Thinker · TH-0151
Eva Kittay
Eva Feder Kittay is an American philosopher, long based at Stony Brook University, who works on feminist theory, care ethics and the philosophy of…
Also known as Eva Feder Kittay
b. 1946 · New York (Stony Brook University)
Traditions: Analytic
Schools: Care ethics
Eva Feder Kittay is an American philosopher, long based at Stony Brook University, who works on feminist theory, care ethics and the philosophy of disability. Her central claim is that dependency is not a peripheral exception to human life but a basic condition of it, so that any adequate theory of justice must account for dependents and for the people who care for them. Her work has been influential in bringing cognitive disability into mainstream moral and political philosophy.
Key ideas
- Everyone is dependent at some stages of life, so dependency belongs at the centre of moral and political theory.
- Theories of justice built on independent, equal contractors leave out dependents and the dependency workers who care for them.
- Care work generates claims of its own, which she expresses through a principle of reciprocity extended across generations of care.
- People with severe cognitive disabilities have full moral standing, and theories that deny this should be revised.
Major works
- Metaphor: Its Cognitive Force and Linguistic Structure (1987)
- Love's Labor: Essays on Women, Equality, and Dependency (1999)
- Learning from My Daughter: The Value and Care of Disabled Minds (2019)
In the conversation
- Debate The argument from marginal cases has never been properly answered
- Debate Justice should start from dependency, not from independent adults making a deal
- Reading group Reading group: Eva Kittay’s Love’s Labor and the dependency critique of Rawls
- Question Who is left out when morality is a bargain?