situations”:

competent language users not only speak the same language in the

literal sense, but also “speak the same language” in the

metaphorical sense – that is, they know which forms of address

and levels of formality or informality are appropriate for

different situations. Language is also “self-policed or policed

by an external authority.” Rules for its proper use are generally

learned from and enforced by other language users, not through

formalized procedures. However, language sometimes may be used as

an “external authority” to distinguish “us” from “them”: grammar

and appropriate forms of address function as the “passwords” that

permit or deny entry to mainstream society and the corridors of

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power. Evidence here ranges from George Bernard Shaw’s Pygmalion

(popularized but de-politicized in Lerner and Loewe’s My Fair Lady)

to contemporary debates in the U.S. about whether African

American modes of speech are “proper” forms of English. In short,

language is a public pattern of rule-following behavior, and thus

it is an institution.

Notice that the publicity of rules does not necessarily

involve either individual recognition of the rules’ existence or

formal codification of the rules. Competent language users

generally follow the rules of speech and grammar, and they can

recognize and correct improper uses of language, even if they

cannot articulate the relevant rules. Moreover, linguists can

determine what the underlying rules of a language are, even if

the rules have not previously been articulated as formal rules.

Rules’ publicity is exemplified by social practices, then: by

widespread rule-following behavior, not by individual awareness

of the rules or by the existence of either formal rules or rule-

enforcing authorities.

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And language is not the only socially important informal

institution. Despite the work of millennia of philosophers and

religious writers, most day-to-day morality is based on a largely

informal set of rules. Philosophers may stipulate moral rules, or

we may examine their philosophical foundations, but unless our

prescriptions hook up significantly with real-life practices, our

work is of only academic interest.14 “Share with your friends.”

“Tell the truth.” “Leave them alone – they’re not hurting you.”

We learn such moral rules from our parents and our peers.

Internalizing these rules is part of what it means to be properly

socialized: in the normal course of events, guilt, shame and

acceptance of the rules’ legitimate authority are supposed to

take the place of external sanctions. Some moral rules do get

institutionalized, of course, in the form of religious or state

policies and laws. But as the work of the moral psychologist

Carol Gilligan indicates, moral practices are guided at least as

much by the informal rules and obligations of personal

relationships as they are by the more formalized rules of

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religion, the state or philosophy.15

21

Custom and etiquette are other important informal social

institutions. “When in Rome, do as the Romans,” the old saying

goes. If a society is to function, its members must learn the

rules of behavior and expectations for different situations and

for interactions with both members and nonmembers. Such rules are

widely known and followed but rarely formally codified. Serious

problems often arise through ignorance of the appropriate rules,

however, or when people operate according to different but

legitimate sets of rules and expectations. Philosophers have

tended to dismiss questions of “mere etiquette,” but in fact

etiquette has important moral and political implications and

underpinnings. The columnist Miss Manners addresses some of these

issues in her writings. In Common Courtesy she addresses what she

calls “the problem that baffled Mr. Jefferson” – namely, how

should the representatives of a self-consciously revolutionary

and egalitarian society deal with each other, and with

representatives from governments of less egalitarian societies?

Contemporary etiquette had been based on hierarchies of rank and

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status; what was egalitarian etiquette?16 And when a reader asks

Miss Manners, “What am I supposed to say when I am introduced to

a homosexual ‘couple’?” and Miss Manners replies, “Gentle Reader:

‘How do you do?’ ‘How do you do?’,” Miss Manners is doing ethics

as well as etiquette.17

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Misunderstandings involving customs and etiquette sometimes

have far-reaching moral and political implications. For example,

assume the best will in the world on the side of both Europeans

and native North Americans during initial contact (an assumption

only a philosopher would make). Imagine the clash of customs and

etiquette – and therefore legitimate expectations – on both

sides. Europeans arrive bearing beads and blankets, which native

people accept. “They’re bringing us hostess gifts,” native people

think. “We just bought Manhattan,” the Europeans think. (Was that

really a legitimate expectation even from the Europeans’

perspective, though? Suppose I drop in on you unexpectedly,

bearing a bottle of wine. You thank me for the wine, invite me

in, and feed me dinner. Can I reasonably believe that you just

transferred ownership of your house to me?) Customs and etiquette

have been seriously undertheorized by philosophers. But those of

us who work to make our language inclusive and who have defended

ourselves against charges of “political correctness” are

practicing and developing an egalitarian etiquette. Exclusionary

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language and practices are not only inaccurate – they are also

rude.

