Peer-Reviewed Articles
Forthcoming. Sorting and the Ecology of Freedom of Association. Journal of Political Philosophy.
Preprint | Publication
Social connections between different types of people are necessary for individuals to fairly access resources and opportunities. Yet we tend to associate homophilously, with people who are more similar to us than different. Our associational choices therefore make it difficult for some groups to access a fair share of resources and opportunities. Freedom of association provides a normative bulwark against interventions on our associational choices, as it guarantees the presumptive right to exclude and a right against interference from the state on our associational choices. Thus there is a tension between freedom of association and the demands of justice – this is the problem of sorting. This paper argues that the negative conception is insufficient, and offers an ecological conception of freedom of association as a way to resolve the problem of sorting. On the ecological conception, certain social conditions are necessary for associational freedom. Freedom of association and justice can be jointly realized to an extent further than previously thought.
2021. Social Structural Explanation. Philosophy Compass 16(10).
Preprint | Publication
Social problems such as racism, sexism, and inequality are often cited as structural rather than individual in nature. What does it mean to invoke a social structural explanation, and how do such explanations relate to individualistic ones? This article explores recent philosophical debates concerning the nature and usages of social structural explanation. I distinguish between two central kinds of social structural explanation: those that are autonomous from psychology, and those that are not. This distinction will help clarify the explanatory power that each type of SSE has, points of convergence with methodological traditions such as critical theory and rational choice theory, and the difficulties that each type of SSE faces.
2021. An Intrapersonal, Intertemporal Solution to an Interpersonal Dilemma. Philosophical Studies.
Preprint | Publication
It is commonly accepted that what we ought to do collectively does not imply anything about what each of us ought to do individually. According to this line of reasoning, if cooperating will make no difference to an outcome, then you are not morally required to do it. And if cooperating will be personally costly to you as well, this is an even stronger reason to not do it. However, this reasoning results in a self-defeating, yet entirely predictable outcome. If everyone is rational, they will not cooperate, resulting in an aggregate outcome that is devastating for everyone. This dismal analysis explains why climate change and other collective action problems are so difficult to ameliorate. The goal of this paper is to provide a different, exploratory framework for thinking about individual reasons for action in collective action problems. I argue that the concept of commitment gives us a new perspective on collective action problems. Once we take the structure of commitment into account, this activates requirements of diachronic rationality that give individuals instrumental reasons to cooperate in collective action problems.
2020. Implicit Bias and Social Schema: A Transactive Memory Framework. Philosophical Studies 177(7): 1857-1877.
Preprint | Publication
To what extent should we focus on implicit bias in order to eradicate persistent social injustice? Structural prioritizers argue that we should focus less on individual minds than on unjust social structures, while equal prioritizers think that both are equally important. This article introduces the framework of transactive memory into the debate to defend the equal priority view. The transactive memory framework helps us see how structure can emerge from individual interactions as an irreducibly social product. If this is right, then debiasing interventions are structural interventions. One upshot is that the utility of the individual versus structural distinction is not apparent for the purposes of intervention.
Forthcoming. Sorting and the Ecology of Freedom of Association. Journal of Political Philosophy.
Preprint | Publication
Social connections between different types of people are necessary for individuals to fairly access resources and opportunities. Yet we tend to associate homophilously, with people who are more similar to us than different. Our associational choices therefore make it difficult for some groups to access a fair share of resources and opportunities. Freedom of association provides a normative bulwark against interventions on our associational choices, as it guarantees the presumptive right to exclude and a right against interference from the state on our associational choices. Thus there is a tension between freedom of association and the demands of justice – this is the problem of sorting. This paper argues that the negative conception is insufficient, and offers an ecological conception of freedom of association as a way to resolve the problem of sorting. On the ecological conception, certain social conditions are necessary for associational freedom. Freedom of association and justice can be jointly realized to an extent further than previously thought.
2021. Social Structural Explanation. Philosophy Compass 16(10).
Preprint | Publication
Social problems such as racism, sexism, and inequality are often cited as structural rather than individual in nature. What does it mean to invoke a social structural explanation, and how do such explanations relate to individualistic ones? This article explores recent philosophical debates concerning the nature and usages of social structural explanation. I distinguish between two central kinds of social structural explanation: those that are autonomous from psychology, and those that are not. This distinction will help clarify the explanatory power that each type of SSE has, points of convergence with methodological traditions such as critical theory and rational choice theory, and the difficulties that each type of SSE faces.
2021. An Intrapersonal, Intertemporal Solution to an Interpersonal Dilemma. Philosophical Studies.
Preprint | Publication
It is commonly accepted that what we ought to do collectively does not imply anything about what each of us ought to do individually. According to this line of reasoning, if cooperating will make no difference to an outcome, then you are not morally required to do it. And if cooperating will be personally costly to you as well, this is an even stronger reason to not do it. However, this reasoning results in a self-defeating, yet entirely predictable outcome. If everyone is rational, they will not cooperate, resulting in an aggregate outcome that is devastating for everyone. This dismal analysis explains why climate change and other collective action problems are so difficult to ameliorate. The goal of this paper is to provide a different, exploratory framework for thinking about individual reasons for action in collective action problems. I argue that the concept of commitment gives us a new perspective on collective action problems. Once we take the structure of commitment into account, this activates requirements of diachronic rationality that give individuals instrumental reasons to cooperate in collective action problems.
2020. Implicit Bias and Social Schema: A Transactive Memory Framework. Philosophical Studies 177(7): 1857-1877.
Preprint | Publication
To what extent should we focus on implicit bias in order to eradicate persistent social injustice? Structural prioritizers argue that we should focus less on individual minds than on unjust social structures, while equal prioritizers think that both are equally important. This article introduces the framework of transactive memory into the debate to defend the equal priority view. The transactive memory framework helps us see how structure can emerge from individual interactions as an irreducibly social product. If this is right, then debiasing interventions are structural interventions. One upshot is that the utility of the individual versus structural distinction is not apparent for the purposes of intervention.
Book Reviews
2022. Alex Schafran, Matthew Noah Smith, and Stephen Hall's The Spatial Contract: A New Politics of Provision for an Urbanized Planet. Environmental Ethics 44(4).
2019. Elizabeth Anderson's Private Government: How Employers Rule Our Lives (and Why We Don't Talk About It). Essays in Philosophy 20(1).
2018. Jason Brennan's Against Democracy. Essays in Philosophy 19(1).
2022. Alex Schafran, Matthew Noah Smith, and Stephen Hall's The Spatial Contract: A New Politics of Provision for an Urbanized Planet. Environmental Ethics 44(4).
2019. Elizabeth Anderson's Private Government: How Employers Rule Our Lives (and Why We Don't Talk About It). Essays in Philosophy 20(1).
2018. Jason Brennan's Against Democracy. Essays in Philosophy 19(1).
In prep (email for drafts)
- A paper on how freedom of association is bundled with social and economic goods
- A paper on spatial inequality and agglomeration economics
- A paper on why reparative justice should constrain longtermist priorities
- A paper on measurements of segregation
Policy Articles
- Do Working Families Really Prefer Single-Family Housing?, Niskanen Center
- How Congressional Brain Drain Undermines Equality of Opportunity, Niskanen Center
