Is it possible for desert to work without an underlying objective and real ethical framework other than through power dynamics ?

Can desert meaningfully function without presupposing some objective and mind independent ethical framework ? When we say someone deserves rights, obligations,praise, blame, punishment, reward, or compensation, it seems that this presupposes standards that are not merely expressions of preference or social convention. If there is no underlying moral realism or objective normative structure, then what grounds the claim that a person truly deserves something rather than merely being treated in a certain way according to prevailing norms of a powerful individual or group

If desert is detached from an objective ethical framework, does it collapse into a reflection of contingent social attitudes, institutional arrangements, or negotiated power structures? In that case, would claims about desert simply track what a given community happens to endorse, rather than what is actually fitting or just? And if so, does the language of desert retain ANY critical force, or does it become indistinguishable from statements about what is socially approved or enforced?

I'm also wondering whether a power dynamic based account of desert might be the only viable option in the absence of objective moral facts. On such a view, more powerful individuals or groups would effectively impose their own conceptions of rights, obligations, liabilities, and entitlements, thereby defining who deserves what. IF(and this I think is debatable)empathy and sympathy are highly variable across cultures and individuals, and if moral sentiments are contingent on psychology and circumstance, perhaps desert claims ultimately reduce to what dominant institutions can successfully establish and maintain. Would this mean that desert is fundamentally political rather than moral?

At the same time, if desert is entirely grounded in power relations, can it still serve as a constraint on power? Can we coherently criticize unjust systems as failing to give people what they deserve if our standard of desert is itself produced by those systems? Or does the very practice of moral criticism presuppose some independent normative standpoint?

More broadly, is desert conceptually tied to responsibility and agency in a way that already commits us to some deeper metaphysical or moral commitments? Can compatibilist or constructivist approaches preserve a robust notion of desert without invoking moral realism? And how would anti realist or expressivist theories account for the apparent objectivity and universality that desert claims often aspire to?