This information is indicative and can be subject to change. 

Welfare models for sustainable development

MMMEF, Université Paris 1 Panthéon-Sorbonne
Instructor: Marcus Pivato (Centre d'Économie de la Sorbonne).
Email: [email protected] or [email protected] .
Classes: (to be scheduled — nine weeks)
Website: https://sites.google.com/view/welfare-models-for-sustainable/home
Required readings:
• Matthew D. Adler, Measuring Social Welfare: An Introduction, Oxford UP, 2019 (required)
• Hilary Greaves, “Population axiology.” Philosophy Compass 12, no. 11 (2017): e12442).
• Walter Bossert, “Anonymous welfarism, critical-level principles, and the repugnant and sadistic
conclusions”, pp.63-85 of The Oxford Handbook of Population Ethics)
Marking scheme:
• 100% Final Exam
The exam will be based on the lists of recommended problems which I will give you each week. It is
strongly recommended that you try to solve all of these problems during the semester, as a way of
studying for the exam.
Lecture schedule for nine classes (provisional; sections numbers refer to book by Adler.)
1. Introduction to Social Welfare Functions (Adler Ch.1, Appendices A & B)
2. Measuring well-being; interpersonal comparisons, preferencism, vNM utility (Adler §2.1-2.3,
Appendices C & D)
3. Equivalent income, objective good, experientialism (Adler § 2.4-2.7)
4. The landscape of SWFs (Adler Ch. 3, Appendices E & F)
5. Utilitarianism vs. Prioritarianism (Adler § 4.1, Appendices J & K)
6. Prioritarianism vs. other SWFS (Adler § 4.2-4.3, Appendices G and L)
7. Practical implementation (Adler Ch. 5)
8. Population ethics. (Adler Ch. 7 & Appendix O; Hilary Greaves article)
9. Population ethics (Walter Bossert article)
Advice: I will follow the textbook closely. Thus, it is strongly recommended that you obtain a copy of
the textbook, and read the recommended sections of the book and the online lecture notes before each
lecture. Come to class prepared to ask questions. Be an active learner. After each class, review the
exercises solved in class, and solve the other assigned problems.
Important: During the lectures, I will not have time to cover every fact, definition, theorem, algorithm
and example in the textbook. However, you are expected to know everything stated in the relevant
sections of the textbook (see above). So you should study the relevant textbook sections carefully.