Justice
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"Theory of Justice" redirects here. For the book, see A Theory of Justice. For other uses, see Justice (disambiguation).
Lady Justice, a symbol of justice. She is depicted as a goddess equipped with three items: a sword, symbolising the coercive power of a court; scales, representing an objective standard by which competing claims are weighed; and a blindfold indicating that justice should be impartial and meted out objectively, without fear or favor and regardless of money, wealth, power or identity.[1]
The concept of justice differs in every culture. An early theory of justice was set out by the Ancient Greek philosopher Plato in his work The Republic. Throughout history various theories have been established. Advocates of divine command theory argue that justice issues from God. In the 17th century, theorists like John Locke argued for the theory of natural law. Thinkers in the social contract tradition argued that justice is derived from the mutual agreement of everyone concerned. In the 19th century, utilitarian thinkers including John Stuart Mill argued that justice is what has the best consequences. Theories of distributive justice concern what is distributed, between whom they are to be distributed, and what is the proper distribution. Egalitarians argued that justice can only exist within the coordinates of equality. John Rawls used a social contract argument to show that justice, and especially distributive justice, is a form of fairness. Property rights theorists (like Robert Nozick) also take a consequentialist view of distributive justice and argue that property rights-based justice maximizes the overall wealth of an economic system. Theories of retributive justice are concerned with punishment for wrongdoing. Restorative justice (also sometimes called "reparative justice") is an approach to justice that focuses on the needs of victims and offenders.
Contents
[hide]Introductory understandings[edit]
Justice by Luca Giordano.
Harmony[edit]
Main article: The Republic (Plato)
In his dialogue Republic, Plato uses Socrates to argue for justice that covers both the just person and the just City State. Justice is a proper, harmonious relationship between the warring parts of the person or city. Hence, Plato's definition of justice is that justice is the having and doing of what is one's own. A just man is a man in just the right place, doing his best and giving the precise equivalent of what he has received. This applies both at the individual level and at the universal level. A person's soul has three parts – reason, spirit and desire. Similarly, a city has three parts – Socrates uses the parable of the chariot to illustrate his point: a chariot works as a whole because the two horses' power is directed by the charioteer. Lovers of wisdom – philosophers, in one sense of the term – should rule because only they understand what is good. If one is ill, one goes to a medic rather than a farmer, because the medic is expert in the subject of health. Similarly, one should trust one's city to an expert in the subject of the good, not to a mere politician who tries to gain power by giving people what they want, rather than what's good for them. Socrates uses the parable of the ship to illustrate this point: the unjust city is like a ship in open ocean, crewed by a powerful but drunken captain (the common people), a group of untrustworthy advisors who try to manipulate the captain into giving them power over the ship's course (the politicians), and a navigator (the philosopher) who is the only one who knows how to get the ship to port. For Socrates, the only way the ship will reach its destination – the good – is if the navigator takes charge.[2]Divine command[edit]
Main article: Divine command theory
See also: Divine judgment
Advocates of divine command theory argue that justice, and indeed the whole of morality, is the authoritative command of God. Murder is wrong and must be punished, for instance, because, and only because, God commands that it be so.Divine command theory was famously questioned by Plato in his dialogue, Euthyphro. Called the Euthyphro dilemma, it goes as follows: "Is what is morally good commanded by God because it is morally good, or is it morally good because it is commanded by God?" The implication is that if the latter is true, then justice is arbitrary; if the former is true, then morality exists on a higher order than God, who becomes little more than a passer-on of moral knowledge.
Many apologists have addressed the issue, typically by arguing that is it a false dilemma. For example, some Christian apologists argue that goodness is the very nature of God, and there is necessarily reflected in His commands.[3] Another response, popularized in two contexts by Immanuel Kant and C. S. Lewis, is that it is deductively valid to argue that the existence of an objective morality implies the existence of God and vice versa.
