ABSTRACT
The theory of utility and preference as a conception of individual welfare can be applied fairly directly to the topic of social welfare. The well-being approach is more basic than either the social welfare approach or the basic needs approach. The welfarist approach to the human person is tone-deaf when it comes to issues of equity and distribution. The welfarist model is flawed because it implies flatness in human life. The Aristotelian model is a tradition that extends from Aristotle's Nichomachean Ethics through Georg Hegel and Karl Marx to John Stuart Mill and John Rawls. Women in Mexico are subject to traditional patriarchal limitations on their choices, resulting in significant stifling of the development of their human capabilities. As a line of thinkers from Aristotle and Georg Hegel to Amartya Sen and Martha Nussbaum have emphasized, individuals realize their humanity through the creative activity associated with work.
