Um, er, Veronique Munoz-Darde’s abolish the family problem and my solutions


Author: Doctor Terence Rajivan Edward (or instead 0161__Rajivan, if that helps)
Date: 15th October 2025 (version 5, seventh solution added)
Note: accented e's in Vernonique Munoz-Darde's name have been removed, because they won't appear in some computer screens. It should be: Véronique Munoz-Dardé.


The problem. In multiple papers, Professor Veronique Munoz-Darde has raised the problem of whether the family should be abolished, seeking to avoid a No answer. She writes, “The reason to abolish the family is… the fact that as long as the family exists individuals will have unequal life chances.” (1998a: 339) Within families, advantages are passed on to children, which some other children unfairly do not have. Posed this way, the problem seems to be one for left liberals, socialists, and left-wing anarchists. (She quotes John Rawls as raising the question of whether to abolish the family towards the end of his 1971 A Theory of Justice, but does he even have in mind the general problem that I attribute to Munoz-Darde? Cf. Gheaus 2018.)


Solutions. From reading her work, I do not yet have a clear grasp of Munoz-Darde’s solution (but she should be given some credit for extracting the problem from late on in the monumental A Theory of Justice). Below are some solutions, four of which are in my 2023 responses to Munoz-Darde.


1. The priority of liberty solution. Lexical priority is a feature of John Rawls’s left-liberalism. Given a minimal level of prosperity, his liberty principle, according to which each adult citizen is to have the same set of basic liberties, is to be prioritized over other principles: there can be no sacrifice of basic liberty in order to realize fair equality of opportunity and improve the economic level of the worst off. Basic liberties presumably include the liberty to have a family. So the liberty to have a family is protected by Rawls’s political system from arguments that greater equality of opportunity would be achieved by abolishing it, in favour of orphanages (see also Edward 2023a: remark 4). An objection to this solution is: for Rawls’s system to be of interest, it must be fully realizable, and the abolish-the-family problem suggests or implies that only the liberty principle can be realized. (Is it then of any more interest than a minimal state system?)


2. The fair equality of opportunity definition solution. After implementing the liberty principle, the next task for achieving Rawls’s ideal is to realize fair equality of opportunity in our society. But what is fair equality of opportunity? It is more than merely if persons A and B are both capable of doing a job, then they both have a right to apply: formal equality of opportunity. Also if A and B are equally capable, they should stand an equal chance of getting the job, assuming they both apply, while if one is worse, then that one should stand a lower chance. But explained like this, there is no restriction on preventing a family from socially “creating” a more talented child than another family, or one more talented from an employer’s perspective: higher relevant talents. This solution says that if you understand fair equality of opportunity properly, then the abolish-the-family problem goes away because it does not require countering the advantages that abolition seeks to counter (see also Rawls 1999: 448).


3. The difference principle solution. This solution is that although the institution of the family causes unfairness, undermining equality of opportunity, this injustice is easy enough to bear in a Rawlsian society, because it will implement the difference principle as well: according to which we should prefer the economic system with the least bad worst-off position. Rawls strongly suggests this solution or a minor variation on it (1999: 448); but should we bear up the injustice, given his aim of social justice?
 
4. The human race solution (Edward 2023a). The only way to end injustice caused by families is to destroy the human race and to do this is to commit an even greater injustice. I do not accept this solution, but I presented it (see also Rawls 1999: 448).


5. A career-prohibition solution (Edward 2023b). This solution relies on what I call the insider knowledge assumption: that the main way in which a family creates advantages for children is by passing on unofficial and difficult-to-gain information about how a particular field works, acquired through experience of that field. For example, the parents or grandparents or an uncle (etc.), have worked in that field (e.g. philosophy, the popular music industry, law…) and give children tips to get ahead. The career prohibition solution prohibits a person from entering a field which their family is already established in, to prevent advantages from insider knowledge.


6. The busybody solution (Edward 2023c). The busybody solution says that the family can be kept as long as (adult) individuals from advantaged families behave like “busybodies”: more precisely, get involved in how other people raise their children to ensure that these children have the same or similar advantages. For example, one lives amongst the lower class and converses as follows with a neighbour: “Don’t you read to your children? I do. Reading skills are very important in this world.”


7. A conservative solution (Edward 2023e). This solution tells us to accept inequalities caused by family background. Let us suppose that you and some friends begin a new and difficult project. You ask people for help but some people are sceptical and show a preference for well-established projects: the tried and tested. However, over time, your project becomes successful and important. Bringing it to this state may well involve your descendants as well. Families involved in this project from the beginning are probably disinclined to help well-positioned families who did not earlier help them on the journey up and people who are only there now because now the project is well-established. They might even compare the situation to that of some children who are setting up a tent, ask a fellow child to help, which is refused, only to find that the child later wants to use the tent - is letting them not an injustice? Even if it is officially disallowed, I suspect most successful ongoing projects have some way of rewarding families who earlier helped when others were sceptical. We should accept this as reasonable, says this conservative solution.


