JUSTICE AS UNIVERSAL LOVE

AN ENDORSEMENT, DEFENSE AND BROADENING OFANDERSONS IDEA OF DEMOCRATIC EQUALITY

BY DAVID CASPERS

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STUDENT UNIVERSITY COLLEGE MAASTRICHT

WORD COUNT: 6743

Introduction....................................................31. Definition of Universal Love.................................31.1 The original position of universal love.........................4

2. The nine key characteristics of universal love...............42.1. Universal love is universal....................................52.2. Gude Laune as the end-state of happiness and the satisfaction of wants...............................................................52.3.Every human is capable of exercising unconditional love.........62.4.The remaining six characteristics in short......................9

3. Love Utopia..................................................94. The love test...............................................115. Anderson meets the Love Test and the 9 principles of universallove...........................................................125.1.The love-problem of luck-egalitarianism........................135.1.1. Option luck vs. “brute luck”...............................14

5.2.The alternative system of democratic equality and its coherence with the nine principles of universal love.........................155.2.1 Democratic equality and its institution of the state of Love Utopia............................................................155.2.2. Democratic Equality and distribution of resources in Love Utopia............................................................16

6. Conclusion..................................................197. References..................................................20

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Introduction

The philosophical concept of Universal Love has been initially

established in the paper “Justice as Universal Love- A critique of Robert

Nozick” by David Caspers (2014). It shall now be outlined,

analyzed and explained in more detail to serve its direct

application to Andersons theory of democratic equality as

distributive justice in our societies. The idea of universal love

in a philosophical context provides a radically different

egalitarian approach to distributive justice.

Firstly, the philosophical idea and concept of universal

love is introduced to the reader on the basis of a so-called

“original position of universal love”. Secondly, through an in-

depth guidance of the reader through the three most important key

principles of universal love the idea of universal love shall be

operationalized culminating in a set of in total nine key

principles that need to be fulfilled in order to form a society

of universal love. Thirdly, facilitating and simplifying a case-

application of these principles, an imagined community of hippies

living under the principles of universal love shall be

introduced. This hippie community, as designed to be the final

stage of universal love, shall be called Mini-Love Utopia.

Fourthly, in order to facilitate and streamline the abstract idea

of universal love into a philosophical tool to be worked with, a

love-test just as the envy-test inspired by Dworkin, shall be

introduced. Working from within the limited domain of resource

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distribution the love-test shall be capable to answer the

question of what brings us to a state of universal love. Fifthly

and lastly the love-test and the 9 principles of universal love

will be applied directly to Elizabeth Andersons text “What is the

point of equality”, and used as a means to reinforce, defend and

broaden the argument of Anderson, but also of justice as

universal love itself. Through this logical line of

argumentation, a theory of distributive justice capable of

promoting universal love as perceived in the original position of

universal love is identified, defended and reinforced.

1. Definition of Universal Love

When thinking about universal love, various different categories

of love can be identified first. There are many shapes of love,

such as the love to ones parents, to a friend, to a lover, to a

culture, to good food and music and smells. Love is a feeling and

a state of mind, and at the same time the driving source for the

most important things in life: the creation of life itself and

the sources of enjoyment within it.

Universal love is multi-significant. It can be seen as an

altruistic attitude of love and friendliness. It also means to

refuse animosity, bitterness and resentment. Self-interest is

subordinated to communal interest in a framework of universal

love, as the community is capable of constantly upholding a warm-

hearted feeling of fellowship and sympathy. Universal love

overcomes all social, religious, racial political and economic

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barriers. It has additional multiple meanings, such as being a

societal state of mind, a direct expression of an emotion or, as

will be shown, the basis for a theoretical framework for a theory

of justice.

1.1 The original position of universal love

I take it as granted, that universal love is highly desirable to

all human beings. After all, who dislikes the feeling of loving

and being loved? For the sake of realizing what would be the most

pure, and true to the core way that universal love would manifest

itself, I am putting myself behind a veil of ignorance and into

the so-called “original position”. This perspective ignores all

social realities that exist, that are surrounding us and that are

influencing our perception and ideal of what justice would look

like. It is from this perspective of standing in the original

position that the principles of universal love have to be looked

at. Seen from this position, universal love has great appeal for

humanitarian and egalitarian reasons, and provides one of the

most compelling arguments to strive for collective welfare,

communal engagement and less selfishness.

