{"title":"Amartya Sen’s “Capabilities” Approach to the Evaluation of Welfare: Its Application to Communications","authors":"N. Garnham","doi":"10.1080/13183222.1997.11008658","DOIUrl":null,"url":null,"abstract":"AbstractTo concern ourselves with the welfare state is to concern ourselves with entitlements. This raises the question, entitlements to what? This essay examines the relevance of the thought of welfare theorist Amartya Sen for the subject of communication theory and policy. Sen’s perspective originates from a normative egalitarianism derived from a Kantian emphasis on the position of the other, which he poses in contrast to utilitarian views on welfare. Sen observes that it is possible to make the same set of resources or utilities available to different persons or groups and realise that some are capable of making more effective use of them than others. Applying this “capabilities” approach to communication policy leads to the conclusion that it is not access in a crude sense that is crucial, but the distribution of social resources which make access usable. The point of framing the analysis in this way is that the focus shifts from a mechanistic and crude preoccupation with utilities to enhancing the s...","PeriodicalId":46298,"journal":{"name":"Javnost-The Public","volume":"86 1","pages":"25-34"},"PeriodicalIF":1.7000,"publicationDate":"1997-01-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":"120","resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":null,"PeriodicalName":"Javnost-The Public","FirstCategoryId":"98","ListUrlMain":"https://doi.org/10.1080/13183222.1997.11008658","RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"文学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":null,"EPubDate":"","PubModel":"","JCR":"Q2","JCRName":"COMMUNICATION","Score":null,"Total":0}
引用次数: 120
Abstract
AbstractTo concern ourselves with the welfare state is to concern ourselves with entitlements. This raises the question, entitlements to what? This essay examines the relevance of the thought of welfare theorist Amartya Sen for the subject of communication theory and policy. Sen’s perspective originates from a normative egalitarianism derived from a Kantian emphasis on the position of the other, which he poses in contrast to utilitarian views on welfare. Sen observes that it is possible to make the same set of resources or utilities available to different persons or groups and realise that some are capable of making more effective use of them than others. Applying this “capabilities” approach to communication policy leads to the conclusion that it is not access in a crude sense that is crucial, but the distribution of social resources which make access usable. The point of framing the analysis in this way is that the focus shifts from a mechanistic and crude preoccupation with utilities to enhancing the s...
期刊介绍：
Javnost - The Public, an interdisciplinary peer-reviewed social and cultural science journal published by the European Institute for Communication and Culture in association with the Faculty of Social Sciences, University of Ljubljana, addresses problems of the public sphere on international and interdisciplinary levels. It encourages the development of theory and research, and helps understand differences between cultures. Contributors confront problems of the public, public communication, public opinion, public discourse, publicness, publicity, and public life from a variety of disciplinary and theoretical perspectives.
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