While informal institutions differ from formal ones in both

the codification and enforcement of their rules, these two

differences are philosophically – and, in most cases, practically

– insignificant. The rules of formal institutions are

substantially codified in the forms of laws, codes of practice,

authoritative writings and the like, while the rules of informal

institutions remain substantially uncodified. Informal

institutions’ rules are no less widely understood and followed

than those of formal institutions, however. In addition, formal

institutions may be policed by external authorities, while

informal institutions generally are self-policed. But in both

formal and informal institutions rules are most commonly self-

policed, by members internalizing the relevant norms and

developing the appropriate habits of behavior, and when self-

policing fails, by individual and social disapproval. External

sanctions such as legal procedures are complicated and

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disruptive, and must be saved for the most serious rule

violations.

Radical egalitarians advocate equality in informal as well

as formal social institutions, and in the informal rules of

formal institutions. Admittedly, it is easier to examine formally

codified rules and institutions, and the processes of legal and

policy reform are widely understood. But this is no philosophical

– or political – reason to limit our enquiries to formal

institutions and rules. Unwritten laws, rules and practices often

have significant effects. In principle, for example, “separate

but equal” could be an egalitarian doctrine. But its de facto

practice in the U.S. was anything but egalitarian, as the Supreme

Court finally recognized in Brown vs. Board of Education. Indeed, any

philosopher or legal theorist who uses the de jure/de facto

distinction implicitly acknowledges the existence of informal (de

facto) rules.

All institutions change over time, in response to changing

social circumstances and needs. Not only do we change or make new

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laws and policies, but we also invent new words and adapt or

develop new standards of behavior for new situations. We must

ensure that informal rules and institutions enhance, or at least

do not undermine, equality.

3. Institutional Discrimination and Privilege

Radical egalitarians claim that most instances of racism,

sexism and the other bad “isms” are institutional and not just

individual practices. While the bad “isms” can be given generic

definitions – e.g., racism is discrimination and/or privilege

based on race, sexism is discrimination and/or privilege based on

sex – the institutional forms are most emphatically not generic.

Institutional racism in western societies is discrimination

against people of color and privilege in favor of white people,

and institutional sexism is discrimination against women and

privilege in favor of men.

I use “discrimination” and “privilege” here in ordinary

language senses, not in any special radical sense.

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“Discrimination” is differential and negative treatment or

distinction based on membership in a particular social group, and

“privilege” is differential and positive treatment or distinction

based on membership in a particular social group, where in either

case group membership should be irrelevant to the treatment or

distinction. My dictionary defines “discrimination” as “ ... (3)

treatment or consideration of, or making a distinction in favor

of or against, a person or thing based on the group, class, or

category to which that person or thing belongs rather than on

individual merit: racial and religious intolerance and discrimination.”18

However, many contemporary egalitarians, both scholars and

activists, reserve the word “discrimination” for examples of

“making an unfair distinction against,” and use the word

“privilege” for “making an unfair distinction in favor of,” and I

follow that practice here. Most people agree that differential

and negative treatment based on irrelevant characteristics is

unfair – though they do not always agree on what to do about it,

or even whether it has occurred in a particular case. In the past

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forty years or so many radicals have begun to point out that

differential and positive treatment based on irrelevant

characteristics also is unfair. Discrimination and privilege are

unfair because benefits and burdens get distributed based on

group membership when the relevant criteria should be either

individually based (e.g., merit or first-come, first-served) or

universally applied (e.g., equality before and under the law).

Radical egalitarians are concerned with social patterns of

discrimination and privilege, with institutionalized

inequalities. In North America darker skin correlates strongly

with more discrimination and fewer privileges, lighter skin with

less discrimination and more privileges.19 Female traits

correlate with greater discrimination and fewer privileges, while

male traits correlate with less discrimination and more

privileges.20 There are individual exceptions, of course. Oprah

Winfrey and Michael Jordan are millionaires, while some white

people struggle just to have enough to eat. And Oprah and Madonna

have triumphed in male-dominated professions, while some men

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struggle just to get by. These exceptions no more disprove the

existence of institutionalized racism and sexism than irregular

verbs disprove the rules for regular verbs, however. Exceptions

do not undermine the patterned, statistical disparities between

the life prospects of people of color and whites, women and men,

and members of other subordinated and privileged groups.