2. The nine key characteristics of universal love

To underline principles of universal love, and in order to bring

them into context with political philosophy, I have come up with

nine key principles of universal love in order to operationalize

the yet vague concept of universal love into an academically

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workable shape. The three most important ones are elaborated upon

in more detail: its universality, it´s aim for an end-state of

happiness through meeting “wants” at a sufficient level, and the

capability of every human to exercise universal love. Due to the

limited scope of this paper, the remaining six key principles are

written out only in short.

2.1. Universal love is universal

Universal love can be philosophically seen as the Higgs-Boson1

permeating the social glue of our communities, holding together

human bonds, families and societies. Using the Higgs-Boson as an

example, a cohesive example of the origins of universal love can

be provided. Universal love did not simply appear all of a sudden

during the Stone Age. Rather I argue, it has been there since the

beginning of time, since the big bang of our universe, and has

since then continued to permeate the surroundings in which human

societies are embedded in to different degrees determined by

humans themselves.

This theoretical view of universal love as a meta-physical,

non-detectable web of energies helps us to explain what is meant

with the word universal. Imagine that this ever-present web of

universal love-energies creates the capability for humans, to

from within naturally be capable of exercising and living the

spirit of universal love. How humans react to and interpret these

capabilities of universal love on everyday basis has been, is and

1 The Higgs Boson is proof of the existence of the so-called Higgs Field, ahypothetical, invisible kind of force field that pervades the whole universe

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always will be up to the personal freedom and character of each

human himself. As explained, the particles of universal love have

to be imagined to be all-encompassing, to exist at any time and

geographic point in the world and are thus to be understood as

unbounded by time and space constraints2. If we take these

premises as granted, universal love is universal, for it cannot

be constrained by any force in the world except by humans within

themselves. Consequently, if it can be constrained by humans for

their capability of themselves to exercise universal love, it can

also be liberated again by the human mind to thrive.

2.2. Gude Laune as the end-state of happiness and the satisfaction of wants

DJ Sven Väth, a famous German Techno-DJ and artist at the

famous Berlin Love Parade, is widely known in the scene for his

words of wisdom he repeatedly proclaims to crowds when playing

his sets: “It is all about the Gude Laune people!” (Väth, 2006).

For the Love Parade in Berlin is a group of lovers of music

united in their love for dance, the music itself and the other

people surrounding them can be compared to temporary members of a

2 The beauty about this cosmic way of explaining universal love is, that whileit obviously stands on very shaky grounds from a scientific perspective, ithas neither been scientifically proven as right nor wrong so far- no one hasbeen capable of measuring or detecting universal love reliably withinstruments, making it extremely hard to determine whether it exists or not.Given this background, the cosmic way deserves to be considered as ahypothetical and idealistic true way of explaining universal love

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hippie community. This comparison is deepened and made clearer at

a later stage as Love Utopia. Gude Laune means something like “it

is all about the good vibes and moods”, and carries its subtle

very own additional and precise meanings hard to translate to the

English language. I claim that Gude Laune is the second underlying

principle of universal love. The mental and societal state of Gude

Laune carries the positive attitude towards life, embracement of

joy, happiness, respect and an optimistic and positive attitude

towards life and other human beings inherently necessary for

universal love. One of the core attributes of a distributive

philosophical theory of universal love shall be reaching this

societal state of mind. In philosophical terms, Gude Laune refers

to a state of happiness induced through the satisfaction of basic

“wants” or needs such as food and shelter and a healthy state of

the body and mind.

Gude Laune simultaneously can be seen as the behavioral change

from individualist towards communal, from materialistic towards

idealistic, from selfish to benevolent attitudes. Gude Laune is a

societal state of mind acting very much alike a societal perpetuum

mobile3. The law of attraction states “like attracts like”. In other

words, humans focusing on positive thoughts will be attracting

other people with positive thoughts. Through this mechanism, and

because positive thoughts and attitudes are not limited in their

quantities, a constantly reinforcing mechanism is created.

3 a vehicle that per definition is feeding itself with energy without anyexternal source of energy necessary

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From a sociological, human perspective, Gude Laune can be seen

as state of extreme cohesion of social capital that provides the

community of universal love with a societal state of mind. This

enables increasingly sustainable, satisfying lives blessed by

universal welfare for all members of society in the here and now

and the foreseeable future.

