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

2. Core Ideas and the Framework
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If the capability approach is an open framework, then what are the ways
in which it has been closed to form more specific and powerful analyses?
Scholars use the capability approach for different types of analysis,
with different goals, relying on different methodologies, with different
corresponding roles for functionings and capabilities. Not all of these
are capability theories; some are capability applications, both empirical
as well as theoretical. We can observe that there is a rich diversity of
ways in which the capability approach has been used. Table 2.1 gives
an overview of these different usages, by listing the different types of
capability analyses.
Normative theorising within the capability approach is often done
by moral and political philosophers. The capability approach is then
used as one element of a normative theory, such as a theory of justice
or a theory of disadvantage. For example, Elizabeth Anderson (1999)
has proposed the outlines of a theory of social justice (which she calls
“democratic equality”) in which certain basic levels of capabilities that
are needed to function as equal citizens should be guaranteed to all.
Martha Nussbaum (2006b) has developed a minimal theory of social
justice in which she defends a list of basic capabilities that everyone
should be entitled to, as a matter of human dignity.
While most normative theorising within the capability approach
has related to justice, other values have also been developed and
analysed using the capability approach. Some theorists of freedom
have developed accounts of freedom or rights using the capability
approach (van Hees 2013). Another important value that has been
studied from the perspective of the capability approach is ecological
sustainability (e.g. Anand and Sen 1994, 2000; Robeyns and Van der
Veen 2007; Lessmann and Rauschmayer 2013; Crabtree 2013; Sen
2013). Efficiency is a value about which very limited conceptual
work is done, but which nevertheless is inescapably normative, and
it can be theorised in many different ways (Le Grand 1990; Heath
2006). If we ask what efficiency is, we could answer by referring to
Pareto optimality or x-efficiency, but we could also develop a notion
of efficiency from a capability perspective (Sen 1993b). Such a notion
would answer the question ‘efficiency of what?’ with ‘efficiency in the
space of capabilities (or functionings, or a mixture)’.