ark@alice.UUCP (Andrew Koenig) (04/06/85)
> Glad you asked that question! Basically I agree with John Rawles' > use of the social contract positions of John Locke (who was the primary > influence on our own esteemed Thomas Jefferson) in "A Theory of > Justice". Rawles' argues that Justice is that society or institutional > arrangement all would agree to if they do not know what their own > position will be in that system. While this position promotes the > basic principle of equality it also allows inequality *if such > inequality makes everyone better off*. Further it also promotes > equality of opportunity-if I don't know what my own position may be > besides wanting equal positions in themselves I am also likely to > want to have a very good chance to attain various positions. There seems to be a skipped step in this reasoning. You say that a just society is one in which anyone would agree to participate even without knowing in advance what one's position would be in that society. You then conclude from this that such a society "promotes the basic principle of equality." Even if I accept your premise, I do not see how this conclusion follows. It only follows if you make a large, unstated, and probably false assumption that people have no control over their own destinies and that they are incapable of creating anything of value. If I do not make this assumption, then the society I would most like to see would be based on the principle that I get to keep what I create. As far as I can tell, this cannot coexist with the "basic principle of equality." Since you obviously think differently, could you please spell out your reasoning in more detail so I can try to follow it?
laura@utzoo.UUCP (Laura Creighton) (04/06/85)
Rawl's theory has been interpreted to mean several different things. On one extreme theyre have been arguments that this is the ciorrect formulation of why a laissez-faire capitalist anarchy would be just (I think Murray Rothbard did this, but I could be wrong) and on another extreme, John Jewkes has argued that this results in a justification for a welfare state. How can any book produce such a divergence of conclusisions? It depends on the people involved in the society. For instance, start a society with nothing but anarchist-libertarian types. Come back in a few years. Assume that nobody has abandoned their libertarian and anarchist positions in that time. Ask anyone, from the poorest to the wealthiest whether they would change places with anyone in that society -- and everyone will say yes! Everybody understands that the results of their efforts is a result of them applying their brains and labour to the problem of survival and engagin in free trade with their neighbours. Everybody realises that their neighborus are in the same position. There is no envy for the better off, since the poorer off have such a healthy dose of self-esteem that they are too busy feeling great about their own efforts... [Remember I said that nobody had abandoned their libertarian anarchist positions in that time...] In contrast to this, start a society with nothing but anarchist-libertarian types and 5 socialists. Make these socialists the sort who want *strict* equality of outcome. Now come back in a few years. The anarchist-libertarians will still be happy. The socialists won't. They will argue that the worse off in the libertarian society should be upset that the well off have so much, and that they would be unhappy with any society which does not guarantee equality of results. This illustrates the fundamental problem with Rawl's theory. I can come up with a theory of ``what I jolly well think that you, you and anybody else damn well better consider just'' quite easily. What I cannot do is make everybody feel that it is just. When slavery was legal in the southern United States people routinely argued that the Blacks were better off as slaves, living well in the US, than as ignorant barbarians living short, miserable lives in Africa. The people who argued that way were sincere. If they had been born Black, they really thought that they would prefer to be a slave in Virginia than a free man in the Congo. As long as people are capable of sincerely believing that injustices are just, Rawl's theory of justice will never work. It may be that *no* theory of justice can work under such conditions, however. Laura Creighton utzoo!laura
lucius@tardis.UUCP (Lucius Chiaraviglio) (04/08/85)
_ Laura Creighton writes: > everybody feel that it is just. When slavery was legal in the southern > United States people routinely argued that the Blacks were better off as > slaves, living well in the US, than as ignorant barbarians living short, > miserable lives in Africa. The people who argued that way were sincere. If > they had been born Black, they really thought that they would prefer to be > a slave in Virginia than a free man in the Congo. > (especially note last sentence) A great many people who were born black back then didn't feel that way. -- -- Lucius Chiaraviglio lucius@tardis.ARPA seismo!tardis!lucius