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Sandel's Definitions of the Moral Limits of Markets

Moral limits are the restrictions civil society imposes on itself about certain goods or services that should not be for sale in society due to primarily moral concerns. Michael J. Sandel divides these moral limits into fairness and corruption. The fairness argument is opposed to the commodification of goods in the setting of inequality and as a result leads to unfair bargaining. Sandel's corruption argument states that the character of certain goods should determine whether they are bought and sold regardless of the establishment of fair bargaining conditions.

Limitations of Sandel's Corruption Argument

Research Question: To what extent is Sandel’s definition of corruption insufficient?

It is evident that to a large extent, mainly using a virtue ethics approach, Sandel's definition of corruption is insufficient. Sandel's definition of corruption is centered around the degradation of goods and norms. However, his examples are wholly myopic and focus on shock value as opposed to the market degrading the goods, societal norms and corruption.His view involves things that money cannot buy (honorific goods et al) and things that money can buy and arguably should not buy. Although Sandel states that the corruption argument is about the inherent value certain things have and the devaluation money accords to them, he does not account for other corrupting elements in a society.

Virtue Ethics Application

Virtues and Vices

A virtue is a well-entrenched trait that prioritises benevolence and people's perceived well-being regardless of the consequences. It is the basis of the word virtuous. A vice is the opposite of a virtue. It involves a moral pitfall and an outcome that promotes harm. It forms the etymological root of the word vicious. Virtue ethics is one of the three and arguably least known approach to normative ethics (deontology and consequentialism). The crux of this theory is moral character or virtue being its focal point and this involves an application of practical wisdom and a decision that is virtuously motivated in the pursuit of their version of a good life. Sandel opines in his corruption argument that the market results in the degradation of certain goods and although his argument may be valid in cases of higher education and COVID-19 testing, with women's reproductive labour, more nuance and practical wisdom is needed.

Higher Education

For instance, higher education includes legacy preferences as a default especially for sought after universities like Harvard (33%) but simultaneously criminalises the outright purchase of limited academic seats like in the 2019 college admissions bribery scandal. The focus is on the corruption argument in relation to institutional integrity.  According to Sandel, the purpose of higher education is to arguably result in the instillment of certain ideals like the pursuit of truth and the cultivation of civic virtue. Along those lines, rich people have an astronomically higher chance of getting into government so the corruption would not just reflect on the institution of academia but the judicial institution in its entirety. Furthermore, money is a corrupting element particularly in education because it is meant to have value in and of itself.

COVID-19 Testing

Health care is something that should not be a bidding war in a civil society but in most countries that is still the case. Another example of corruption is the disportionate Coronavirus testing and the tendency of the powers that be to prioritise the rich and famous. This is a clear case of the market herein class determining the allocation of resources as opposed to gender and racial factors evidenced by Idris Elba and Tom Hanks as well as their partners getting tested despite mostly being asymptomatic. A more glaring example of this disparity is the partner of Nigerian singer, Davido testing positive and the latter being able to get access to 31 tests for asymptomatic close contacts. . The average Nigerian just like the average American does not have the capacity to one test not to talk of multiple ones. This is corrupt because healthcare is a public service tainted by the introduction of money and there should not be a market in the first place.The aforementioned cases are arguably clear-cut cases of the market being the source of degradation hereby corrupting the goods and services.

Women's Reproductive Labour

Two women looking at a baby

Reproductive labour has a lot to do with the social conditioning of women and their perceived biological role regardless of reality in the cultivation of offspring. This phenomenon provides an example of how Sandel's corruption argument is wholly insufficient
Egg donors and surrogate mothers are seen to be corrupting motherhood if they do not express an altruistic motive. Constructions of social norms and what women are expected to do are embedded in an unequal society and classified as the protection of women. This is not to say it is all about bodily autonomy and that women are not exploited. Banning compensation does not address the corrupting way women's bodies are treated in a patriarchal society.

Egg Donors

This section is examining egg donation as the sole part played in the reproductive process. There is a market for egg donors who fit very specific intellectual, physical and social criteria. There is a very large market for tall women who went to Ivy League schools for instance.That is not in itself corrupting as people choose their mating partners through superficial criterion all the time. Multiple objections to egg donation refer to its unethical nature in terms of commercialising something sacred that should not be commercialised. Women's bodies have been used as vessels for men's desires, egg donation that employs that being the only part the woman plays is novel and a form of bodily autonomy reclamation. In a patriarchal society, women rarely have the option of opting out of motherhood. Furthermore, natural causes induce women to lose eggs every month so if they opt for their eggs to be extracted with consent, rather than degradation, that is foresight. There is nothing inherently corrupting in the nature of money being used to buy eggs, if exploitation occurs, it rarely has anything to do with egg donation in itself but the capitalist nature of exploitation.

Surrogate Mothers

There have been many arguments against surrogacy that relate to bonding and so on. Unlike egg donation, surrogate motherhood comes with all the risks of pregnancy. The medical risks have been well documented and it is less likely for a woman to die in the process of egg donation than surrogacy. The commitment is more extensive with an average gestational period of nine months. The Baby M case in America has been theorised time and again but another case that influenced legislation was Baby Gammy in Thailand. The events differ from Baby M's in multiple ways:

i) Biological parents were the couple

ii) Unplanned twins; one with Down's' syndrome

iii)Wanted her to abort the less desirable baby

iv) Biological father is a sex offender (pedophiles)

The above events show that though there may be complications with the process of surrogacy, they are not indicative of surrogacy itself being a corrupting activity because the aforementioned events are not limited to surrogacy. The exchange of money was not the sole factor and this case reveals that reproductive labour can get complicated but policy fails to cater to surrogate mothers because of a perceived moral failing. A more appropriate approach would have been to prioritise the well-being of the surrogate mother as no one has a right to a child but they do have a right to bodily autonomy. Thailand failed in its bid at paternalism with legislation that supposedly protected women but actually caused more harm. Compensation price floors could have been introduced as reproductive labour is another form of labour one can do in a capitalist society. Then paternalism where it is needed with more stringent regulations for would be parents so pedophiles do not get approved to have children.The move to criminalise surrogacy in Thailand except for opposite sex couples is discrimination according to the Human Rights Charter and that can be viewed as corrupting not the act of surrogacy. Furthermore, virtue ethics require the application of practical wisdom herein pragmatism, so in line with the changing norms in our civic society, surrogacy does less to corrupt them than the statutory laws in place.

Applicable Theoretical Concepts and Beyond

i) Paternalism is applicable because the state purports to know what is better for women's bodies than they do for themselves with regards to egg donors and surrogate mothers.

ii) Liberalism is applied because of the presumption that the society is a free and equal one.

iii) Clientelism is in reference to the Higher Education and Covid-19 Testing sections as essentially laissez-faire cronyism.

iv) Feminist Theory has to do with reproductive labour being a viable option in a capitalist society and a probable conceptualisation of the wage gap.

Conclusion

In a nutshell, to a large extent, Sandel's definition of corruption is wholly insufficient especially through a virtue ethics approach because corruption manifests differently and is not dependent on the nature of the market but sometimes the corruption embedded in society itself. Higher education is termed an honorific good but your chances are massively increased if you are rich. According to societal norms, commercial surrogacy and egg donation are acceptable as long as women are not compensated for their labour. However, society finds it perfectly normal for gender economic disparity to exist anywhere but the reproductive sphere. Sandel's definition of corruption is wholly insufficient because it assumes the markets are the source of corruption when:

(i) corruption can take place without money.

(ii) degradation can be imminent in the structure of society itself.

(iii) preserving norms can do more to corrupt.