PHIL 001 Lecture Notes - Lecture 11: Age Of Enlightenment, Justice As Fairness, Arbitrariness
3 Jun 2018
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Week 8A – Distributive Justice - Epistemology
PHILOSO PHY
Outline
- Distributive Justice
- Rawls
- Nozick
- Comparing two Views of Justice
- From Justice to Truth
- Where does knowledge come from?
- Testimony
Political Philosophy: the study of political societies using the methods of philosophy
Two basic questions:
1. ”Who Says So?”
Legitimacy of Political Authority
2. “Who Gets What?”
Distributive Justice: the fair distribution of society’s benefits and burdens
e.g., freedom, income and wealth, jobs, property, public service
Possible Basis of Distributive Justice
- Maximization of Utility
- Merit/Desert
- Equality
- Entitlement
- Fairness
Justice as Fairness
A fair distribution based on fundamental principles that rational and reasonable self-interested agents can agree
upon under certain informational constraints a hypothetical deliberative/bargaining situation: Original Position
In the original position (OP)
We are behind a veil of ignorance
No-one knows her own
- Class position
- Social status
- Race and gender
- Natural talents
- Psychological propensities
- Conception of the good
Fairness
In OP, everybody lacks knowledge of one’s social position, talents, etc. Hence, no-one is inclined to exploit
whatever advantage one might have in the actual society in order to agree on the fundamental principles of
justice
Contrast with Actual Bargaining
When outcome might still be agreed upon by everyone but each party exploits their knowledge of their
conditions
- Mutual consent is not sufficient for fairness
What is agreed upon in OP?
Two fundamental principles of Justice
find more resources at oneclass.com
find more resources at oneclass.com
Week 8A – Distributive Justice - Epistemology
PHILOSO PHY
(P1) Each person is to have an equal right to the most extensive total system of basic liberties … compatible
with a similar system of liberty for all others
Basic Liberties
- Political liberty: right to vote and eligibility for office
- Freedom of speech and assembly
- Freedom of person and property
- Freedom from arbitrary arrest
Justifiable Inequality
(P2) Social and economic inequalities are to be arranged so that they are both:
1. attached to offices and positions open to all under conditions of fair equality of opportunity
2. to the greatest benefit of the least advantaged (the Difference Principle)
In other words. . .
Wealth and power are to be distributed equally unless a difference would make the least advantaged better off
Notice: Everybody is going to be better off than under strict equality but the focus is on the least advantaged
Lexical Order
The principles are lexically ordered
- we have to satisfy P1 before worrying about P2
- we have to satisfy P2.1 before worrying about P2.2
We don’t sacrifice the liberties of equal citizenship to secure equality of opportunity and a more equal
distribution of wealth and income, and we don’t sacrifice equality of opportunity to secure a more equal
distribution of wealth and income
Justifying the Principles
- Everybody gets treated as an end, not just as a means
o no one is sacrificed just to make some other group or even the majority better off
- Society as a system of co-operation between free and equal individuals
Kantian Justification
Justification of Redistribution
Sharing the costs and benefits of the cooperative scheme via the redistribution under difference principle (P2.2)
because of Moral Arbitrariness of the results of “Natural Lottery” in the actual distribution of talents and
skills
- this distribution is screened off by the Veil of Ignorance in OP
Justice as Entitlement
A just distribution: the one reached by operating 3 principles:
1. Principle of transfer I whatever is justly acquired can be justly transferred, if done with owner’ consent
and with no violation of others’ rights
2. Principle of just initial acquisition I one can acquire unowned properties as long as the rights of others
are not violated
3. Principle of the rectification of injustice I how to handle unjust acquisitions and transfers
Justice as entitlement
- ‘From each as they choose, to each as they are chosen’
find more resources at oneclass.com
find more resources at oneclass.com
Document Summary
Political philosophy: the study of political societies using the methods of philosophy. Legitimacy of political authority: who gets what? . Distributive justice: the fair distribution of society"s benefits and burdens e. g. , freedom, income and wealth, jobs, property, public service. A fair distribution based on fundamental principles that rational and reasonable self-interested agents can agree upon under certain informational constraints a hypothetical deliberative/bargaining situation: original position. In op, everybody lacks knowledge of one"s social position, talents, etc. Hence, no-one is inclined to exploit whatever advantage one might have in the actual society in order to agree on the fundamental principles of justice. When outcome might still be agreed upon by everyone but each party exploits their knowledge of their conditions. Mutual consent is not sufficient for fairness. Week 8a distributive justice - epistemology (p1) each person is to have an equal right to the most extensive total system of basic liberties compatible with a similar system of liberty for all others.