References
Edward, Terence Rajivan. 2023a. How to avoid abolition of the family? On Veronique Munoz-Darde’s options. Available at academia.edu:
https://www.academia.edu/94833071/How_to_avoid_abolition_of_the_family_On_V%C3%A9ronique_Munoz_Dard%C3%A9s_options
Edward, Terence Rajivan. 2023b. A career-prohibition solution to the abolish the family problem.  Available at Researchgate:
https://www.researchgate.net/publication/372518517_A_career-prohibition_solution_to_the_abolish_the_family_problem
Edward, Terence Rajivan. 2023c. A busybody solution to the abolish the family problem Available at Researchgate:
https://www.researchgate.net/publication/372533047_A_busybody_solution_to_the_abolish_the_family_problem
Edward, Terence Rajivan. 2023d. Lazily abolishing the family, with the original position. Available at Researchgate:
https://www.researchgate.net/publication/372655013_Lazily_abolishing_the_family_with_the_original_position
Edward, Terence Rajivan. 2025e. Going too conservative? The family and accepting unequal life chances. Available at PhilPapers:
https://philpapers.org/archive/eDWGTC.pdf
Gheaus, Anca. 2018. What abolishing the family will not do. Critical Review of International Social and Political Philosophy 21 (3): 284-300.
Munoz-Darde, Veronique. 1998a. Rawls, Justice in the Family and Justice of the Family. The Philosophical Quarterly 48 (192): 335-352. Available at:
https://sas-space.sas.ac.uk/1110/1/V_Munoz-Darde_Rawls.pdf
Munoz-Darde, Veronique. 1998b. Is the family to be abolished then? Paper given at a meeting of the Aristotelian Society, 9th November 1998: 37-56. Available at:
https://sas-space.sas.ac.uk/1109/1/V_Munoz-Darde_Family.pdf
Munoz-Darde, Veronique. and M.G.F. Martin. 2023. Family and Marriage: Institutions and the Need for Social Goods. Aristotelian Society Supplementary Volume 97 (1): 221–247. Available at:
https://watermark02.silverchair.com/akad010.pdf?token=AQeCAHi208Be49Ooan9kkhW_ercy7Dm3ZL_9Cf3qfKAc485ysgAAA2YwggNiBgkqhkiG9w0BBwagggNTMIIDTwIBADCCA0gGCSqGSIb3DQeHATAeBglghkgBZQMeAS4weQQMYcU_13KFBZw8IDG1AgeQgIIDGfmBI1OBzB4Onehoj6zCud78mpLFzu5XYsaUUmpd0KDKkR6wdNvD7fO4XkfK35NVQc--L_ajpHT9Hit3mF7bl9kAazXOABHvfekhOQzoPYflepYjBFRkRdgtDfQr7jhfp-LfC9ofjBGGgRT4L7P3XmKivmJceeMij_5c5cscPY3mUmU0-Uw4XUFcMe8gkJWa3_e3zj6jHbQ2yybbpOms2Qe4g1gSoHKSWjAoeHBwJu9fW2KjC-KfvG-t44YUP6YUd4c__WC0uutP8YbrYqvAZ25_SQW3WRBT8q7asw9KDOL-C1_afGtmIKu8HUIFhoxoa9v1zBXwN5e6jhShBKStxmo8eu4NN1nd_8CBbR8rKOUeeug2zb4PMlO9zkI7Ll6_jGmnNjA_6Y-HswlueTyqVuyvWHSaBTQv5wf_GtQ73Ypg6DaceS54nFoDTFcezSbVxD6IwhGoepDPC0Np7u0Ox_AuPnqHGNHHdsRjLduIvuA9tXJnHZoAUjS7RB5CvdVdFtsM0BjlFai-0yeyAtD26IgMHH38AOwfCAsG6F7dtt9rl_uqiBURdgv-BxMkWDAtpZPJIVcAMAQjvyIxnGP8I9eOH1j5JuWPluDSDaCvjAqeqX_SOKanBkL0eCKJHq-eeI0tLpLtLa5rDxqfi8JKOYFejHMc899bF-fVWATQR0tRIveNoOuGe89Y-di4gvqOJ66UKMWCPxTemu_yfG63JQkoYeRJQ7ebSkeqrBmS8aP9oj6d-Vi1Fn4hR0P0yxw0IO6tr-2CFM3oHUpTe7kBv8YjlDD6RPNjmrfrZRpFBd6DIk3QuNWCmmguWrCRT3LGP2qFnL5diuMaOotk_-GvVOKsjH5dk9NeCfxTpxM7zPCj97tn05A-pkjB7Tp9OnVJbKMV81c6h2LykC_Bh89BMilrqY02aqARbMLrvoaivnhmBkKSfqZrthnSa7qCgn7jxR0qcGRY_OnBBwM70zovtniHejjGcP01KOLSIpg6re0IIm7zBIvUWCtZzBOe2IAbqgVS6MUqb7Wk4L02SDPj09WkaQrHSbPONic
Rawls, John. 1999 (revised edition). A Theory of Justice. Cambridge, Massachusetts: Belknap Press. Available at:
https://giuseppecapograssi.wordpress.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/08/rawls99.pdf