A theory of fairness from consistency

Abstract Firstly, I articulate a fairness conception (FC) which combines the basic thesis of Broome’s well-known 1990 account of fairness with a requirement of non-comparative fairness and the Aristotelian thought that like cases should be treated alike . Secondly, I argue that FC implies than any fair allocation rule should respect five axioms which, conjointly, are shown to characterize the absolute priority rule $$P^\dag $$ <mml:math xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML"> <mml:msup> <mml:mi>P</mml:mi> <mml:mo>†</mml:mo> </mml:msup> </mml:math> . In this characterization, the consistency axiom plays a pivotal role. Thirdly, I comment on the significance of the obtained results for literatures in, respectively, philosophy and economics.