2.3.Every human is capable of exercising unconditional love

For the argument of universal love as ideal theory of justice to

be defendable, it needs to be reasonably well established that

every human is capable of exercising and practicing universal

love. As only the proof of this capability allows building a

society in the first place that puts the ability to grow and

fully enjoy ones capability of universal love at its center,

without alienating or discriminating e.g. mentally disabled

citizens not capable of pracitcting universal love. If there

would be humans incapable of exercising or learning universal

love, it would be inherently unfair and unjust and against the

important principle of the universality of love. Without the

universality established, the theory of universal love would

become based on brute luck. However, as will be shown, the theory

of universal love provides a counter-theory to luck-

egalitarianism.

It is obviously extremely hard to scientifically prove the

existence of universal love as natural “God-given” surrounding

element in our societies, for it cannot be measured, quantified

or directly altered using technology. Yet, its philosophical

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existence can be proven. First however a quick detour to the

human underlying image that we accept has to be taken.

Underlying to the idea of universal love is an absolutely

positive and optimistic image of human nature, far away from the

limited models for predicting human behavior such as the homo

oeconomicus (lat.: economic man) that largely ignores vital human

dimensions such as ethics and morals. In opposition to the homo

oeconomicus that defines in many ways the selfish character

attributes of contemporary society, I would like to propose the

human image of the homo amoris universalitate (lat.: man of universal love). The

homo amoris universalitate I propose has ethical and emotional concerns

and morals at its center, subordinating all other values to the

ones of universal love, happiness and compassion at the core4.

The perfect homo oeconomicus, “that through his reinforcement of

economic models used in our world becomes more and more a reality

[…], and in the long run ultimately predictable and thus not only

eliminates the concept of a free market but also is the ultimate

humiliation to humans” (Hürter & Vasek, 2014) stands in contrast

to the homo amoris universalitate. This homo amoris universalitate rather

stands in the Aristotelian tradition of the desire for a life of

Eudaimonia (Greek: human flourishing). In this view, humans engage with

each other for the sake of experiencing universal love and the

flourishing of human nature and societies. Yet, while this short4 This radically different human image underlying the theory clearly needsfurther analysis and argumentative support structure. It nevertheless make thepoint clear, that a radical change to a different economic, social andpolitical perception of the human image is necessary to enable a broadunderstanding of universal love making our societies capable of accepting andliving it

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explanation of the alternative underlying human image does not

prove the capability of humans to universally love, it

established the necessary paradigm change one has to mentally go

through in order to avoid non-clarity and confusion with the

concepts of universal love.

Prove that humans are capable of exercising and living

universal love is established through looking at the two aspects

of capability of universal love. First of all I am talking about

the capability of practicing and living according to the

standards of universal love, thus by definition of the word

capability the power or ability to do this. Hence, it needs to be

proven that first of all every human is capable of love, and

secondly and crucially to be capable of loving universally.

There are more than enough proofs that every human is

capable of feeling and exercising love. Most of us remember the

love they felt as a young child towards their parents. The love

for my mother and father is different from the love I feel for my

very good friends, just as it is different to the love I feel

towards my partner in life. Apart from perhaps some extremely

rare cases of genetic dysfunction, every human born feels a

special love for their mother. It is an evolutionary trick of

nature to secure and protect the young, dependent and vulnerable

baby from harm, making it capable of surviving under the

protection of its parents. The feeling of love is a chemo-

biological process in the brain, based on serotonin, oxytocin,

dopamine and other chemicals that are poured out in the brain

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when falling or being in love. Thus, every human is technically

capable of feeling and exercising love. The widely perceived

limited applicability of its universal applicability to all

humans can be partially explained by the social norms governing

our industrialized, capitalist societies: to love universally,

thus to love everybody in a society is condemned as weird. After

all, capitalists argue that there is no materialistic benefit in

loving and giving to people unconditionally that one does not

know. However, especially within small-scale communities, humans

have repeatedly shown that they are capable of practicing

universal love. Resources are shared with everybody non-

conditionally, people have smiles on their faces and Gude Laune,

and love is given without the need to be given back immediately.

