Abstract
Normative questions have been rarely raised in stratification studies as in other sociological fields of studies. This is still the case even in the current feverishness on inequality problems. The existence or the expansion of inequality is denounced by the taken-for-granted assumption that it is simply bad, without any theoretical examination on why and to what extent the inequality is undesirable. On the other hand, the once celebrated functionalistic stratification theory had unintendedly provided a normative rationalization of stratification, but did not work out it purposefully. Contrastingly, normative egalitarian theories have been enthusiastically developed by contemporary liberalism. However, many of the liberal egalitarian theories, in which Luck-egalitarianism is a typical one, show two theoretically deficient features, “neglect of production” and “lack of consideration for consequences”. This is not an exception. Most theories on normatively desirable distribution rule are characterized by “Manna-type” principle in the sense that goods to be distributed are treated as given from somewhere else. In this paper, the normative question what is a desirable distribution rule is investigated as the question; given a certain production function in society, under what kind of a distribution rule a desirable consequence in terms of individuals' benefits can be brought forth as Nash equilibrium when individuals rationally choose their own production activities under that distribution rule?