Natural law[edit]
Main article: Natural law
For advocates of the theory that justice is part of natural law (e.g., John Locke), it involves the system of consequences that naturally derives from any action or choice. In this, it is similar to the laws of physics: in the same way as the Third of Newton's laws of Motion requires that for every action there must be an equal and opposite reaction, justice requires according individuals or groups what they actually deserve, merit, or are entitled to.[citation needed] Justice, on this account, is a universal and absolute concept: laws, principles, religions, etc., are merely attempts to codify that concept, sometimes with results that entirely contradict the true nature of justice.Human creation[edit]
In contrast to the understandings canvassed so far, justice may be understood as a human creation, rather than a discovery of harmony, divine command, or natural law. This claim can be understood in a number of ways, with the fundamental division being between those who argue that justice is the creation of some humans, and those who argue that it is the creation of all humans.Despotism and skepticism[edit]
In Republic by Plato, the character Thrasymachus argues that justice is the interest of the strong—merely a name for what the powerful or cunning ruler has imposed on the people.
Further information: The Republic (Plato)
Mutual agreement[edit]
Main article: Social contract
According to thinkers in the social contract tradition, justice is derived from the mutual agreement of everyone concerned; or, in many versions, from what they would agree to under hypothetical conditions including equality and absence of bias. This account is considered further below, under 'Justice as fairness'. The absence of bias refers to an equal ground for all people concerned in a disagreement (or trial in some cases).Subordinate value[edit]
According to utilitarian thinkers including John Stuart Mill, justice is not as fundamental as we often think. Rather, it is derived from the more basic standard of rightness, consequentialism: what is right is what has the best consequences (usually measured by the total or average welfare caused). So, the proper principles of justice are those that tend to have the best consequences. These rules may turn out to be familiar ones such as keeping contracts; but equally, they may not, depending on the facts about real consequences. Either way, what is important is those consequences, and justice is important, if at all, only as derived from that fundamental standard. Mill tries to explain our mistaken belief that justice is overwhelmingly important by arguing that it derives from two natural human tendencies: our desire to retaliate against those who hurt us, and our ability to put ourselves imaginatively in another's place. So, when we see someone harmed, we project ourselves into her situation and feel a desire to retaliate on her behalf. If this process is the source of our feelings about justice, that ought to undermine our confidence in them.[4]Theories of distributive justice[edit]
Main article: Distributive justice
Allegory or The Triumph of Justice by Hans von Aachen.
- What goods are to be distributed? Is it to be wealth, power, respect, opportunities or some combination of these things?
- Between what entities are they to be distributed? Humans (dead, living, future), sentient beings, the members of a single society, nations?
- What is the proper distribution? Equal, meritocratic, according to social status, according to need, based on property rights and non-aggression?
This section describes some widely held theories of distributive justice, and their attempts to answer these questions.
Social justice[edit]
Main article: Social justice
According to the egalitarian, justice can exist only within the parameters of equality. This basic view can be elaborated in many ways, according to what goods are to be distributed—wealth, respect, opportunity—and who or what they are to be distributed equally among—individuals, families, nations, races, species. Egalitarian theories are typically less concerned with discussing who exactly will do the distributing or what effects their recommended policies will have on the production of the goods, services, or resources they wish to distribute.Commonly held egalitarian positions include demands for equality of opportunity, though equality of opportunity is often defended by adherents of nonegalitarian conceptions of justice as well. Some variants of egalitarianism affirm that justice without equality is hollow and that equality itself is the highest justice, though such a formulation will have concrete meaning only once the main terms have been fleshed out.
At a cultural level, egalitarian theories have developed in sophistication and acceptance during the past two hundred years. Among the notable broadly egalitarian philosophies are socialism, left-libertarianism, and progressivism, which propound economic, political, and legal egalitarianism, respectively.
Fairness[edit]
Main article: A Theory of Justice
- Each person is to have an equal right to the most extensive total system of equal basic liberties compatible with a similar system of liberty for all.
