Social justice. Environmental justice. Distributive justice. Procedural justice. The list goes on. Justice is a term that we hear often, but that many of us probably don't often enough take the time to ponder. What exactly is justice and, more importantly, what does it mean in practical terms for each of us as people and as citizens?
When you hear the term "social justice," undoubtedly your mind goes to social issues. For instance, the Black Lives Matter movement or ensuring equality of opportunity and equal treatment in the workplace. The term "environmental justice" likely conjures up notions of protecting the environment from human degradation, but also of recognizing that the route of a highway corridor through a city, inconsistent zoning laws, and unequal access to outdoor spaces can represent matters of justice. "Distributive justice" refers to the distribution of resources, which in modern times typically concerns issues such as determining what amounts to fair taxation, to what purpose tax money should be allocated, and how to treat corporations relative to the individual. The term "procedural justice" refers to equal treatment under our officially codified operating procedures, including in legal matters, but also in the perceived fairness of the system as a whole.
This is hardly an exhaustive list of the applications of justice, but it at least provides a starting point for our examination. Matters of justice are difficult to adjudicate because the persons or entities involved rarely share the same perspective. For example, should there be hard and fast rules, such as the justice of the many taking precedence over the justice of the individual? Or should we evaluate scenarios on a case by case basis? This approach may seem ideal, but in a society of many millions of individuals all with distinct interests, it is certainly impractical. Likely, as with so many things in life, the answer lies somewhere in between.
To seek out that (admittedly incomplete and elusive) answer, we will examine three common schools of thought which have developed to provide guidance in determining what constitutes justice. For a more thorough and in-depth treatment of this topic, I recommend checking out Justice: What's the Right Thing to Do? by Michael Sandel. Ideas from Mr. Sandel's book will act as our guide.
- Utilitarian Justice
We begin with the notion of utility, first popularized by Jeremy Bentham and John Stuart Mill. Utility maintains that humans, and human societies, should approach justice in a calculating manner. Whatever decision or action results in the greatest good (or least harm) for the greatest number of people should be the logical choice. At the individual level, we are no longer concerned with the greatest number of people, but rather with the greatest amount of pleasure derived from a decision or activity.
This approach is generally straightforward, provided one knows what one wants, or whether the greatest amount of good for society can be reasonably estimated. These assumptions are rarely the case, however, and the result is conundrums that the concept of utility is ill-prepared to deal with. For instance, the utilitarian notion of choosing that which will result in the greatest pleasure for ourselves does not distinguish between levels of choices or activities, which is to say, the virtue of the thing in question. Furthermore, utilitarianism concerns itself with deserts rather than the experience. If two people do the same job and make the same money, proponents of utilitarianism are satisfied. Never mind that the second person is miserable doing the job while the first loves it. And never mind whether one of them is more satisfied by their income than the other.
It is my sense that utilitarianism seeks to remove morality from the question and distill decision making at the individual and societal levels to an equation of that which results in the greatest pleasure or good. Mind you, that's good with a lowercase "g" and not capital "G" Good. It is good in that it provides pleasure or does not harm, but it is not necessarily (though is not exclusive from) Good that promotes virtue or values.
- Freedom of Choice
A second notion of justice is that of freedom of choice, which has gained adherents in the modern political sphere. In his book, Sandel uses as an example of freedom of choice the modern arguments put forth by (often political) proponents of marriage equality (abortion is another such example provided). In essence, justice in this case is represented by the freedom of the individuals to marry whom they choose, and neither society nor individuals should be allowed to interfere.
Sandel notes that this approach, like that of utilitarianism, sometimes results in the removal of the morality of the question and simply makes it a matter of personal liberty. It is appealing because it allows for a certain detachment: society does not have to grapple with matters of collectively-defined virtue, we simply make our own choices freely insofar as they do not encroach on the rights of others. Leave well enough alone, as it were.
Often times, however, this approach fails precisely because it does not engage individuals on an emotional level. It is my sense that we do not want a society where people merely tolerate the choices of others, while maintaining a bitter resentment regarding said choices. Instead, it seems worth striving for a society in which people can understand and respect one another's choices alongside the act of tolerance.
- Purpose
The third notion of justice that we will examine here is that of purpose, which is to say, the idea of promoting virtue while reasoning about the common good. This injects notions of morality and emotion back into the question. It is necessarily messier than the prior two ideas, but the result is also more satisfying.
At the heart of this notion of justice is Aristotle's idea of telos, or the purpose of a thing, individual, society, or instrument. For instance, according to the idea of telos, the best violins in the world should go to the best violin players, rather than to the nobility, those who can afford the highest price, those who know the right people, etc. In order for the violin to fulfill its purpose, it must be played by the best violinists.
Telos forces us to grapple with what it is that we want justice to represent and promote. Under this ideology, justice is not merely an abstract or indifferent concept. Justice becomes a system of behavior and results whereby we promote behaviors in individuals and societies that we collectively desire. This borders on the notion of justice as fairness expounded by John Rawls, which posits that society should be fair and the individual free, thus "resolving the tensions between the ideas of freedom and equality." In this sense, we must provide justification for our notions of justice, which forces us to think long and hard about why one choice outweighs another.
In
Justice: What's the Right Thing to Do?, Sandel presents the third notion of justice as his preferred method, and I must agree. To remove notions of fairness, however difficult to define for a given case, is to distill out the human element of justice. Justice cannot be an equation, as with utilitarianism, nor can it be wholly impartial and indifferent, as with freedom of choice. In order to promote virtue in individuals and society, we must grapple with difficult questions of fairness, what it is that makes for a just society, and what it is to live a
good life.