2.4.The remaining six characteristics in short

For the sake of this paper, only the first three key

characteristics of universal love according to me have been lined

out in more detail. The full list of the nine characteristics of

universal love is in short5:

1.) Universal love is universal

2.) It´s aim is the end state of Gude Laune

5 I want to express my concerns for the potential personal limitedness in coming up with „Key characteristics“ of universal love, and want to encourage every reader to take part in the discussion on this matter. For it is only with a working definition of universal love, that it becomes useful and discussable in an academic environment without creating too much confusion.

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3.) Every human is capable of exercising and living

universal love. Furthermore, universal love postulates the

idea of a homo amoris universalitate as underlying human image

4.) The universal love and power of a human community is

the strongest, most resources and welfare-giving, socially

uniting force between humans and groups of humans - strong

bonds between members of the hippie-community, and absolute

social openness are key pillars for universal love

5.) A community of universal love lives in harmony with

itself and its surrounding nature, for it sees any form of

live as sacred and loveable

6.) In a society founded in universal love, a strong

personal materialistic detachment takes place in the

interest of giving back to the community

7.) Universal love is voluntary

8.) Universal love is not limited or bound in time and

space

9.) Universal love should be lived and given to others

unconditionally, for creating conditions upon which

universal love is given or received would break the

universality of love

3. Love Utopia

After I have shown what the nine key principles of universal love

are according to me, a hypothetical utopian society that is very

much founded on and inspired by the idea of Plato’s Republic is

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successively introduced. Based on a set of virtues and values,

such as postulated and operationalized in the nine key principles

of universal love as seen above, a perfect and just society shall

be imagined that is based upon these principles. Love-Utopia is

an imagined community of hippies, living together on a small

island under the principles of universal love. Just like in the

Plutonian Utopia, Love Utopia has its own sets of rules and norms

on the basis of which equality and ultimately satisfaction and

fulfillment is achieved.

According to Socrates the newly founded city of Plato’s

Republic will be “wise, brave, sober, and just […] if it has been

rightly founded in the full sense” (Plato & Halliwell, 1988).

This slightly circular argument can be used just the same way for

Love Utopia. If it has been rightly founded, with the core belief

of absolutely fulfilling all nine key principles of universal

love, then it will be wise, sustainable, fulfilling and just.

So just like the voluntary community of dancers united in

the name of love and music during the times of the Love parade6,

the hippie community of Love Utopia is absolutely voluntary. For

it is permeated by universal love, which in itself has to be

given voluntarily to others, wherefore membership of the

community is to be chosen individually. Yet, for the

universalistic aspect of universal love and its time and

geographic non-limitedness, universal love is to be found

everywhere on the island. Love Utopia carries an underlying human

6 A free yearly techno parade in the heart of Berlin during the 90s, eventuallyattracting more than a million ravers and music lovers

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image of the homo amoris universalitate. This image is “implying the

eagerness and openness to always care and look out for each

other, to meet, discuss laugh and dance together with random

strangers on the streets, and to enjoy a fulfilling and happy

life” (Caspers, 2014). Seeing any form of life sacred and

loveable, as well as realizing that the community is the

strongest, most resources and welfare giving force will

incentivize the hippie on the island to voluntarily life

together. When the hippies are sharing their resources with each

other, everyone is better of. At the same time, given the strong

focus on upholding, creating and deepening social bonds between

each other, a different valuation of materialistic resources has

taken place in Love Utopia. The hippies realize, that they are

much happier with each other if they can stop bothering about the

protection of their own property, for they do not believe that

they really “own” anything (apart from their own body) to its

full extent that exists in the world.

“As everybody loves everybody unconditionally in this ideal state of Mini Love-

Utopia, and a strong detachment of materialistic obsessions has taken place,

there is no problem in redistributing material resources from the

materialistically rich to the materialistically poor, and in the end everybody is

left off happier - as the desires born out of universal love have been met

through the redistributive process.” (Caspers, 2014)

This way the state of justness has been reached in the society of

Love Utopia. Additionally, the desire to find happiness, and

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satisfaction of wants and desires (Gude Laune), has been achieved

as the end-state in the society of universal love. 7

4. The love test

From a concept such as the Love Utopia, where a fully

operationalized conception of universal love is lived, general

principles of justice promoting, supporting and realizing

principles of universal love in our current societies can be

deducted. The so-called love test provides us with a test that

allows us to establish whether or not the redistribution of

resources in a society is grounded in the key principles of

universal love. This test, when applied in the setting of love-

utopia, is capable of determining whether or not the ultimate

state of justice has been found. As a consequence, with this test

existing theories of justice that both promote and realize

principles of justice grounded in the key principles of universal

love as established earlier can be identified. Because the end-

state of love utopia is still unrealistically far away for the

societies we currently live in, this trick has to be undertaken

in order to find a path towards universal love. We want to know

what the perfect state of justice would look like in a society

founded entirely in the desirable state of universal love. This

state of justice is represented in the distributive method of

resources based on the love-test, which is considered as ideal

for it is in line with the nine principles of universal love.

