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Mitigating Servility: Policies of Egalitarian Self-Relations

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  25 January 2021

Anne-Sofie Greisen Hojlund Open the ORCID record for Anne-Sofie Greisen Hojlund [Opens in a new window]
Anne-Sofie Greisen Hojlund*
Affiliation:
Department of Political Science, Aarhus University, Aarhus, Denmark
*
E-mail: agh@ps.au.dk
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Abstract

How should inequalities generated in part by people's self-devaluing attitudes be understood, and what can be done politically to counteract them? Building on central elements of relational egalitarianism, this article scrutinizes the case of servility as an instance of failure to relate to oneself as an equal, attitudinally and behaviorally speaking. From this perspective, servility as well as the adverse distributive consequences it gives rise to should be considered objectionable and in need of mitigation. Considering the case of political voice, the article points to certain paternalistic policies as a means of altering servility by inducing people to make their claims heard. Indeed, such policies may serve as particularly apt instruments since they directly target attitudinal barriers to relational equality in the political sphere. The novel claim is that paternalism, by altering servile attitudes as well as behavioral patterns, may effectively help make people relate to themselves in a more egalitarian manner.

Keywords

relational equalityservilitypaternalistic policiesattitudinal changebehavioral changepolitical voice
Type
Article
Information
British Journal of Political Science , Volume 52 , Issue 2 , April 2022 , pp. 908 - 920
Copyright
Copyright © The Author(s), 2021. Published by Cambridge University Press

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