These patterns make institutional discrimination and

privilege worse than their individual forms. Of course any form

of racism, sexism, heterosexism and so on is objectionable. But

persistent and patterned forms of the bad “isms” are worse. To

glimpse the particular wrongs of institutionalized

discrimination, try the following thought experiment. Suppose

someone calls you an idiot. You examine the incident and decide

if that person was right or wrong under the circumstances; if

right, you change your behavior, and if wrong, you dismiss the

comment. Suppose that person follows you around, though,

undermining you everywhere you go, and no matter what you do. Not

only would you decide that the person has it in for you, but you

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would have grounds for a charge of criminal harassment. The wrong

here is not any one individual act; rather, it is the persistent

pattern of acts that constitute the harm to you. Now suppose that

different people call you an idiot and otherwise undermine you,

everywhere you go and no matter what you do. You would not have

grounds for a charge of criminal harassment in this case. But are

the effects on you and your self esteem really any different? If

anything, they’re probably worse. Did you fail to get that job

because you really weren’t good enough, or was it because you’re

a person of color, a woman, a person with a disability? How can

you tell?21 The bad “isms” are not isolated incidents in the

lives of members of equality-seeking groups. People of color,

women and members of other equality-seeking groups learn to

expect differential and negative treatment. Because such

treatment is statistically normal, often they do not object to

particular instances; they come to believe it is deserved, based

on their individual characteristics, when in fact it is based at

least partly on their membership in particular socially

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subordinated groups. Persistent patterns of unequal treatment

undermine people’s self esteem, including their abilities to see

themselves as equals and to demand equal treatment.22

Some people hold the mistaken belief that privilege is

simply the reverse or lack of discrimination. It is much more

than that, though. Understanding institutional privilege requires

a different thought experiment. We all remember someone who was a

“teacher’s pet.” That person got all sorts of undeserved benefits

that none of us had a right to – extra attention, extra help, the

benefit of the doubt when there was a problem, and so on. While

none of us had a right to those benefits, we did have a right to

expect equal and fair treatment, and the teacher’s “playing

favorites” conflicted with this right. Both the teacher and the

teacher’s pet saw the treatment as individually deserved,

however, as based on the particular merits of the “pet.”

Institutional privileges are akin to being a lifelong “society’s

pet.” We get extra attention, the benefit of the doubt; we are

considered “standard,” “the norm” or “normal”; we are assumed to

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be more intelligent, more qualified, more worthy.23 One of the

biggest privileges is living in a society that is tailor-made for

us, which fits us like a glove, rather than constantly having to

fit our square needs and aspirations into round holes. We learn

to expect differential and positive treatment. Because such

treatment is statistically normal for us, we come to believe it is

deserved, based on our individual characteristics, when in fact

it is based at least partly on our membership in particular

socially favored groups. We also come to believe such treatment

is the norm for everyone in society. This is what we take as our

baseline for equality – being treated as we are treated. Notice

the contradiction inherent in this view. Our own unequal and

preferred treatment has become invisible to us, and so we use an

unequal situation as our standard for equal treatment.24 We

wouldn’t recognize equality if we tripped over it.

Institutionalized discrimination and privilege are worse

than their individual counterparts because of their connections

with social power and inequality. Isolated, individual instances,

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while still wrong, do not contribute to social powerlessness or

inequality. Persistent patterns of discrimination and privilege,

on the other hand, not only contribute to but also create

unjustified social powerlessness in those who are discriminated

against and unjustified social power in those who are the

beneficiaries of systems of privilege.

To say that discrimination and privilege are institutions is

to say that certain forms of racism, sexism, anti-Semitism, etc.

constitute public patterns of rule-following inegalitarian

behavior. That there are distinct patterns of inequality in

western societies based on race, sex, religion and so on is a

long-established social fact. But are the inequalities the result

of rule-following behavior, and are the rules public? Yes. In the

past few centuries egalitarians have been relatively successful

at eliminating formal rules mandating or permitting inequality.

And yet equality still has not been achieved; there are

significant differences between the life prospects of people of

color and whites, women and men, and members of other equality-

34

seeking vs. equality-possessing groups. Eliminating formal

inegalitarian rules turns out to be only part of the process of

achieving equality – an important part, but still only a part.