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Consequently, the theories looked at should be either supported

and argumentatively deepened, or heavily criticized

The love test has been inspired by the envy test created by

Ronald Dworkin8, and is founded on the idea of a society with a

deeply rooted conviction of voluntary universal love and respect,

harmony for society itself and within it, and reaching an end

state of Gude Laune.

“The love test states, that resources are not distributed, but shared in such a

manner, that, as soon as no one would want anyone else anymore to receive

more materialistic resources an optimum state has been found.” (Caspers,

2014)

It has to be made clear one more time, that this love state has

the underlying assumption of a homo amoris universalitate. The universal

capability of every human to love is the source of this “wanting”

of more resources by individuals for others. It is through this

mechanism, that especially the most worse off will always receive

something, whilst being treated with respect and dignity equally

to the materialistically rich.

5. Anderson meets the Love Test and the 9 principles of universal love

8 „No division of resources is an equal division if, once the division is complete, any immigrant would prefer someone else´s bundle of resources to hisown bundle.”(Dworkin, 1981)

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After the nine principles of universal love have been established

and elaborated upon in depth in the case example of a

hypothetical perfect society following these principles called

Love Utopia, the love-test has been introduced as a means to

compare and contrast different theories of distributive justice.

It is not time to introduce a philosophical reading and use the

tools that have just been established.

Throughout the text “What is the Point of Equality?” by

Elizabeth Anderson several reoccurring themes have arisen. The

first theme consists of the philosophical arguments brought

forward by Anderson against luck-egalitarianism as postulated by

Arneson, Cohen, Dworkin, Nagel and van Parijs. The second theme

is the discussion about the proposed alternative system of

democratic equality as designed by Anderson herself. As a

consequence of the introduction of this new system, two new

themes about the role of the state and the ways of resource

distribution automatically arise too. As will be seen throughout

almost all of these themes, universal love serves as a useful

tool to deepen, defend and broaden the (counter-) arguments

brought forward by Anderson.

5.1.The love-problem of luck-egalitarianism

Elizabeth Anderson reiterates that Ronald Dworkin “defines

equality as an envy-free distribution of resources” (Anderson,

1999; Dworkin, 1981). Simultaneously, Anderson argues, that the

agenda of egalitarian theorizing is to narrowly focused “on the

distribution of divisible, privately appropriated goods such as

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income and resources, or privately enjoyed goods, such as

welfare” (Anderson, 1999). This is a principle shared by the

philosophy of universal love. The sole view of distribution of

material resources as a source of equality is counter-intuitive

for a philosophy that puts the human at its core, and not its

possessions. The communal consensus prevailing in the society of

Love Utopia views welfare and equality more holistically,

focusing on equality of respect and universal love for each

member at its core

Anderson deepens the argument with regards to brute luck and

optional luck by arguing that recent egalitarian writing has come

to be dominated by the view “that the fundamental aim of equality

is to compensate people for undeserved bad luck- being born with

poor native endowments, bad parents” (ibid.) etc. This, according

to Anderson, is out of touch with political aims of

egalitarianism, which at its core has the idea “to end

oppression, which by definition is socially imposed”(ibid.).

Furthermore, egalitarianism as proclaimed by Anderson should have

the aim “to create a community in which people stand in relations

of equality to others”(ibid.).

Universal love adds several important notions to this

reasoning. Firstly, given its universality, universal love is

lived by everybody in a society of love, and every member of the

love-society is capable of exercising it. Given the universal

capability of citizens to universally love, and the societal

consensus of loving everybody equally and unconditionally,

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oppression is unthinkable; the oppressors do not oppress people

for that it is against both principles of loving unconditionally

and universally. Secondly, with the end-state of Gude Laune in

mind, oppression is to be seen as a destructive social phenomena

acting against this end-goal. Oppression creates anger,

frustration and envy, which have a negative emotional influence

on the social bonds between humans and their capability to

exercise universal love freely. Therefore, it needs to be

criticized. Lastly, universal love supports creating a community

in which people stand in relations of equality to others, for

relations of equality create and maintain strong social bonds,

social openness and harmony within societies.

