When Privilege Speaks of Inequality

     For those who do not daily walk an existential tightrope, it is easy to discuss inequality as an important yet abstract issue with no sense of urgency. It is my position that equality is more than an institutional question and cannot be divorced from ethical and moral implications. Mount's article on Five Types of Inequality is framed by privilege and tinged with disdain. His background, being a member of the esteemed Number Ten Policy Unit which directly advises the British Prime Minister, also presents the impetus to read more critically. One who benefits from the maintenance of inequality is hardly positioned to critique those so disadvantaged or offer solutions. On the other hand, it is nice to hear an acknowledgement of things many people experiencing inequality are gaslighted about. Here are my impressions on Mount's 5 Types of Inequality:

1. Political equality - Defective equality is still equality. Western civilization has been working up to it for over a two millennia. Things are so much better than antiquity.
2. Outcome equality - Equality is oppression if you have to force people to give up their privileges and advantages. Don't let it threaten your liberty.
3. Equal Opportunity - Don't focus on the wage gaps, focus on the fact that it's possible for anyone to make inordinate sums of money.
4. Equal Treatment - Correcting inequality is inequality, because the state has to use unequal treatment to fix unequal treatment.
5. Equal membership - Assimilation is the answer. Be more British and play up old traditional values to be accepted so that everyone can feel equal.

Kendrick Lamar's lyric refers to the fact that he has much more unreleased music than anticipated.

It's used here to indicate that there are likewise many more types of equality that could be enumerated.

    If equality were so highly valued in the West, there would be no valid obstacles or impediments to achieving such a lofty goal. It's natural for people to be hesitant to relinquish their advantages, but Mount's dismissal of restorative action on behalf of the state is an unsubtle argument on behalf of those with much to lose. There would likewise be no exclusion of equality from comparative macroeconomic studies like those that won this year's Nobel prize.

"Rather than asking whether colonialism is good or bad, we note that different colonial strategies have led to different institutional patterns that have persisted over time," Dr. Acemoglu said during a news conference after the prize was announced.

Picture me unimpressed.

    Again, institutional equality cannot and should not be divorced from its ethical and moral implications. Awarding such a high prize to a study on the economic outcomes of colonial legacies is like awarding chemists for their pioneering research on the efficacy of biological weapons, especially when the ethical component is totally omitted. The celebration of such accomplishments rings hollow to those whose "benefit" has been death and destruction. 

According to the researchers, prosperity today is partly a legacy of how a nation's institutions evolved over time -- which they studied by looking at what happened to countries during European colonization.

Countries with "inclusive" institutions that protected personal property rights and allowed for widespread economic participation tended to end up on a pathway to longer-term prosperity. Those that had what the researchers called "extractive" institutions -- ones that helped elites to maintain control, but which gave workers little hope of sharing in the wealth -- merely provided short-term gains for the people in power.

    After reading these perspectives I gather that equality is not a core principle of the West, hypocrisy is. Otherwise, there would be no need to immediately redefine or modify the concept. The perspectives and experiences of colonized peoples would be equally valuable to these types of academic conversations without the need to center the West. Minhaz Merchant also called this out in his article from BW BUSINESSWORLD. 

Wow, there are publications outside mainstream Western media? Who knew?!

The understated message of the work of the three 2024 Nobel laureates is this: if you want to build prosperous, inclusive societies, colonise geographies like North America, South America, Australia and New Zealand. Their Native populations are too few and too weak to resist you. Meanwhile, in populated ancient civilisations like India, engage in “extractive” colonisation, exploiting the poor and co-opting the elite for as long as such extractive policies are possible. The outcome: poverty and undemocratic postcolonial institutions. These are evident even today in former European colonies across Africa, South America and Asia.

     Whether the state governments are monarchical or democratic, whether considering economic or social development, paradigms descended from colonial influence will have institutional and structural inequality to correct. Furthermore, the centering of European and colonized countries marginalizes those relegated to the global periphery. As long as the voices being amplified are those in favor of an unequal status quo, the West should abstain from its claims that equality is a core value. After all, it is steeped in a pride and privilege which cannot be reconciled with true equality.

“When you're accustomed to privilege, equality feels like oppression."

                                                                                                            -Anonymous