Many rules of institutionalized racism, sexism and the like

are informal.25 These informal rules can be recognized in the

patterns of internalized inegalitarian norms and attitudes that

manifest themselves as inegalitarian practices. For example,

there are persistent negative stereotypes of women, people of

color, Muslims, Jews and other non-Christians, and so on. Members

of equality-possessing groups are more likely to be assumed to be

competent or honest, and are more likely to receive benefits that

no one has an individual right to, such as extra attention.

Members of equality-possessing groups are considered “standard,”

and others are defined with respect to them (e.g., whites and

nonwhites) and must fit their needs and aspirations into the pre-

existing, narrowly-defined standards (e.g., “normal” career

patterns that do not include the care of children or elderly

relatives).26 People tend to prefer others with whom they are

35

comfortable, and in a race-, gender- and otherwise stratified

society, this means that the already-equal tend to continue

hiring and otherwise benefitting others like them/ourselves.

Colleagues and even subordinates frequently imply, and often say

outright, that women, people of color and people with

disabilities got their positions because of affirmative action –

and not, by implication, because of their qualifications.

A skeptic might raise several objections. First, the skeptic

could argue that the presence of patterns of norms and attitudes

does not necessarily indicate that the beliefs underlying them

are rule-governed. Second, the skeptic could argue that even if

the underlying beliefs are rule-governed, the rules are not

public. Third, the skeptic could argue that, even if the

underlying beliefs are rule-governed and public, there is no

necessary connection between their possession and social and

political inequality. Fourth, the skeptic could argue that, even

if the underlying beliefs are rule-governed, public and connected

with social and political inequality, those who hold them do not

36

necessarily have inegalitarian intentions, and cannot be held

accountable for unintended social consequences of their beliefs.

I will deal with each of these objections in turn.

Of course social patterns of inequality do not necessarily

indicate underlying inegalitarian social rules. But the patterns

do require explanation. Perhaps they are the result of chance,

perhaps they are artefacts of other social phenomena that have

nothing to do with equality and inequality, perhaps they are

expressions of natural inequalities, or perhaps humans simply are

incapable of equality. We can quickly dismiss the first

possibility, that patterns of inequality are purely the result of

chance or coincidence. We might get “snake eyes” eight or nine

out of ten fair dice throws. But if we kept getting snake eyes

over and over, we would assume the dice were loaded. Inequalities

between social groups appear too consistently across a variety of

institutions, cultures and times to be attributable simply to

chance. Perhaps the inequalities are artefacts of other

phenomena, then, such as merit or the market. In that case, their

37

inegalitarian consequences give us good reason to doubt the moral

neutrality of these other phenomena. Moreover, this still does

not account for the existence of patterned rather than randomized

inequality. We are left with the latter two possibilities – that

certain groups are naturally unequal, or that inequality itself

is natural to humans. The existence of natural inequalities

between groups is implausible, in the first place, since many

social inequalities are based on traits that have no natural

basis, such as religion and ethnicity. And even where there is

some natural basis to a trait, as there is with sex, we still

need evidence of connections between the trait and natural

inequality. But any purported evidence for natural inequalities

between groups will be undermined by the (present or previous)

existence of formal rules mandating inequality, which would be

completely unnecessary were the inequalities really natural.

Finally, even if inequality were natural to humans as a species,

this neither explains why inequalities cluster around particular

social traits (which, moreover, differ between cultures and

38

times), nor justifies inequality. What’s natural is neither

morally right nor inevitable.27 The only reasonable explanation

for persistent patterns of inequality is that they are the result

of rule-governed social behavior.

The claim that the rules are not public can be dismissed for

the same reason that we would dismiss a denial that the rules of

language are not public. “Public” rules are not only those that

we are individually aware of or that have been formally

articulated. The publicity of inegalitarian rules is demonstrated

by the widespread practice and persistence of inegalitarian

beliefs, not by conscious knowledge or codified rules.

Inegalitarian norms and attitudes are patterned, rule-

governed and public, and thus they clearly fit the definition of

an informal institution. A skeptic might claim there is no

necessarily causal connection between inegalitarian beliefs and

inegalitarian practices. Such a skeptic misunderstands what it is

for something to be an institution, however. Institutions create

regularities in social behavior. Once institutional rules are learned and

39

internalized they become habits, “second natures.” Competent

language users normally do not think about the word order in

their sentences; they have internalized the rules, and most of

the time the words come out in the proper order. People who grow

up in inegalitarian societies do not have to consciously prefer

members of socially favored groups; they have internalized the

socially inegalitarian rules, and most of the time social

inequality will be maintained. Institutionalized rules manifest

themselves as practices in the normal course of events precisely

because the process of internalization makes them habits, which

take the place of much slower and less consistent conscious

decision procedures. This is as true of bad habits, like

inegalitarian beliefs and practices, as it is of good habits,

like proper grammar and good manners.

