How to Achieve Fairness Using Random Lotteries Illustrated by Broome

REVIEW: JOHN BROOME’S “FAIRNESS”
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Review: John Broome’s “Fairness”
Often, people ask the question of what is fair in life. Deciding what is fair and to whom can be a challenge sometimes. When it comes to the allocation of resources in a world that has limited resources, fairness becomes problematic. This is because scarcity and the need to treat all people equally get in the way of determining who deserve these resources. However, Broome (1990) developed a theory that he suggested should be applied as a guideline to fairness in the allocation of goods. The purpose of this paper is to summarise and critique Broome’s paper on fairness.
Summary
Broome explains that there are three ways of allocating resources to candidates. One involves using someone in authority to judge who is the best candidate, which is costly and involves deliberate selection. Another involves developing a fixed rule for picking the best candidate, which eliminates costs and the risk of deliberate selection. The third involves a random lottery. Of the three, Broome posits that using the random lottery is the best method of allocation because it will not only avoid costs and the risk of deliberate selection but will also be the fairest.
To defend this position, Broome states that fairness requires satisfaction of claims and everyone should be treated proportionally to the strength of their claim (Broome 1990, p.95). Thus, the resources should be divided amongst the candidates to ensure that everyone’s claim is satisfied. This position best applies to divisible resources where a person will receive a share of the resources that is proportional to the strength of their claim. However, when it comes to indivisible resources, it is a bit problematic because, unlike divisible resources, indivisible resources cannot be equally distributed amongst candidates to ensure fairness. When the resource is indivisible, it is highly unlikely that one candidate will be treated unfairly, especially when they have equal claims to the resource (Broome 1990, p.98). However, the use of lotteries can reduce this unfairness by giving the candidates equal chances of receiving the said resource.
Critique
Broom posits that fairness is about relative satisfaction and not absolute satisfaction. This means that when allocating resources, the focus should not be ensuring that everyone gets maximum satisfaction; this is not possible, especially in scarcity. The focus should be to ensure that everyone receives equal satisfaction from the said resources. However, this is only applicable to divisible resources. When it comes to indivisible resources, there cannot be an equal distribution, which means that there cannot be equal satisfaction from the resource. Thus, it is either one candidate gets maximum satisfaction from the resource or no one gets satisfaction at all, such as the case of two candidates waiting to receive one kidney. Either way, there will be no fairness unless a lottery is used to at least give the individuals a chance to get the kidney.
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