- Social and economic inequalities are to be arranged so that they are both
- to the greatest benefit of the least advantaged, consistent with the just savings principle, and
- attached to offices and positions open to all under conditions of fair equality of opportunity.[5]
In one sense, theories of distributive justice may assert that everyone should get what they deserve. Theories disagree on the meaning of what is "deserved". The main distinction is between theories that argue the basis of just deserts ought to be held equally by everyone, and therefore derive egalitarian accounts of distributive justice—and theories that argue the basis of just deserts is unequally distributed on the basis of, for instance, hard work, and therefore derive accounts of distributive justice by which some should have more than others.
According to meritocratic theories, goods, especially wealth and social status, should be distributed to match individual merit, which is usually understood as some combination of talent and hard work. According to needs-based theories, goods, especially such basic goods as food, shelter and medical care, should be distributed to meet individuals' basic needs for them. Marxism can be regarded as a needs-based theory on some readings of Marx's slogan "from each according to his ability, to each according to his need".[6] According to contribution-based theories, goods should be distributed to match an individual's contribution to the overall social good.
Property rights[edit]
Further information: Libertarianism and Constitutional economics
In Anarchy, State, and Utopia, Robert Nozick argues that distributive justice is not a matter of the whole distribution matching an ideal pattern, but of each individual entitlement having the right kind of history. It is just that a person has some good (especially, some property right) if and only if they came to have it by a history made up entirely of events of two kinds:- Just acquisition, especially by working on unowned things; and
- Just transfer, that is free gift, sale or other agreement, but not theft (i.e. by force or fraud).
On the basis of this theory of distributive justice, Nozick argues that all attempts to redistribute goods according to an ideal pattern, without the consent of their owners, are theft. In particular, redistributive taxation is theft.
Some property rights theorists (like Nozick) also take a consequentialist view of distributive justice and argue that property rights based justice also has the effect of maximizing the overall wealth of an economic system. They explain that voluntary (non-coerced) transactions always have a property called Pareto efficiency. The result is that the world is better off in an absolute sense and no one is worse off. Such consequentialist property rights theorists argue that respecting property rights maximizes the number of Pareto efficient transactions in the world and minimized the number of non-Pareto efficient transactions in the world (i.e. transactions where someone is made worse off). The result is that the world will have generated the greatest total benefit from the limited, scarce resources available in the world. Further, this will have been accomplished without taking anything away from anyone unlawfully.
Welfare-maximization[edit]
Main article: Utilitarianism
According to the utilitarian, justice requires the maximization of the total or average welfare across all relevant individuals. This may require sacrifice of some for the good of others, so long as everyone's good is taken impartially into account. Utilitarianism, in general, argues that the standard of justification for actions, institutions, or the whole world, is impartial welfare consequentialism, and only indirectly, if at all, to do with rights, property, need, or any other non-utilitarian criterion. These other criteria might be indirectly important, to the extent that human welfare involves them. But even then, such demands as human rights would only be elements in the calculation of overall welfare, not uncrossable barriers to action.Theories of retributive justice[edit]
Walter Seymour Allward's Justitia (Justice), outside Supreme Court of Canada, Ottawa, Ontario Canada
- why punish?
- who should be punished?
- what punishment should they receive?
Utilitarianism[edit]
According to the utilitarian, as already noted, justice requires the maximization of the total or average welfare across all relevant individuals. Punishment fights crime in three ways:- Deterrence. The credible threat of punishment might lead people to make different choices; well-designed threats might lead people to make choices that maximize welfare.
- Rehabilitation. Punishment might make bad people into better ones. For the utilitarian, all that 'bad person' can mean is 'person who's likely to cause bad things (like suffering)'. So, utilitarianism could recommend punishment that changes someone such that they are less likely to cause bad things.
- Security/Incapacitation. Perhaps there are people who are irredeemable causers of bad things. If so, imprisoning them might maximize welfare by limiting their opportunities to cause harm and therefore the benefit lies within protecting society.
