Ethics of Justice
ETHICS Of JUSTICE
Ethics of justice, also known as morality of justice, is the term used by Carol Gilligan in In a Different Voice to describe the ethics and moral reasoning common to men and preferred[clarification needed] by Kohlberg's stages of moral development. The ethics of justice deals with moral choices through a measure of rights of the people involved and chooses the solution that seems to damage the least number of people. Rooted in a respect for the legal system[citation needed], it applies in the Western democracy ideas like social contract theory to everyday moral decisions.
Three Theories of Justice
I will discuss three theories of justice: Mill’s Utilitarianism, Rawls’s Justice as Fairness, and Nozick’s libertarianism. Much of my understanding of theories of justice comes from Business Ethics (Third Edition) by Willian H. Shaw. I will expand my discussion of justice by considering objections to each of these theories, but I do not necessarily endorse any of the objections and there could be good counterarguments against them.
What is justice?
Justice can be used to mean any number of things, like the importance of having rights, fairness, and equality (87-88). People will think it’s unjust to have their rights violated (like being thrown in prison without being found guilty in a court of law); or being unfairly harmed by someone unwilling to pay compensation for the harm done; or being unfairly treated as an inferior (unequal) who isn’t hired for a job despite being the most qualified person for the job. Theories of justice are not necessarily “moral” theories because “justice” is a bit more specific and could even be separate from morality entirely.
What rights will likely lead to greater happiness? – One proposed list of rights that seem like they could be justified through Mill’s utilitarianism are those listed in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. Let’s consider three of those rights:
1. Right to property –
“No one shall be arbitrarily deprived of his property” (Article 17). People ought to have a right to property for at least four reasons. One, because we have various needs and property is very helpful to fulfill those needs. We need food and shelter, and we can become ill or die when people take our food and shelter from us. Two, we make plans throughout the day concerning our future (e.g. retirement) and property rights are needed to have the stability required for these plans. Three, it often makes people upset when they are robbed, even when only luxuries are stolen. Four, the right to make a profit from one’s labor can be an incentive to work hard and be productive, which can help create greater prosperity for society at large.
2. Right to social welfare –
“Everyone has the right to a standard of living adequate for the health and well-being of himself and of his family, including food, clothing, housing and medical care and necessary social services, and the right to security in the event of unemployment, sickness, disability, widowhood, old age or other lack of livelihood in circumstances beyond his control” (Article 25). The right to the necessities of life requires the redistribution of wealth, but it can help many people who need help the most and thus increases happiness (the grater good) despite the fact that it can harm certain people. The greater happiness given to the poor can justify sacrificing some welfare of everyone else. As I said before, utilitarianism can justify greater income equality, and redistributing wealth can lead to greater income equality.
When are rights violated? –
Consider the following six situations and whether or not any rights are being violated:
1. A corporation sells TV sets that don’t work and scams people out of their money because people assume that the TV sets work when they buy them. Is this a violation of anyone’s rights? Mill can argue, yes, because a person’s property rights entail that property is transferred given an agreement and no one agreed to buy a broken TV set. Buying a TV set implies that it works unless it’s explicitly made clear that the TV set is broken.
2. Samantha was born in a poor family and she could never afford an education. She couldn’t afford food and couldn’t find a job, so she starves to death. Meanwhile there is an abundance of food and wealth that is almost exclusively owned by the wealthiest members of society. Was any right being violated? Mill could argue, yes, because (a) she should have been given a free education and (b) she has a right to social welfare and redistributing wealth could have helped her survive. People have duties to help one another and they can’t just let others die of starvation.
3. The government taxes all profits 10% to help poor families buy the necessities of life. Anyone who doesn’t pay their taxes can be punished. Was any right being violated? It seems obvious that the right to property was violated in this case, but Mill could argue that such a violation is necessary for ethical reasons—either because of conflicting rights or other moral considerations to the “greater good.” It is possible that a utilitarian could argue that taxing profits by 10% isn’t enough, or there’s some better way to redistribute wealth, but we will leave that concern aside for now.
Objections
1. It’s too simple –
Many philosophers who reject utilitarianism are “deontologists” who generally agree that utilitarianism has much to say about morality that’s relevant, but utilitarianism is too simple and ignores some moral principles. It’s possible that consequences (promoting goodness) is not the only thing of moral relevance.
2. Utilitarianism fails to account for the need to be respectful –
It’s not clear that utilitarians can fully account for why we need to respect people. There are some “counterexamples” philosophers often give against utilitarianism, and they often argue that it might (sometimes) be wrong to hurt someone even if it promotes the greater good. For example, we wouldn’t think it’s right to kill someone and donate their organs to those who need them to survive, even if the person’s death lead to a “greater good.” Someone could argue that utilitarian governments would take away people’s rights whenever they decide that it will serve the “greater good” to do so; but such a dispensable view of rights could miss the point of having rights in the first place.
3. It ignores personal relationships –
Some philosophers argue that personal relationships provide us with unique obligations that utilitarianism can’t account for. For example, parents have a duty to protect and feed their children; but they don’t have the same duty to all children that exist. They shouldn’t spend just as much time protecting and feeding the children of strangers as they spend to feed and protect their own children.
4. It’s too demanding –
Some philosophers argue that utilitarianism implies that we have a duty to promote goodness as much as possible, but that’s too hard. Mill’s utilitarianism in particular says it’s wrong to do something that maximizes happiness less than an alternative course of action. It might be that you could be doing something better to promote goodness every second of your life. Maybe you could be curing cancer right now instead of reading this. There might be no limit to how much good we can do, and we would then be forever condemned for failing to live up to the unlimited demands of utilitarianism. This not only requires us to stop enjoying ourselves when we could be doing something better, but it implies that no actions are “above the call of duty” despite the fact that it seems intuitive that there are.
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