JusticePolitical philosophy

It is the idea we’re required to treat eachother equally. If you do bad to someone, you’ll have to pay your ‘dues’ in order for equality to be restored i.e. a murderer going to prison for life or facing the death penalty.

Justice branches to in punishment and distribution of goods in society – further divides to – political; basic liberties and rights & social, economic or distributive; money and oppourtunities.

What is justice?

Specifies which ‘goods’ are being considered and how to divide the good.

EqualityMorally everyone is equal. On moral equality we

can argue for ‘assumed’ equality – inequalities need to be justified. We require strict equality unless we have good reason why another distribution would be better.

Inequalities cannot be justified leads to egalitarianism (the view that justice requires equality).

Distributive justice

People should receive equal amounts of goods as it best respects their moral equality.

OBJECTIONS;-What counts as the same ‘amount’? -We could give each individual the same goods – food, house etc, but

it’s not a good interpretation as people have different preferences.-Giving people freedom with their money creates inequalities as

some may be able to make more from what they’ve got while others only lose it.

-It overlooks what people need a disabled person will need greater government funding than an able-bodied person for medical treatments etc.

-Ultimately means that differences are being treated unequally.-To live equally everyone requires equal opportunities but what is

this?

Strict Equality (Basic Egalitarianism)

Equality is for people to have equally happy lives.this does depend on what makes each individual happy – someone

may have rich tastes requiring more money to be as happy as someone with simpler tastes.

‘Equality of resources’ – everyone’s resources are equal if no-one envies another. Once achieved, people can do what they want with their resources – it leads to inequality but egalitarians believe justice is to take away disadvantages people suffer that aren’t results of their choices.

People are morally responsible for their choices & actions – if you choose to live in a mansion you can’t expect to be given extra money to support this.

OBJECTIONS;If two people have different capacities, equal resources wont ensure

equality – one will be able to do more than the other. We should instead have ‘equal access to advantage’ – able to make equal use of whatever makes life better.

Developing Egalitarianism

1) We can’t ensure equality. Its impossible to distinguish between aspects of peoples lives resulting from inheritance or choice.

2) Any egalitarian principle of justice restricts freedom.

3) We can object that everyone will be better off if we don’t respect equality – economic equality – higher salary for better work creates incentives for people to produce more wealth.

Objections to egalitarianism

Need is a social construction – it is what we decide it is. What people need is not equal.

A need isn’t like a desire as it isnt a psychological state – a child needing medicine doesn’t depend on if he wants to take it.

A need is objective – a need depends on facts about their health both physical and psychological. A need is necessary to achieve a level of human flourishing.

Need

There is a danger of ‘needs-inflation’ – where we as a society decide that a certain aspect will better our lives, and so the things to help that can become needs. i.e. if we find out we can live longer by our diet, lifestyle etc, do our diets and lifestyles become a need?

Should justice be concerned with needs taken ‘absolutely’ or does it need to take into account comparisons? – comparisons enable a society to become richer and increase its ‘needs’- without comparison society can gain inequalities without injustice.

Needs change with society – saying yes to some things may appear like ‘needs-inflation’ but it may be necessary for everyone to live similarly equal lives.

Egalitarians – ‘need’ does not do justice to equality. People will not always need what they deserve – nor deserve what they need.

Objections

People should be treated according to their specific qualities and actions. Distributed goods are rewards people receive in response to how they choose to live.

1) Effort: justice means people are rewarded to the effort they make. People deserve to keep what they make for the effort they put into making it.

2) Compensation: all the costs someone incurs deserves reward – they should be compensated accordingly.

3) Contribution: the value of the contribution determines what they deserve to receive

4) Virtue: a persons virtues determine what they deserve.

Desert (not a yummy thing you eat, it’s pretty boring actually)

We can object; rewarding desert is impractical. How can we identify what is effort or cost?

The ‘free market’ should reward someone proportionally to how valuable their contribution is. – it’s not true. It distributes based on how much and how many people desire what’s offered.Market values are affected by scarcity – gold is wanted as it is rare, not useful.

Noone should get greater reward for providing something that’s scarce, unless its crucial to social welfare.

Working out desert

Justice doesn’t require people getting what they deserve. The winner of a race gets the prize, not the person who put most effort in or most deserved to win.

The rewards we get are based on our choices –but there are factors outside our control which affect how much our contribution is valued – how much others value it for instance.

Desert can’t define justice because it presupposes justice. You only deserve something if you deserve it following the rules.

Structure of reward doesn’t necessarily reflect what people do or don’t deserve.

Objections

Just distribution of goods requires intervention. Justice isn’t the only political value – justification of redistribution requires we consider other values such as liberty.

‘equal access to advantage’ suggests no-one should be disadvantaged if it doesn’t result from choice.

Need claims justice requires basic needs are met – so those who cant provide for their own needs will have to be provided for by those who have more than they need.

Desert claims justice requires reward in proportion to value of the contribution – redistribution is needed to balance the market.

Can redistribution be justified?

Distributive justice is based on society being a ‘system of cooperation for mutual advantage between individuals’.

Justice is the most important political value as it applies to ‘basic institutions of society’.