5.1.1. Option luck vs. “brute luck”

Taking the stand of luck egalitarians and their resulting

theories of equality of fortune, Ronald Dworkin argues that

“justice demand that the state compensate each individual for

whatever brute risks they would have insured themselves against,

on the assumption that all were equally likely to suffer from the

risk” (Anderson, 1999). Simultaneously, luck egalitarians also

argue that the victims of very bad option luck deserve their

misfortune, and society does not need to secure them against

exploitation.

Firstly, while it is appraisable that luck egalitarians want

to compensate the unlucky humans punished with an e.g. disability

or less intelligence, the motivations on which this compensation

takes place is highly questionable. The “chief appeal of equality

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of fortune […] lies in the appearance of humanitarianism9”(ibid.)

as reason for acting. This can be either seen as motivated by

ideas of universal love, or pity. A society that works towards

equality on the basis of pity violates the fundamental expressive

requirement of any theory of egalitarian justice, for it ignores

the idea of equal respect for all citizens. “Pity is incompatible

with respecting the dignity of others” (ibid.). Anderson states,

“it is hard to see how citizens could be expected to accept such

reasoning and still retain their self-respect”(ibid.). Pity in

itself is not necessarily bad from a perspective of universal

love, yet it becomes disrespectful as soon as it arises out of

negative emotions and not the true, inherent desire of humans to

help fellow human beings. Therefore, if it is pity for the sake

of treating others like inferiors, it has to be abolished. Yet,

truly felt pity grounded in feelings of universal love has to be

endorsed by the theory of universal love.

Secondly, the argument of not caring about victims of

optional luck has to be heavily criticized from the standpoint of

democratic equality and universal love. A society that permits

“the creation of outcasts and subordinate classes” (ibid.) can be

as repressive as a despotic regime. It ignores the fundamental

values of mutual unconditional respect and platonic communal love

within a framework of universal love, and ignores and actively

counteracts the power of the human community as the strongest9 Compassion becomes pity, as soon as the internal characteristic judgement about a person is not „She is badly off“ but „she is worse off than me and thus sadly inferior“. While both feelings carry potential positive outputs, only pity is condescending and disrespectful.

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most socially uniting force between humans. The community,

designed to liberate individuals in a community of universal

love, turns in this case into an oppressor within a framework of

luck-egalitarianism.

Anderson also lines out that equality of fortune assumes

atomistic egoism and self-sufficiency as the norm for human

beings. The contrast of the theory of equality of fortune to the

theory of universal love could not be clearer: the human image of

universal love is communal altruism and community-power, in

contrast to atomistic, individualistic selfish egoism and the

belief in self-sufficiency. Herewith, the last argumentative

deathblow to equality of fortune as acceptable to a theory of

justice based on universal love has been given.

5.2.The alternative system of democratic equality and its coherence with the nine principles of universal love

The idea of democratic equality by Anderson provides an

alternative philosophical framework, through which justice in

societies can be achieved. It will be analyzed on the basis of

the nine principles of universal love, whilst imagining what the

institution of the state would look like in Love Utopia. To

finalize, a discussion about how resources should be distributed

in a love-utopian society is established, using the envy and the

love-test to determine possible solutions to this problem.

5.2.1 Democratic equality and its institution of the state of Love Utopia

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The theory Anderson defends is called “democratic equality”. It

actively seeks the construction of a “community of equals”,

integrating “principles of distribution with the expressive

demands for equal respect” (ibid.). In Andersons theory of

democratic equality the fundamental aim of every citizen is to

secure everybody´s freedom, thus no one is told what to do or

judged on the responsibility for choices that had unfortunate

outcomes. Democratic equality proposes a society where “persons

stand in relations of equality”(Anderson, 1999). The democratic

community, in contrast to a hierarchical one, understands

democracy as a collective self-determination “by means of open

discussion among equals, in accordance to rules acceptable to

all” (ibid.). No one is inferior to anyone else, and everybody

shall receive the same amount of attention and respect when

talking. Furthermore, democratic equality is “a relational theory

of equality; it views equality as a social relationship”(ibid.).