Retributivism[edit]
The retributivist will think the utilitarian's argument disastrously mistaken. If someone does something wrong, we must respond to it, and to him or her, as an individual not as a part of a calculation of overall welfare. To do otherwise is to disrespect him or her as an individual human being. If the crime had victims, it is to disrespect them, too. Wrongdoing must be balanced or made good in some way, and so the criminal deserves to be punished. It says that all guilty people, and only guilty people, deserve appropriate punishment. This matches some strong intuitions about just punishment: that it should be proportional to the crime, and that it should be of only and all of the guilty. However, it is sometimes argued that retributivism is merely revenge in disguise.[8] However, there are differences between retribution and revenge: the former is impartial and has a scale of appropriateness, whereas the latter is personal and potentially unlimited in scale.Restorative justice[edit]
Main article: Restorative justice
Restorative justice (also sometimes called "reparative justice") is an approach to justice that focuses on the needs of victims and offenders, instead of satisfying abstract legal principles or punishing the offender. Victims take an active role in the process, while offenders are encouraged to take responsibility for their actions, "to repair the harm they've done—by apologizing, returning stolen money, or community service". It is based on a theory of justice that considers crime and wrongdoing to be an offense against an individual or community rather than the state. Restorative justice that fosters dialogue between victim and offender shows the highest rates of victim satisfaction and offender accountability.[9]Mixed theories[edit]
Some modern philosophers have argued that Utilitarian and Retributive theories are not mutually exclusive. For example, Andrew von Hirsch, in his 1976 book Doing Justice, suggested that we have a moral obligation to punish greater crimes more than lesser ones. However, so long as we adhere to that constraint then utilitarian ideals would play a significant secondary role.Theories[edit]
Rawls's theory of justice[edit]
Further information: Justice (virtue) and Cardinal virtues
It has been argued[10] that 'systematic' or 'programmatic' political and moral philosophy in the West begins, in Plato's Republic, with the question, 'What is Justice?'[11] According to most contemporary theories of justice, justice is overwhelmingly important: John Rawls claims that "Justice is the first virtue of social institutions, as truth is of systems of thought."[12] In classical approaches, evident from Plato through to Rawls, the concept of 'justice' is always construed in logical or 'etymological' opposition to the concept of injustice. Such approaches cite various examples of injustice, as problems which a theory of justice must overcome. A number of post-World War II approaches do, however, challenge that seemingly obvious dualism between those two concepts.[13] Justice can be thought of as distinct from benevolence, charity, prudence, mercy, generosity, or compassion, although these dimensions are regularly understood to also be interlinked. Justice is the concept of cardinal virtues, of which it is one. Metaphysical justice has often been associated with concepts of fate, reincarnation or Divine Providence, i.e., with a life in accordance with a cosmic plan. The association of justice with fairness is thus historically and culturally inalienable.[14]Equality before the law[edit]
Law raises important and complex issues concerning equality, fairness, and justice. There is an old saying that 'All are equal before the law'. The author Anatole France said in 1894, "In its majestic equality, the law forbids rich and poor alike to sleep under bridges, beg in the streets, and steal loaves of bread."[15] The belief in equality before the law is called legal egalitarianism.Classical liberalism[edit]
Equality before the law is one of the basic principles of classical liberalism.[16][17] Classical liberalism calls for equality before the law, not for equality of outcome.[16] Classical liberalism opposes pursuing group rights at the expense of individual rights.[17]Religion and spirituality[edit]
Abrahamitic justice[edit]
The Hebrew Bible describes God as saying about the Judeo-Christian patriarch Abraham: "No, for I have chosen him, that he may charge his children and his household after him to keep the way of the Lord by doing righteousness and justice;...." (Genesis 18:19, NRSV). The Psalmist describes God as having "Righteousness and justice [as] the foundation of [His] throne;...." (Psalms 89:14, NRSV).
The New Testament also describes God and Jesus Christ as having and displaying justice, often in comparison with God displaying and supporting mercy (Matthew 5:7).
