elderly, gays and lesbians, religious minorities, and so on, rather than the
poor. A consequence of this shifting understanding of equality is the emer-
gence of a commitment to pursuing and theorizing equality in a way that
acknowledges and celebrates diVerences.
While attempts to address economic inequalities have traditionally focused
on distributive issues, seeking to erase the (economic) diVerences between
people as the means of securing their equality, attempts to address cultural
and political inequalities usually entail calls that (cultural) diVerences be
recognized and respected, rather than denied or eroded, as a precondition
for securing their equality. In other words, the shift in concern from eco-
nomic to cultural and political inequalities is accompanied by a shift in focus
from sameness to diVerence. Equality now appears, in both policy and theory
debates, to require a respect for diVerence rather than a search for similarities.
Some theorists are concerned that this turn to diVerence may have served
to eclipse, rather than augment, the earlier concern with economic inequal-
ities. Many liberal egalitarians argue that the preoccupation with groups
rather than individuals undermines the principle of equal treatment and
distracts attention from more pressing economic inequalities (see Barry
2001 ). Others, more sympathetic to the concern with group inequalities,
argue that the narrow focus on cultural inequalities and recognition have
nonetheless created an unnecessary split between recognition and redistribu-
tion, or between the political and the economic (see Fraser 1995 ; Phillips
1999 ). While some have come to view this debate as misguided (Parekh 2004 ),
it has nonetheless inspired theorists to articulate theories of equality that
attempt to negotiate diVerence by engaging economic, cultural, and political
concerns.
2 Theorizing Equality
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Equality is perhaps best understood as a distinctively modern value, in that
‘‘under conditions of modern social citizenship, it is inequality not equality
which requires moral justiWcation’’ (Turner 1986 , 18 ). The key features of this
‘‘modern social citizenship’’ have, following T. H. Marshall, been widely
understood to entail civil, political, and social rights. Civil citizenship refers
equality and difference 471