Phil 2265: Social / Political Philosophy Introducing Rawls

John Rawls 1921 – 2002 Professor of Philosophy at Harvard (emeritus 1996) Spent a few years at Oxford, where he studied under Isiah Berlin (who we’ll read later regarding ‘liberty’).

Rawls’ contribution To Rawls or not to Rawls? His contribution to social / political philosophy cannot be underestimated. Prior to the publication of the paper form of Justice as Fairness in 1958, social / political philosophy in the Analytic tradition was, well, dead.

Conceptual Analysis Justice is X Fairness is Y If X = Y, Justice = Fairness. But that is not Rawls claim, his theory is for justice as fairness.

The project Rawls is putatively not offering a defense of a particular type of state or system of Government. –Like, say Hobbes, Locke, Rousseau, Wolff, & Goldman. He is offering an account of justice, by which various political systems can be judged.

Therefore,… Fairness is X. The principles by which we judge states, laws, etc as just or unjust are those that would be agreed upon by people in a totally fair society. Therefore, the principles by which… are those that would be agreed upon by people in a society that embodies X. The fair society: the ‘original condition’, where we operate behind a ‘veil of ignorance’.

Reflective Equilibrium The principles ‘endorsed’ by the people in the original position are tested using the process of ‘reflective equilibrium’,: –Which really simply means that we adjust our beliefs until they are consistent with eachother. –Note: there is some conflict on the interpretation of Rawls’ use of the notion. It might just be a adaptation of the ‘coherence’ theory of truth, which dominated philosophy in the middle of this century. It is, however, currently in disrepute.

Ultimate conclusion There are two principles of justice: 1.Liberty principle: society must provide each individual with the basic ‘rights’ or ‘liberties’. 2.Difference principle: inequalities in wealth and power should be distributed so as to benefit the worst off.

OK, the details: What is justice? –The ‘first virtue’ of social institutions. What is a ‘first virtue’? –It is as truth is to a system thought What is a social institution? –A society is “a more or less self-sufficient association who in their relations to one another recognize certain rules of conduct as binding and who for the most part act in accordance with them” (4)

The Rules? Social institutions = the rules by which people in a society abide. ASSUMPTION= that these rules are designed for mutual advantage. Society is ‘typically’ marked by conflict as well as identity of interests –Identity of interests because cooperation make life better for all (as opposed to living alone) –Conflict because the benefits of cooperation need to be distributed.

The problem? Need to create a system for judging which method of distribution is the best = the principles of justice. (4) In a well-ordered society: 1.Everyone knows & accepts that everyone knows & accepts the same principles of justice. 2.The ‘basic social institutions’ generally satisfy & are known to satisfy these principles.

Hold on right there… 1.OK, so what are we to do with sociopaths? 1.Autistics? 2.Idiots? 3.Children? 4.The Senile? 5.Insane? 6.Etc.

Con’t 2.OK, so what do we do when the basic social institutions are either: 1.Untrustworthy 2.Untrusted 1.Eg: The Tuskegee experiment 2.Smallpox blankets 3.Eugenics & Involuntary sterilization

Remember Rawls not at all concerned with reality – in fact, he is so far from the reality of real, existing human society that four pages into the text, ‘realists’ (those concerned with the practical) are incapable of following along! Rawls is concerned with a conceptual analysis of ‘justice’.

Competing views: Plato: Justice is a each part of society (the person) existing in balance Thrasymachus: Justice is whatever those in power say it is. Mill: justice is what ever produces the greatest good for the greatest number. ‘Democracy’: justice is whatever the majority says it is.

So the question is: When we say ‘that was a just ruling’, what do we mean? When we ‘demand justice’ for, say, the victims of August Pinochet, what do we mean? When we say ‘taxes are unjust’, what do we mean? How do we settle questions like ‘Is it just for ½ the states to pay 1.4 trillion more in taxes then the receive, and the other ½ to receive 800 billion more than they pay’?

And the answer is: “the principles o justice for the basic structure of society are the object of the original agreement. They are principles that free and rational persons concerned to further their own interests would accept in an initial position of equality as defining the fundamental terms of their association. These principles are to regulate all further agreements; they specify the kinds of social cooperation that can be entered into and the forms of government that can be established.” (10)

Justice as fairness: “the original position is the appropriate initial status quo which insures that the fundamental agreements reached in it are fair.” (15) Thus, a principle X is more just than another principle Y iff the people in the original condition would prefer X to Y. (I.e. in a fair society, X is preferable to Y) (15-16)

Two Principles “No one should be advantaged or disadvantaged by natural fortune of social circumstances in the choice of principles” (17) –Thus, the ‘veil of ignorance’ “It seems reasonable to suppose that the parties in the original condition are equal” (17) Together with the veil of ignorance, these to principles define the principles of justice:

Two conflicting principles: –Each person is to have an equal right to the most extensive scheme of equal basic liberties compatible with a similar scheme of liberties for others. (liberty) –Social and economic inequalities are to be arranged so that they are both (a) reasonably expected to be to everyone’s advantage, and (b) attached to positions and offices open to all. (equality) How do we test the theory: compare it to our intuitive notion: –Is that what we mean when we demand justice for, say, the victims of August Pinochet?(e.g.)

With a twist [in the case of discrepancies between our commonsense notion of justice and the principles of justice agreed upon by the fair society]: “We can either modify the account of the initial situation or we can revise our existing judgments, for even the judgments we take provisionally as fixed points are liable to revision. By going back and forth, sometimes altering the conditions of the contractual circumstances, at others withdrawing our judgments and conforming them to principle, I assume that eventually we shall find a description of the initial situation that both expresses reasonable conditions and yields principles which match our considered judgments duly pruned and adjusted. This state of affairs I refer to as reflective equilibrium.” (18)

The two principles will be in conflict: Solutions: –Utilitarianism: Principle of Utility is to arrange social institutions in such a ways that it maximizes the net balance of satisfaction. –If one has to suffer for the greater good, so be it (anti-equality) Unacceptable violation of ‘fairness’!

Intuitionists No higher-order principles by which we can judge something as fair, just, etc. –“That is right” == “That Yeah!” –“That is wrong” == “That Yuk!” Consider consensual, protected incest. What’s wrong with it? It’s yucky.

Rawls Two points –Intuitions often based on culture –When these intuitions are in conflict, how do we resolve? “To reach some measure of understanding an agreement which goes beyond a mere de facto resolution of competing interests and a reliance on existing conventions and established expectations, it is necessary to move to a more general scheme for determining the balance of precepts, or at least for confining it within narrower limits.” (31)