Theories of sentencing[edit]
In criminal law, a sentence forms the final explicit act of a judge-ruled process, and also the symbolic principal act connected to his function. The sentence can generally involve a decree of imprisonment, a fine and/or other punishments against a defendant convicted of a crime. Laws may specify the range of penalties that can be imposed for various offenses, and sentencing guidelines sometimes regulate what punishment within those ranges can be imposed given a certain set of offense and offender characteristics. The most common purposes of sentencing in legal theory are:| Theory | Aim of theory | Suitable punishment |
|---|---|---|
| Retribution | Punishment imposed for no reason other than an offense being committed, on the basis that if proportionate, punishment is morally acceptable as a response that satisfies the aggrieved party, their intimates and society. |
|
| Deterrence |
|
|
| Rehabilitation | To reform the offender's behavior |
|
| Incapacitation | Offender is made incapable of committing further crime to protect society at large from crime |
|
| Reparation | Repayment to victim(s) or to community |
|
| Denunciation | Society expressing its disapproval reinforcing moral boundaries |
|
Evolutionary perspectives[edit]
Reactions to fairness[edit]
Studies at UCLA in 2008 have indicated that reactions to fairness are "wired" into the brain and that, "Fairness is activating the same part of the brain that responds to food in rats... This is consistent with the notion that being treated fairly satisfies a basic need".[18] Research conducted in 2003 at Emory University involving capuchin monkeys demonstrated that other cooperative animals also possess such a sense and that "inequity aversion may not be uniquely human"[19] indicating that ideas of fairness and justice may be instinctual in nature.Institutions and justice[edit]
Main article: Law
In a world where people are interconnected but they disagree, institutions are required to instantiate ideals of justice. These institutions may be justified by their approximate instantiation of justice, or they may be deeply unjust when compared with ideal standards — consider the institution of slavery. Justice is an ideal the world fails to live up to, sometimes due to deliberate opposition to justice despite understanding, which could be disastrous. The question of institutive justice raises issues of legitimacy, procedure, codification and interpretation, which are considered by legal theorists and by philosophers of law.See also[edit]
- Types of injustice
References[edit]
- Jump up ^ Luban, Law's Blindfold, 23.
- Jump up ^ Plato, Republic trans. Robin Waterfield (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1984).
- Jump up ^ "The Euthyphro Dilemma Once More". ReasonableFaith.org. Retrieved 8 October 2014.
- Jump up ^ John Stuart Mill, Utilitarianism in On Liberty and Other Essays ed. John Gray (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1991), Chapter 5.
- Jump up ^ John Rawls, A Theory of Justice (revised edition, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1999), p. 266.
- Jump up ^ Karl Marx, 'Critique of the Gotha Program' in Karl Marx: Selected writings ed. David McLellan (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1977): 564–70, p. 569.
- Jump up ^ C. L. Ten, 'Crime and Punishment' in Peter Singer ed., A Companion to Ethics (Oxford: Blackwell Publishing, 1993): 366–72.
- Jump up ^ Ted Honderich, Punishment: The supposed justifications (London: Hutchinson & Co., 1969), Chapter 1.
- Jump up ^ Michael Braswell, and John Fuller, Corrections, Peacemaking and Restorative Justice: Transforming Individuals and Institutions (Routledge, 2014).
- Jump up ^ See, e.g., Eric Heinze, The Concept of Injustice (Routledge, 2013), pp. 4-10, 50-60.
- Jump up ^ Plato, The Republic, Book I, 331b-c.
- Jump up ^ John Rawls, A Theory of Justice (revised edn, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1999), p. 3
- Jump up ^ See, e.g., Eric Heinze, The Concept of Injustice (Routledge, 2013).
- Jump up ^ Daston, Lorraine (2008). "Life, Chance and Life Chances". Daedalus 137: 5–14. doi:10.1162/daed.2008.137.1.5.