But, the skeptic protests, those who have inegalitarian

beliefs and habits may have no inegalitarian intentions, and in

fact, their intentions may be consciously egalitarian. Good

intentions alone cannot overcome institutionalized inegalitarian

40

habits, however. Internalized institutional rules bypass, and

thus tend to override, conscious intent. Institutional inequality

cannot simply be wished away or eliminated by good intentions

alone. Eliminating institutional inequality requires deliberate,

conscious effort. First we must bring the various inegalitarian

rules to consciousness and unlearn them, and then we must develop

new, egalitarian rules and make them habitual. This is difficult,

conscious work, at least until the new egalitarian rules become

internalized. But it is no more difficult than learning proper

use of the specialized languages of our professions and

disciplines, and most of us manage that (too well!).

Notice that it is not only members of equality-possessing

groups who have these inegalitarian habits, and not only members

of equality-seeking groups who have unlearned them. Everyone

learns institutional rules; that most people follow the rules

most of the time is what it means for something to be an

institution. We all have learned that we, and others like us, are

either more or less likely to be meritorious, simply on the basis

41

of our/their group membership. So of course women too sometimes

discriminate against other women and in favor of men, people of

color too sometimes prefer whites to other people of color,

people with disabilities too sometimes prefer the non-disabled,

and so on. But since inegalitarian institutional rules conflict

with the self esteem of members of socially subordinated groups,

while they enhance the self esteem of members of privileged

groups, the latter tend to be more consistent in following and

enforcing the rules. In addition, people who have a political

awareness of themselves as members of equality-seeking groups are

more likely to have unlearned at least some of the inegalitarian

institutional rules that apply to their groups. Members of

equality-possessing groups also can and do unlearn inegalitarian

institutional rules, of course. Breaking inegalitarian habits

tends to be more difficult for us, however, since their

egalitarian replacements often conflict with our socially-

enhanced self esteem, at least initially. Engaging in this

admittedly difficult process is a matter of common decency,

42

however, of living up to the egalitarian ideals we espouse.

What about responsibility? Can individuals be held

responsible for following and enforcing inegalitarian

institutional rules, particularly if they are unaware of the

rules’ existence? While an adequate response to this complex

question is beyond the scope of this paper, I will briefly

suggest some relevant considerations for such a response. First,

institutional remedies, such as adopting equality-creating

policies, are generally the most appropriate responses to

institutional inequalities, and these may bypass the question of

individual responsibility. In any case, individual responsibility

will depend partly on these institutional responses: whether the

institutional “culture” supports equality or inequality, whether

the individual has the power within the particular institution to

promote or hamper equality-creating policies, whether the

individual actually followed or ignored existing policies, the

extent to which the individual’s actions promoted or hampered

equality in a particular case, and so on. Second, we cannot use a

43

“reasonable man” standard for moral responsibility here.

Institutional discrimination and privilege undermine the very

possibility of generic standards. What is “reasonable” from the

perspective of the already-equal (the present system, perhaps

minus any formal rules permitting or mandating inequality, but

still including all the unearned informal privileges) is

unreasonable from the perspective of those seeking equality.

Should we assign responsibility based on the present

inegalitarian institutional rules, or should we apply our nascent

egalitarian rules? (Radicals sometimes refer to the dilemma of

“living in this world or living as if the revolution had

occurred.”) Third, even when we do assign individual

responsibility, we may choose among a variety of sanctions –

individual disapproval, social disapproval, institutional

penalties or the penalties of the civil and criminal laws.

Different standards of proof and evidence of intent apply to

each, and which is most appropriate will depend on the

particulars of the individual, institution and situation.

44

4. Conclusion

We can return to the questions I posed at the beginning of

this paper. How can anti-racists and feminists defend themselves

against claims that affirmative action is simply “reverse

discrimination”? Institutional inequality requires institutional

remedies. We not only must eliminate formal rules permitting or

requiring inequality, but also break our inegalitarian habits,

the informal institutional rules that confer unearned benefits on

the already-advantaged and undeserved burdens on the already-

disadvantaged. Changing laws and having good intentions will not

achieve this; we need to change institutional rules. Affirmative

action programs that aim to admit or hire members of

disadvantaged groups in proportions equal to their applicant

populations do nothing more than mandate egalitarian practices.