This view enjoys strong support from the view of justice as a

consequence of universal love. The idea of superiority or

inferiority does not exist in a society truly grounded in

universal love, for everybody is loved unconditionally and

universally. The right to a collective self-determination ensures

the state of Gude Laune for all citizens of that society, for it

guarantees them with a self-determined, idealistic community that

is run by the community itself. This democratic management system

ensures furthermore that the society can live in harmony with

itself- thus, that no person in political power abuses his or her

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power for personal benefit and thereby creating societal

disharmonies. A relational theory of justice fulfills insofar the

requirements of a theory of justice congruent with universal

love, as it acknowledges the importance of each individual for

the society, without discriminating and marginalizing. Putting

every member on equal footing of respect gives true political and

societal value and power to the universally acknowledged inherent

value and sacredness of human life itself.

5.2.2. Democratic Equality and distribution of resources in Love Utopia

For every society talking about justice, needs to talk about how

resources should be distributed. Throughout this paragraph, the

importance of enabling citizens to being capable of living a

fulfilling and happy life is established. Following this, the

envy-test and the love-test are discussed

Democratic equality strives for equality of capabilities,

with capabilities as defined by Amartya Sen as sets of

functioning’s one can achieve, given the personal, material and

social resources available. For the e.g. capability of every

human to work, effective access to means of sustaining one´s

biological existence is necessary. Food, shelter, clothing,

medical care and “access to basic conditions of human

agency”(Anderson, 1999) such as the psychological conditions of

autonomy, including the self-confidence to think and judge for

oneself, freedom of thought and movement” are necessary for

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humans to being capable of being a free and equal citizen.

Societies based on universal love clearly endorse the idea of a

capabilities approach, as is also reflected in the belief of a

love-capability inherent to every human as manifested as key

principle. The state cannot tell its citizens what to do and how

to manage their lives on a long-term large-scale basis. Rather, a

society based on universal love proposes to equip its citizens

with the right capabilities to flourish, so to e.g. have food-

security, the right to shelter, water and education. It is

important to note, that securing only the capabilities the

citizens need and not declaring which ones are more important

than others allows individuals to decide for themselves how

useful or important the goods are that the state guarantees to

them. Citizens are obliged to provide each other with that

certain minimum level of resources for sufficiency reasons. For

without this sufficient level of care provided for each other

human dignity, mutual respect and the principle of universal love

are ignored and led ad absurdum.

The envy-test as proposed by Ronald Dworkin is based on

thought of: “I want what you have”. The only way citizens that

are materialistically worse off than others can claim their fair

share is through the expression of envy. This limited idea of

offering ones own “envy as a reason to the envied to satisfy one

´s desire is profoundly disrespectful” (ibid.). This shows the

limitation of the envy test for a theory of egalitarian justice

based on equality of respect. Theories of equality of fortune are

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distributive theories, perceiving equality as patterns of

distribution. The love-test on the other hand as has been

introduced earlier already, perceives equality not as a

materialistic issue to be solved, but as an idealistic issue of

respect. This goes hand in hand with the idea of democratic

equality, that argues, “goods must be distributed according to

principles and processes that express respect for all” (ibid.).

It furthermore states, that the correct distribution of resources

requires “that everyone have effective access to enough resources

to avoid being oppressed by others and to function as an equal in

civil society” (ibid.). Cultural norms, the natural environment

and individual circumstances determine what is “enough” in this

context.

The love-test states that, if “resources are not distributed, but shared

in such a manner, that, as soon as no one would want anyone else anymore to receive

more materialistic resources an optimum state has been found” (Caspers, 2014).

This test is in direct emotional contrast to the envy test, it

finds universal love at its center of thought and not envy. It

implies, that equal respect to all citizens is given

unconditionally, as mutual unconditional love and respect for

everybody is the philosophical basis in the society of universal

love. It rests on the assumption, that in a society where

everybody loves everybody unconditionally, justice with regards

to distribution of material resources is automatically achieved

through the human power of exercising universal love. Because

people know what other people like, want and need, they take care

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that each and everyone of them receives these resources from the

common pool. Given a strong materialistic detachment and a

perception of humans as strongly embedded within and dependent on

a community in love utopia, people are willing and ready to share

the resources for the purpose of strengthening everybody within

their community and thereby the health of the community itself.

