8
concern underlying Sen’s emphasis on freedom is not, as Pettit suggests,
merely to ensure that persons may pursue their goals free from a
repellent level of subservience. Rather, Sen is motivated by a more
fundamental intuition regarding the relation of freedom to well-being.
B.
Athleticism. The centrality of freedom in Sen’s account, Cohen
argues, gives his theory an unduly "athletic" character (Cohen 1993, 25).
In defining capabilities as freedoms to choose (e.g. to nourish
oneself), Sen’s approach would exclude from central concern important
aspects of the person’s circumstances. In particular, if capabilities
are merely freedoms the person has the discretion to exercise, then
states of the person "which he neither brought about nor was in a
position to bring about" will not count as objects of fundamental concern
for capabilities theory (Cohen 1993, 28).
Consider, Cohen suggests, the case of an epidemiological policy
required to reduce the incidence of malaria. Since the benefits of this
policy are not something the person brings about, Cohen argues, those
benefits would not constitute a fundamental concern for capabilities
egalitarians (Cohen 1993, 28). Sen’s theory therefore appears to be
insensitive to the needs of disadvantaged persons who are not in a
position to control the benefit to be provided, even in cases (such as
policy responses to epidemics) that concern Sen centrally at the
practical level.
Sen’s account does not, however, limit fundamental concern to
objects over which the individual is able to exercise control: "[a]s long
as the levers of control are systematically exercised in line with what I
would choose" Sen argues, "my >effective freedom= is not compromised"
(Sen 1992, 64-65). Central to this view, as Philip Pettit has argued
persuasively, is Sen’s claim that it is not an essential element of
freedom that the person’s choices must control what actually happens (Sen
Convention