Affirmative action programs with higher aims only recognize that

institutional inequalities already have unfairly advantaged some

applicants and unfairly disadvantaged others, and aim to redress

45

this unfairness.28

Why are racism by white people directed against people of

color, and sexism by men directed against women, worse than

racism by people of color against whites, or sexism by women

against men? They are worse because the first two are part of the

pattern of institutionalized practices that contribute to further

unearned advantages for whites and men and unfair burdens for

people of color and women, whereas the latter are not. This does

not excuse “reverse racism” or “reverse sexism,” of course; two

wrongs don’t make a right, even if one is individual and the

other institutional. But then why are women-only or people of

color-only groups acceptable to radicals, while men-only and

whites-only groups are not? The former are acceptable because

they do not tap into institutionalized systems of power and

privilege, whereas the latter do. When “the revolution has

occurred” – when institutional equality has been achieved, and

people’s life prospects cannot accurately be predicted at birth

based only a few social characteristics like race, sex and

46

parents’ income – either women-only and people of color-only

groups no longer will be acceptable, or men-only and whites-only

groups once again will be. Finally, discrimination continues to

occur, even in the absence of either formal rules or individual

intent, because informal inegalitarian institutional rules

operate as “second natures,” bypassing and even overriding

conscious intentions.

Where inequalities have been institutionalized, equality

requires more than simply the absence of formal inequality.

Inequality as the standard, the norm, will continue until the

informal rules and practices of institutionalized inequalities

have been brought to consciousness and replaced with egalitarian

rules and practices. Institutional equality must be developed at

the same time that institutional inequality is dismantled.

Because institutions develop over time, we cannot know in advance

exactly what institutionalized equality will look like. We can,

however, be certain that it will not just look like people of

color in whiteface, women in drag, “straight-acting” queers,

47

“special services” for people with disabilities, and so on.

Achieving institutional equality will require that we rethink all

our rules, standards of behavior and values. Equality cannot

simply be legislated, and inequality cannot simply be wished away

with good intentions.29Endnotes

48

49

11. “Equality-seeking groups” and “equality-seeking movements” are

phrases used by the Canadian government to designate women, people of

color, native people and people with disabilities. Members of these

groups have convinced many citizens (and also the federal government

in Canada) that social benefits and burdens have been unfairly

distributed to them and hence that their claims for equality, social

recognition and inclusion ought to be supported. Some egalitarians

include other socially subordinated groups, such as refugees and

lesbians, gays, bisexuals and transgendered people, in their

egalitarian aims. The social consensus on the justice of these

groups’ claims is less broad, however.

22. By “radical egalitarians” I mean that loosely-knit group of anti-

racists, feminists and other egalitarians who share certain

perspectives on equality and inequality, whether implicitly or

explicitly. Radical egalitarians believe that inequality is primarily

a group and not an individual phenomenon. The persistence of patterns

of social inequality based on a small subset of human characteristics

(e.g., race, sex, religion, class or economic status) provides

evidence for this view: members of dominant groups generally fare

better, on whatever social scale (income, overall health, education,

self esteem, etc.), than members of subordinated groups. Since

radicals believe inequality is a group phenomenon, the appropriate

egalitarian yardstick must measure group status. Hence radical

egalitarians believe that equality has been achieved only when the

majority of members of socially subordinated groups, and not just a

few individuals, fare as well as the majority of members of socially

dominant groups. Radical egalitarians also believe that equality

requires large-scale social and political and not just individual

changes. Achieving equality requires more than accommodation within

existing frameworks and changes in individuals’ beliefs; we aim,

instead, to change the underlying social structures that permit

persistent group inequalities. A corollary of this view is that legal

or formal equality is not sufficient for equality. There is

considerable disagreement among radicals about the necessity of legal

change, particularly specific legal changes. However, since radicals

agree that egalitarian change must be widespread and structural and

not piecemeal, radical egalitarianism cannot focus only on a single

social form or structure such as the law.

33. In my experience, the words “system” and “institution” have the

same extension in radical use. The liberal literature uses the word

“institution,” though, and I follow that practice here.

44. Some of the material in this section first appeared in Karen

Wendling and Paul Viminitz, “Could a Feminist and a Game Theorist Co-

Parent?,” Canadian Journal of Philosophy 28, 1 (1998), pp. 33-50.