The benevolent wanting for other people to receive more is

satisfied as soon as even the worst off have received a healthy

level of resources, making the capable of living a fulfilling

life. The question arises, which mechanism would be good and

useful to carry this out. Luckily, one way of doing this, which I

regard as highly useful, has come up in recent debates of

distributive justice.

The idea of an unconditional basic income provides every

citizen with the absolutely equal amount of respect, non-

conditionality, and lastly a sufficient level of resources. It

does not look at the age, gender, race or social standing of

citizens receiving the income. Already Rawls has stressed the

fact that people within a society hold different perceptions of

the good. If a society aims to provide its citizens with

resources to enable them of their capabilities, these goods can

be called neutral goods for the purpose of justice. Neutral not

in the sense of being equally valuable in comparison with other

goods, but because “reasonable people can recognize that these

form a legitimate basis for making moral claims on one

another”(ibid.). Anderson proposes that “one mechanism for

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achieving a decent minimum” on which people could live “would be

a minimum wage”(ibid.). The proposal of a minimum wage is

already the correct first step, as it provides a more equal

footing in guaranteed resources and also respect one receives for

his work. Universal love however goes further in arguing that an

unconditional basic income should be provided by the state to all

its citizens. It is the ultimate manifestation of what universal

love would look like if applied to the idea of a welfare state.

It provides a neutral ground from which people can make moral

claims on one another, and works absolutely hand in hand with the

nine principles of universal love10. The unconditional basic

income would equip all citizens with the most elementary basic

needs and capabilities to live a happy, fulfilling life, and thus

provides an elegant and swift solution to the end-state of

universal love, Gude Laune.

6. Conclusion

Throughout this text, the concept of universal love has been

established as a philosophical concept. It has been done by

moving from the original position of universal love towards nine

key principles of universal love that can be established from the

original position. On the basis of these nine principles, a

10 Given that the philosophical concept of universal love is still in its beginnings, an in-depth discussion of why Universal Love would work best with an unconditional basic income still needs to be elaborated upon and established in more detail. Time and space-constraints refrain me from doing this in the context of this paper as we speak.

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perfect society called Love Utopia has been imagined living to

the rules of universal love, and with the underlying human image

of the homo amoris universalitate. A test to reach the perfect state of

material distribution in Love Utopia has been established, called

Love-Test. This test, together with the nine principles of

universal love, has subsequently been applied to the discussion

of Anderson and her theory of democratic equality.

Several important conclusions can be drawn from this paper.

As Anderson and the theory of universal love have highlighted,

the principles of justice deductible from luck-egalitarian

theories are to be condemned for several reasons: Luck

egalitarians ignore the inherent value of every human being, his

dignity and the resulting necessity to always equally respect

every human being, as they either argue out of condescending pity

or on the basis of envy. Through failing to show the equal

respect to everybody, luck egalitarians consequently fail the

most important pillar of egalitarianism: to create a society of

equals. Anderson theory of democratic equality and my theory of

universal love share the condemnation of pity and disrespectful

behavior, whilst putting humans into the center of attention and

promoting a materialistic detachment. The theory of universal

love has deepened the idea of the capabilities approach as used

by Anderson and Sen, with regards to arguing that within a

society of universal love an equality of capabilities is

desirable.

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Lastly, the theory of universal love has argued, that in

line with Anderson’s idea of democratic equality and the idea of

a “minimum wage” to create more equality of capabilities, an

unconditional basic income should be introduced. This would

create a society of equals as postulated by Anderson, which is

founded in equal respect for everybody whilst maintaining

individual freedoms and incentive structures enabling people to

determine their own future.

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7. References

Anderson, E. S. (1999). What Is the Point of Equality?*.

Ethics, 109(2), 287-337.

Caspers, D. (2014). Justice as Universal Love - A

critique of Robert Nozick’s idea  of self-ownership.

Dworkin, R. (1981). What is equality? Part 2: Equality

of resources. Philosophy & Public Affairs, 283-345.

Hürter, T., & Vasek, T. (2014). Zombies des Zasters.

Hohe Luft Philosophie Zeitschrift(5), 20-27.

Plato, & Halliwell, S. (1988). Republic 10: Cambridge Univ

Press.

Väth, S. (2006). It is all about the Gude Laune.

Youtube.

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