The conditions for cooperation need to be defended – inequalities (of social positions) also need to be justified.

Principles of justice‘the principles that free and rational persons… to further

their own interests would accept in an initial position of equality as defining the fundamental terms…’

Justice is fairness.

Rawls & Justice

For us to agree to a social contract we need to eliminate bias to certain groups i.e. rich or poor. Rawls assumes we’re able to agree theses principles unsure of our position in society – we don’t know if we’re going to be rich or poor, like playing a game of monopoly you eliminate bias by giving everyone the same money and same opportunities to roll – regardless of knowing if you’re going to win or not.

The veil of ignorance allows that ‘no one is advantaged or disadvantaged in the choice of principles by the outcome of natural chance or social circumstances… no one is able to design principles to favour his particular condition, the principles of justice are the result of fair agreement…’

Rawls & Justice

For the contract to be just we need to make the rules based on everyone being in the same starting position – instead of assuming the outcome will be a certain way and so allowing the rules to benefit the poor more greatly. Like assuming a person who goes to the gym regularly would win a race over someone that doesn’t – both have the same length to run and the same starting line.

InequalityWe can only assume the goods being distributed are those that

everyone wants – rights, liberties, powers, opportunities, income etc. We will agree to equal distribution – unless inequality will work to everyone's advantage. We may need inequality to give people motivation to work – a low income earner will have greater motivation to work than someone with a high income as they will need a higher income to achieve the same happiness and ultimately provide greater wealth for society.

EqualityAfter there is secured material well-being we then become to

value our basic liberties more so. This Is when we will prefer equal liberty over unequal liberty with greater wealth.

Gaining the two principles of justice

Both equality and inequality lead to political justice,(>) and social justice.

1) Each individual should have equal right to a system of equal basic liberties.

2) Social and economic equalities should be arranged so the least advantaged benefits the most.

Social inequalities should be to everyone’s benefit –social inequality should make the poor richer– we should maximise the minimum welfare

OBJ: it makes just as much sense to maximise the average wealth – there’s equality of opportunity allowing someone to improve their position.

Two principles of justice

Our individual interests can be identified prior to existence in society.

OBJECTIONS;Rejected by Marx and conservatism - it rules out theory that

sees social bonds as intrinsically good – its assumes we’re fundamentally separate rather than naturally social.

Rawls assumes we can live meaningfully being the ‘veil of ignorance’. But we can’t make up the ideal ‘good society’ behind this veil – our values and ideas of what is good comes from others.

By this even redistribution that is justified, by Rawls’ argument it wouldn’t be.

Self and society

Equality, need and desert don’t link distributive justice to liberty or rights. Rawls does.

Rawls’ first principle of justice covers liberty – Liberty is more important than the distribution of social and economic equalities.

Rawls rejects the idea of rights before justice – principles of justice givit’s only possible to make a right claim once there are principles of justice. e rights – so

Distributive justice, Liberty & Rights

Nozick focus’ on distribution of property.Justice involves three ideas:1) In acquisition – how you acquire property

rights if something hasn’t previously been owned.

2) In transfer – how you acquire property rights over something transferred – i.e. a gift.

3) Rectification of injustice – how to restore something to its rightful owner in case of injustice.

Nozick & Justice (against Rawls)

Whether a distribution is just depends on how it came about.

On the other hand justice according to – Rawls, need, desert and equality depend on the ‘pattern’ of distribution.

An advantageIf a certain distribution is just, then if people

voluntarily move to a different distribution, observing justice in transfer will also be just (regardless of whether it is patterned according to need, desert, equality and Rawls).

If a footballer wants to get 25p from every match ticket sold, although they will be better off it is still just as the fans voluntarily paid an extra 25p.

Nozick & Justice

Justice is respecting natural rights-their rights to property and self-ownership. We must allow people to do what they want with what they own.

People are autonomous, they own themselves and their talents so they own what they create. It’s wrong to tax on what they earn. Rawls might say – its luck as to what your given in order to succeed – if your given the winning hand in a card game it’s pure luck.

To take property away from someone in order to redistribute violates the individuals rights. – property rights are important because they come from self-ownership.

Nozick & Justice

Everyone has a right to what they produce because they own their own labour which they invest. ‘Justice in acquisition’ constrains when and how this happens – but once you justly own something it’s all about justice in transfer.

Patterned theories of distributive justice restricts free action – if people can do as they please with their property liberty upsets the patterns.

Nozick & Justice

Nozicks theory is controversial – it may justify unequal distribution, not respect what they deserve or need, and not give priority to those worse off.

Rawls – what people own is down to social status and natural talents – inequalities in ownership are unjust. The rights people have cant be decided before the principles of justice – it would enable us to alter justice to suit our rights.

Nozick – each person’s talents and abilities are their own – they have a right to keep what the talents produce & gain – forcibly redistributing this would fail to respect their autonomy.

Nozick & Rawls

He supposes any transfer if freely consented is just – the rules governing the transfer should be sensitive to different political values not just liberty.

Individual liberty could be a goal to be pursued – if property is important and justice rests on liberty everyone needs sufficient property to be free.

If we don’t start from a just beginning there is no way to know if what people own is justly theirs.

Objections to Nozick