360 Degrees: Justice

After reading Sophie’s World and learning about numerous philosophies that influence the workings of society, I truly find it interesting to find current philosophers discuss and explain their ideas. John Rawls, a James Bryant Conant University Professor of Philosophy at Harvard University from 1962-2002, did just that in his unique claims concerning justice. His most famous work is probably A Theory of Justice (and mainly what this blog will talk about) from 1971. I’ve done a little bit of reading on some of his work, and I find it confusing yet interesting as I’ve tried to digest it.

In the U.S., “justice” is a term thrown around without much thought given to its actual meaning. Schoolchildren across America say the Pledge of Allegiance concluding with the phrase “with liberty and justice for all.” Justice is a concept that has been argued about by philosophers since the beginning of history. It’s often closely tied with the idea of fairness and has been connected with the idea of rationality. For example, the Supreme Court today is expected to rationally debate long and hard about the fairest course of action. The opposite of a just society is a tyrannical one. Justice and personal virtue (morality) are related, but unique ideas. I guess justice would be the morality that we agree upon as a society and make into laws.

Rawls has two main ideas that work hand in hand with each other: the original position and the veil of ignorance. Basically the “original position” is when representatives of people with limited information about the interests that they represent try to agree as to how society should be ordered. Rawls calls it the place in which everybody decides principles of justice from behind a “veil of ignorance.” All this is a hypothetical “thought experiment” designed to reflect what principles of justice would be present in a society based on free and fair cooperation between citizens.

The “veil of ignorance” that Rawls references on numerous accounts in his works basically blinds people to all facts about themselves that might cloud what notion of justice is developed. This means from behind this veil, that person does not know the background or situation of his “client”. He negotiates blind. Rawls provides an example and says it’s method of determining the morality of a certain issue based upon the following principle: imagine that societal roles were completely redistributed (yes, high class to poverty, working class to billionaires, poor to working class) and from behind this “veil” you do not know what role you’ll be assigned. Decisions made from behind this veil would be more equal than decisions about society made from a starting point where we know our positions and our self interest.

Putting aside the complex “thought experiments” and the vocabulary, if you think about the theory, it makes sense, right? Many “just” things we do are performed based on ignorance. We individually pick lottery numbers to see what order we get to choose items, or what groups are formed. Any decision that is made visually and allows us to logically and rationally calculate automatically is influence by a notion of bias and favoritism.

So Rawls tries to achieve justice or a just society using this method, but does this realistically work? How does either justice or Rawls’ method take into account the basic flaws within human nature? Even if people are behind this “veil of ignorance”, I don’ think fairness can be attained because people will still make calculations about ANY principle based upon how THEY end up under it. Even if the method and “place” have changed, the person making the decision has not.

Furthermore, Rawls considers justice as THE most important thing in society calling it the “first virtue. Should justice be considered before all things? What about survival? Like discussed before, what constitutes justice is open to interpretation. This means that the term is vague. Is justice fairness? Fair according to whom? There will never be a unanimous answer as to what justice is, so can it be achieved. Should something unexplainably come before solid, visible facts? Let’s say there’s a violent student attending an elementary school and one day he brings a gun to school. The administration expels him from the school and denies education to him anywhere within the district. What is more important- the injustice of the student not being able to receive an education like every other child in America or the safety of the other children? When the federal government is implementing a government-run health care program, what’s more important- the advantage of helping economic recovery or being just by giving everyone access to health care? Justice is about equality. However, what if fair or equal distribution is impossible?

I am curious about how groups like the Supreme Court or others in the judicial field would respond to philosophies concerning justice. I’d like to think that justice can always be attained, and personally I try to be fair in all my actions, but is this a realistic way to carry out one’s life? What I see most important from this is the fact that this is something that require ALL of society to contemplate. It’s open to many different views, and justice itself should be formed by society as a whole. Philosophy is also important. It’s the main reason why I would even choose to willingly explore something like this I normally wouldn’t. It’s important in thinking about today’s world from a new angle.