55. John Rawls, “Two Concepts of Rules,” The Philosophical Review 64, 1

(1955), pp. 3-32, at p. 8, and A Theory of Justice (Cambridge: Harvard

University Press, 1971), p. 55. Rawls’ full definition of an

institution in A Theory of Justice is “a public system of rules which

defines offices and positions with their rights and duties, powers

and immunities, and the like” (p. 55).

66. Andrew Schotter, The Economic Theory of Social Institutions (Cambridge:

Cambridge University Press, 1981), p. 11. Schotter’s technical

definition of a social institution is:

A regularity R in the behavior of members of a population P when

they are agents in a recurrent situation Γ is an institution if and

only if it is true and common knowledge in P that (1) everyone

conforms to R; (2) everyone expects everyone else to conform to

R; and (3) either everyone prefers to conform to R on the

condition that others do, if Γ is a coordination problem, in

which case uniform conformity to R is a coordination

equilibrium; or (4) if anyone ever deviates from R it is known

that some or all of the others will also deviate and the payoffs

associated with the recurrent play of Γ using these deviating

strategies are worse for all agents than the payoff associated

with R. (p. 11)

Schotter says his definition is a modification of David Lewis’

definition of a social convention in Convention: A Philosophical Study

(Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1969).

77. John Stuart Mill makes a similar distinction in chapter 5 of

Utilitarianism. His argument that the criminal law is the wrong level of

sanction for self-regarding actions depends on the existence of

social and individual sanctions.

88. For more on social roles, see “Could a Feminist and a Game

Theorist Co-Parent?”, op. cit.

99. Rawls says the family is one of the “major social institutions”

in the “basic structure of society” (A Theory of Justice [Cambridge, MA:

Harvard University Press, 1971], p. 7). For a feminist critique of

Rawls’ theory, see Susan Moller Okin, Justice, Gender, and the Family (New

York: Basic Books, 1989) and “Reason and Feeling in Thinking about

Justice,” Ethics 99, 2 (1989), pp. 229-249.

010. Perhaps as a result of their focus on institutions with legally

codified rules, liberal egalitarians have tended to focus on legal

changes, whether to repeal unjust laws or to enact ones mandating

equality.

111. For a trenchant critique of the use of economic indicators as

measures of value, see Marilyn Waring, Counting for Nothing: What Men Value

and What Women Are Worth, 2nd edition (Toronto: University of Toronto

Press, 1999).

212. Since institutions develop over time, a full understanding of

any particular institution requires knowledge of its history as well

as its rules. The particular forms that institutions and rules take

are shaped by history and practice at least as much as by logic and

consistency.

313. Schotter, The Economic Theory of Social Institutions, pp. 1-2. In the

language of rational choice theorists, social institutions develop in

response to “coordination problems”; they regulate and coordinate

participants’ behavior in situations where uncoordinated actions lead

to sub-optimal solutions. In more ordinary language, institutions

make social solutions possible. Notice, for example, that the

“prisoners’ dilemma” of rational choice theorists vanishes under the

operation of the institutional rule “honor among thieves.”

414. Rawls argues for a method of “reflective equilibrium.” He uses a

very truncated list of “considered convictions,” however.

515. See Carol Gilligan, In A Different Voice (Cambridge, MA: Harvard

University Press, 1982). Some feminist ethicists have used Gilligan’s

work as the basis of a challenge to the principles- and justice-

dominated morality of philosophers like Rawls. See, for example,

Virginia Held, Feminist Morality: Transforming Culture, Society, and Politics

(Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1993), and the survey article

by Owen Flanagan and Kathryn Jackson, “Justice, Care, and Gender: The

Kohlberg-Gilligan Debate Revisited,” Ethics 97, 3 (1987), pp. 622-637.

616. Judith Martin, Common Courtesy: In Which Miss Manners Solves the Problem

that Baffled Mr. Jefferson (New York: Atheneum, 1985).

717. Judith Martin, Miss Manners’ Guide to Excruciatingly Correct Behavior (New

York: Warner Books, 1979), p. 67. That Judith Martin considers

inegalitarian behavior to be bad manners is evident from her many

writings.

818. Webster’s New Universal Unabridged Dictionary (New York: Barnes & Noble

Books, 1992), p. 411; italics in original.

