---
title: "Counterfactual fairness"
description: "The requirement that a decision about an individual be the same in a counterfactual world where the individual belonged to a different group, defined through a causal model; approximated in practice…"
canonical: https://aigovernanceengineer.com/glossary/counterfactual-fairness
author: "Jorge García Aibar"
license: "CC BY 4.0 (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/)"
doi: https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.22956197
version: "0.5.0"
updated: 2026-09-25
---

# Counterfactual fairness

The requirement that a decision about an individual be the same in a counterfactual world where the individual belonged to a different group, defined through a causal model [1]; approximated in practice by counterfactual flip tests.

- Developed in: [ch. 16, Individual and counterfactual fairness](https://aigovernanceengineer.com/bok/fairness-and-explainability#individual-and-counterfactual-fairness)
- Chapters: [ch. 16, Fairness & XAI](https://aigovernanceengineer.com/bok/fairness-and-explainability)
- Contrast with: [Counterfactual explanation](https://aigovernanceengineer.com/glossary/counterfactual-explanation) · [Counterfactual flip test](https://aigovernanceengineer.com/glossary/counterfactual-flip-test)
- In the glossary chapter: https://aigovernanceengineer.com/bok/glossary#t-counterfactual-fairness

## Sources

[1] "Counterfactual Fairness" (Kusner, Loftus, Russell and Silva; arXiv 1703.06856). arXiv. 2017-03-20. https://arxiv.org/abs/1703.06856 (verified: primary)