- Jump up ^ (France, The Red Lily, Chapter VII).
- ^ Jump up to: a b Chandran Kukathas, "Ethical Pluralism from a Classical Liberal Perspective," in The Many and the One: Religious and Secular Perspectives on Ethical Pluralism in the Modern World, ed. Richard Madsen and Tracy B. Strong, Ethikon Series in Comparative Ethics (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 2003), 61 (ISBN 0-691-09993-6).
- ^ Jump up to: a b Mark Evans, ed., Edinburgh Companion to Contemporary Liberalism: Evidence and Experience (London: Routledge, 2001), 55 (ISBN 1-57958-339-3).
- Jump up ^ "Brain reacts to fairness as it does to money and chocolate, study shows". UCLA Newsroom (UCLA). April 21, 2008. Retrieved January 15, 2015.
- Jump up ^ Nature 425, 297–299 (18 September 2003)
Further reading[edit]
- Anthony Duff & David Garland eds, A Reader on Punishment (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1994)
- Barzilai Gad, Communities and Law: Politics and Cultures of Legal Identities (Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 2003)
- Brian Barry, Theories of Justice (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1989)
- C. L. Ten, Crime, Guilt, and Punishment: A philosophical introduction (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1987)
- Colin Farrelly, An Introduction to Contemporary Political Theory (London: Sage, 2004)
- David Gauthier, Morals By Agreement (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1986)
- James Konow (2003) "Which Is the Fairest One of All? A Positive Analysis of Justice Theories", Journal of Economic Literature, 41(4), p. 1188-1239
- David Schmidtz, Elements of Justice (New York: Columbia University Press, 2006)
- Harry Brighouse, Justice (Cambridge: Polity Press, 2004)
- John Rawls, A Theory of Justice (revised edition, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1999)
- John Stuart Mill, Utilitarianism in On Liberty and Other Essays ed. John Gray (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1991)
- Nicola Lacey, State Punishment (London: Routledge, 1988)
- Peter Singer ed., A Companion to Ethics (Oxford: Blackwell, 1993), Part IV
- Plato, Republic trans. Robin Waterfield (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1994)
- Robert E. Goodin & Philip Pettit eds, Contemporary Political Philosophy: An anthology (2nd edition, Malden, Massachusetts: Blackwell, 2006), Part III
- Robert Nozick, Anarchy, State, and Utopia (Oxford: Blackwell, 1974)
- Serge Guinchard, La justice et ses institutions (Judicial institutions), Dalloz editor, 12 edition, 2013
- Ted Honderich, Punishment: The supposed justifications (London: Hutchinson & Co., 1969)
- Will Kymlicka, Contemporary Political Philosophy: An introduction (2nd edition, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2002)
- Reinhold Zippelius, Rechtsphilosophie, §§ 11-22 (6th edition, Munich:C.H. Beck, 2011), ISBN 978-3-406-61191-9
- Amartya Sen (2011). The Idea of Justice. Cambridge: Belknap Press of Harvard University Press. ISBN 0-674-06047-4.
- Eric Heinze, The Concept of Injustice (Routledge, 2013)
External links[edit]
 | Wikiquote has quotations related to: Justice |
 | Wikimedia Commons has media related to Justice. |
| Library resources about Justice |
- Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy entries:
- Distributive Justice, by Michael Allingham
- Punishment, by Kevin Murtagh
- Western Theories of Justice, by Wayne P. Pomerleau
- Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy entries:
- "Distributive Justice", by Julian Lamont
- "Justice as a Virtue", by Michael Slote
- "Punishment", by Hugo Adam Bedau and Erin Kelly
- Justice for the World
- United Nations Rule of Law: Informal Justice, on the relationship between informal/community justice, the rule of law and the United Nations
- Video:Balkan Justice YouTube
- Justice: What's The Right Thing To Do?, a series of 12 videos on the subject of justice by Harvard University's Michael Sandel, with reading materials and comments from participants.
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