Wellbeing, Freedom and Social Justice The Capability Approach Re-Examined, 2017a

3. Clarifications
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choice-making process. Thus, we will shift our normative concern from
capabilities to functionings for those who are incapable of deciding for
themselves. In empirical research, this implies, for example, that it is
fine to study the quality of life of small children by focussing on a range
of functionings (e.g. Phipps 2002).
But the paternalism claim is not limited to the case of infants and the
severely cognitively disabled: one could also apply this argument — at
least to some extent and in some areas — to all adults. Adults, too, often
make systematically irrational or mistaken choices. We are often not
able to choose what is best for us simply because of our psychological
makeup; many of our choices are the result of the impulsive, unreflective,
habit-driven part of our brain rather than the deliberative and reflective
part. There is mounting empirical evidence of our systematic failures in
choice-making, that we are influenced by a large number of arbitrary
factors in making choices and that we often harm our own interests in
non-deliberate and non-intentional ways (e.g. Ariely 2010; Kahneman
2011). It is entirely consistent for a capability theory to argue that we
have strong reasons to protect people against their own systematic
irrationalities, just as it is consistent for the capability approach to argue
that there are stronger reasons why we should allow people to make
the errors that follow from their own systematic irrationalities: both
positions follow from choices made in the B-modules.
Summing up, we have here a first normative consideration that can
help us to decide whether some (limited or fuller) focus on functionings
rather than capabilities is acceptable, namely the question of whether
there are mechanisms that justify paternalism.
A second normative consideration in the choice between capabilities
and functionings stems from the importance given to personal
responsibility in contemporary political philosophy. If one believes that
the moral aim should be to establish equality of opportunity, then it
follows that one should, at least as an ideal, favour equality of capability
over equality of functionings. If equality of capability becomes the ideal,
then each person should have the same real opportunity (capability),
but once that is in place, each individual should be held responsible
for his or her own choices. It is important to stress, however, that
philosophers and social scientists working on issues of social justice
do not at all agree on whether equality of opportunity (capabilities)