The next AMINTAPHIL conference will be held at the Rochester Institute of Technology, Rochester, NY, from October 21 - 23, 2010.  The topic is "Economic Justice”. The first session of the conference will occur on Thursday evening, Oct. 21, beginning at 7 or 7:30 pm. There will be two sessions during the day on Friday and two on Saturday. The conference ends with a banquet on Saturday night.

Please see below for the Sub-Topics for the 2010 Program.

The deadline for submission of Principal Papers is Monday, September 20, 2010 The deadline for  Commentaries is Monday, October 11.
Late papers/commentaries may be posted, but will not appear on the program

Each paper should include an abstract.
Length limits for principal papers are5,500 words (about 20 pages)
Limits for commentaries are 2,200 words (about 8 pages).
These are maximums, not minimums. Longer papers will be sent back for shortening.

The Registration fee for the conference is $75, which includes the banquet. You may  bring a guest to the banquet for an additional $25.

You can pay by credit card (see below) or check made out to AMINTAPHIL and sent to
            Bruce Landesman
            Philosophy, University of Utah
            402 CTIHB
            215 S. Central Campus Dr
            Salt Lake City, UT 84112;

Pay by credit card (University of Utah secure online payment)

2010 Registration and Banquet: $75.00

Additional Guest for Banquet: $25.00

View Papers - members only

HOTEL AND OTHER LOCAL ARRANGEMENTS

The conference hotel is the Radisson Hotel Rochester Airport -- even though it is not at the airport, but on the campus of RIT. The address of the hotel is 175 Jefferson Road, Rochester New York 14623.  The phone number for reservations is 1-800-395-7046 US/Canada Toll-free.

Be sure to mention that you are reserving for the AMINTAPHIL conference. The hotel’s direct telephone number is (585) 475-1910.

The room rate is $89 plus tax. Reservations need to be made by September 23 to be guaranteed a room at that rate.

You can receive much more information about the hotel at http://www.radisson.com/rochesterny_airport

Getting to RIT :

BY AIR -- The airport is the Rochester International Airport (ROC) and is less than ten minutes from the RIT campus. It is served by most of the major airlines -- Delta, Continental, USAirways, JetBlue, and so on. The cheapest flights tend to be via JetBlue.

You may call the hotel at 585 475-1910 to have a van pick you up. If you take a taxi, be sure to specify the hotel by its full name and tell the driver it is at RIT; there is another Radisson in downtown Rochester.

BY CAR -- Interstate 90 is the New York Thruway, and it runs east and west directly south of Rochester, with three exits to Rochester. Take the exit at Interstate 390. Go north on I-390 to the first exit, Hyland Drive, and turn left after exiting. Go about a half mile. You will see a large Crossroads mall sign on your left by a pond. That is the intersection of Jefferson Road and Hyland.

Turn left at the light onto Jefferson Road and go about a mile. You will see a Barnes & Noble at RIT on your left, in the midst of a shopping complex and just before a few apartments. You will find the Radisson Hotel Rochester Airport just pass the complex, on your left. You may park there and walk to the campus.

There will also be shuttle service available from the hotel to campus. There is also a bus service on campus which stops at the hotel and near the campus venue. Maps will be made available in a later newsletter.
If you are driving into the campus, you will need a visitor’s pass to park. Just pass the Radisson is a traffic light to enter RIT. You may turn left there into campus or go ahead to the main entrance, which is just ahead on Jefferson.

If you turn at the traffic light, go to the first and only stop sign, turn right, and go to the circle. You will enter at 9 o'clock and go to 12 before exiting (3/4's of the way around).

If you go to the main exit, drive straight ahead to the circle. You will enter at 6 o'clock and should go to 12 (half way around). When you exit at 12 o'clock, you will see the information booth straight ahead of you. There you can get a visitor's pass for parking.

BY TRAIN -- Rochester is served by Amtrak, and the train station is downtown, at 320 Central Avenue, Rochester NY 14605. Unfortunately, the only way to get from the station to RIT is by taxi -- 8 to 10 miles, depending on the route chosen. The station is not in a safe area of town, and so if you plan on coming by train, arrive at some hour during the day.

MEETING VENUE -- We are meeting Thursday evening in the Louise Slaughter Building, room 2010/20. Meeting room for sessions on Friday and Saturday will be announced later. Click here for a campus map. The Radisson is at J1-2; the Slaughter Building is at C5.

Economic Justice

Topic Outline

1.   The history of philosophical thinking about economic justice

1. Are there universal themes to economic justice that apply across all times, places and contexts?
2. What under-read thinkers merit further attention?
3. What aspects of the economic justice scholarly canon seem particularly applicable to the contemporary economic crisis?
4. Are there current scholarly or intellectual movements of particular promise or importance for economic justice?

2.   Material economic justice
1. How does economic justice intersect with interests in property?  Do different types of property require different justifications?  What justifies property rights? Are there ways to think about property and justice without presupposing the concept of rights?
2. Is economic justice independent of economic production?
3. Are empirical data relevant to justifications for economic justice?

3.   Economic Justice and Markets
1. Does economic justice presuppose the existence of a market?
2. Can a free market be a just market? What definition of ‘free market’ would also meet the requirements of economic justice?
3. What is the scope of a just market (e.g., only the financial sector, or also social goods such as education and health), and by what criteria ought the scope of the market be established?
4. What are the structural features of a just market? Should that structure include regulatory constraints on market behavior?
5. Is government intervention in the market permissible under considerations of justice?  What methods of intervention meet the requirements of justice?

4.   Economic Justice and Inequality
1. Is economic inequality (e.g., income, wealth, or property) unjust in itself; or only when inequality is linked to harmful outcomes such as economic, social or political inequality)?
2. When economic inequality causes non-economic inequality (such as political inequality; legal inequality; social inequality; inequality of opportunity) should different criteria of justice apply?
   

5.   Economic Justice and Distribution
1. Does economic justice within the nation state require a just distribution of public goods across all of those who live in that state? If so, what methods of distribution meet the requirements of justice? 
2. What is the status of economic justice relative to other forms of justice such as juvenile justice, criminal justice, environmental justice, gender justice.?

6.   International Economic Justice
1. Should economic justice exist between nation states, and what outcomes should it seek? 
2. Should the goal of global economic justice be perfect economic equality among all states or is each country first bound to meet the valid claims of its own people?  
3. By what methods (e.g., economic aid, carbon emissions discounts, economic sanctions, military intervention) are national governments and the international community justified to produce their agreed international economic goals, either at home or abroad?

7.   Measures of Economic Justice
What are the measures of whether a society is just or unjust?


a.   Efficiency 
b.   Equity
c.   Desert (or merit)
d.   Egalitarianism
e.   Rule utilitarianism

8.   Justice and other Virtues

1. How should economic justice be balanced with other virtues/moral goods?  For example, would charity be obsolete in a fully just society?
2. When, and under what conditions, should justice and equality take priority over other social virtues? 
3. If a state achieves justice, are the moral aims of the state exhausted?  If a state does have other moral ends, what are they?