919. Of course, institutionalized racism is more complex than this.

Study after study reveals that people of African descent suffer

disproportionately from racism in North America. In recent years,

discrimination against people of Middle Eastern descent, particularly

Muslims, has increased, especially since the events of September 11.

A more nuanced characterization of institutionalized racism would

distinguish between the various forms of racism in North America and

elsewhere.

020. Catharine MacKinnon argues that women are defined, both socially

and in law, as different from men. At the same time, however, sex

equality law requires that women be like men in order to qualify for

“equal” benefits. She writes,

Socially, one tells a woman from a man by their difference from

each other, but a woman is legally recognized to be

discriminated against on the basis of sex only when she can

first be said to be the same as a man. A built-in tension thus

exists between this concept of equality, which presupposes

sameness, and this concept of sex, which presupposes

difference.... Sex equality becomes a contradiction in terms,

something of an oxymoron. (Toward a Feminist Theory of the State

[Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1989], p. 216.)

Some people argue that some of the discrimination against gay men has

to do with the heterosexist perception that gay men are like women.

121. White people and men sometimes wonder the same things. Their

worries are unsupported by hiring statistics, however, while the

worries of people of color and women are unfortunately well supported

by evidence.

222. See Bernard Williams, “The Idea of Equality,” in Philosophy, Politics,

and Society, 2nd series, ed. P. Laslett and W. Runciman (Oxford: Oxford

University Press, 1962), pp. 110-131. In A Theory of Justice Rawls says

the social basis of self respect is the “most important” of the

primary goods (pp. 396, 440). But since his theory recognizes only

formal institutions, it cannot deal with institutionalized but

informal forms of discrimination that undermine the social bases of

self respect.

323. The documentary Blue Eyed (San Francisco, CA: Newsreel Films,

1996) provides an excellent and hard-hitting glimpse of the effects

of racial prejudice and discrimination. In her workshops on racism,

Jane Elliot separates groups according to eye color. She declares the

brown-eyed people to be better and more intelligent, and treats them

with respect that she denies to the blue-eyed members of the group,

whom she treats dismissively and disrespectfully. In a very short

time she demonstrates the personal and systemic effects of racism to

the group, and to the audience.

424. Catherine MacKinnon discusses this extensively in her work. See,

for example, “Difference and Dominance: On Sex Discrimination,” in

Feminism Unmodified (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1987), pp.

32-45.

525. This differs from group to group and from society to society, of

course. In Canada and the U.S., most formal rules permitting or

requiring inequality on the basis of race and sex have been

eliminated. The Americans with Disabilities Act has gone some way to

eliminate formal barriers to equality at the federal level in the

U.S. (still not enough, given the relative weakness of the American

federal government, but stronger than any comparable law in Canada).

On the other hand, the so-called “defense of marriage” acts passed by

various states in the U.S. continue the formal exclusion of lesbians,

gays, bisexuals and transgendered people from legal and social

benefits, and from equality. The queer movement is still in the

early, civil rights stages in most societies; substantial formal as

well as informal barriers to equality remain in place. South Africa

is an exception; the post-apartheid constitution includes sexual

orientation as a prohibited ground of formal discrimination.

626. Catharine MacKinnon provides a powerful list of informally

institutionalized “affirmative action policies” that favor men. She

writes,

virtually every quality that distinguishes women from men is

already affirmatively compensated in this society. Men’s

physiology defines most sports, their needs define auto and

health insurance coverage, their socially designed biographies

define workplace expectations and successful career patterns,

their perspectives and concerns define quality in scholarship,

their experiences and obsessions define merit, their

objectification of life defines art, their military service

defines citizenship, their presence defines family, their

inability to get along with each other – their wars and

rulerships – defines history, their image defines god, and their

genitals define sex. (“Difference and Dominance: On Sex

Discrimination,” in Feminism Unmodified, op. cit., p. 36)

727. The evolutionary biologist Stephen Jay Gould points out that

poor eyesight is natural to some humans, but is easily correctable

with a pair of glasses.

828. Section 15(b) of The Charter of Rights and Freedoms, the Canadian

constitution, explicitly permits programs aimed at redressing

previous inequalities. Thus it implicitly recognizes the existence of

institutional and not just individual inequalities, and provides

grounds for group and not just individual remedies.

929. I would like to thank Jean Harvey, Laura Miller, Barbara

Wendling and an anonymous reviewer for the Journal of Philosophical Research

for their helpful comments on this paper.