What May We Expect of a Theory of International Tax Justice?

Abstract

In this article, we discuss what may be expected of a theory of international tax justice. After looking at the most important distributive as well as procedural theories of tax justice, we conclude that none of the existing theories can provide a coherent account of international tax justice. We therefore propose an alternative, more pragmatic approach drawing on Amartya Sen. Even if we do not agree on any particular notion of tax justice, it is still obvious that developing countries’ interests will be served by much simpler rules of international tax law.