...| John Rawls | Justice and Equality | | [Type the author name] | 5/25/2012 | Ethics and the Legal Environment LS 312 Kaplan University | John Rawls was born in 1921 in Baltimore, Maryland. His father was a well known attorney, and his mother was a chapter president of the League of Women Voters. His parents, through occupation and affiliation were questioners of society as and its’ injustices. This I would think was a contributing factor in John Rawls philosophy of justice as fairness. His time in World War II challenged his faith as he learned of the holocaust and senseless killings upon innocent people in combat. Then the Vietnam War caused Rawls, like many other Americans, to begin to challenge the political system and how conscientious resistance from citizens could affect policies. (Wenar, 2008) Rawls attended Princeton University John Rawls is claimed to be the most important political philosopher of this century. His articles of the 60s and his first book, Theory of Justice written in 1971, was about collective coercive power and its’ use in demanding justice and fairness in a societies as addressed in his dissertation in 1951, “Outline of a Decision Procedure for Ethics”. (Richardson, 2005) Rawls also studied at Oxford University. His first appointments were at Cornell University and MIT and joined the Harvard University faculty in 1962 where he remained for his career of thirty years. (Wenar, 2008)John Rawls had a philosophy of social...
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...Written Assignment 1. Shaw and Barry distinguish two different forms of utilitarianism. What are these two forms? Briefly describe each and use examples. Shaw and Barry distinguish these two forms, act utilitarianisms and rule utilitarianism. Act Utilitarian is a form “to have a rights, then, is... to have something which society ought to defend me in the possession of” (P. 109), they believe the action that can bring happiness for most of the people. For example, banning on drug can bring happiness among large number of people. Banning on drug has more positive points than negative so when the action holds the maximum of happiness is a form of act utilitarianism. Rule Utilitarian, is “identifies as rights are certain moral rules, the observance of which is of the utmost importance for the long run, overall maximization of happiness” (P.110). This rule based on morally not to hurt mankind, do not interfere with each other’s freedom and promote well being in the society. 2. What do economists mean by the "declining marginal utility of money"? Utilitarian tend to favor greater inequality of income goes back to what economist would call the declining marginal utility of money. (P. 112) It mean that utilitarian want more worker participation and more equal distribution. For example utilitarian will vote to democratic. Because they want to promote social well being for more people. They want to see equality in society. 3. Robert Nozick presents his entitlement theory as...
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...many different connotations depending on whom is asked. As a kid growing up in the working middle class I learned that “fairness” is earning something that you worked for, not having something handed to you. Society is founded on the wants and needs of the people, but mostly the wants. The society in this hypothetical world that author John Rawls imagines can easily be defined as a communist and utilitarian society. In the Theory of Justice, John Rawls theoretically explains a society that would be ideal for the majority of the population. According to him, the theory of justice will only be adapted by society if it “guarantees the right of each person to have the most extensive basic liberty compatible with the liberty...
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...Justice as Fairness Harvard philosopher John Rawls (1921-2002) developed a conception of justice as fairness in his now classic work A Theory of Justice. Using elements of both Kantian and utilitarian philosophy, he has described a method for the moral evaluation of social and political institutions. Thesis: While John Rawls theory of Justice as Fairness argues that all social values are to be distributed equally unless an unequal distribution of these values is to everyone’s advantage, his argument is flawed by his reliance on the veil of ignorance and his two principles of justice that are difficult to apply in society. Imagine that you have set for yourself the task of developing a totally new social contract for today's society. How could you do so fairly? Although you could never actually eliminate all of your personal biases and prejudices, could you take steps at least to minimize them? In his book, A Theory of Justice, Rawls attempts to argue a position to do this very thing. He asks us to imagine a fantastic scene: a group of people are gathered to plan their own future society, hammering out the details of what will basically become a Social Contract. Rawls calls this the “Original Position.” In the Original Position, the future citizens do not yet know what part they will play in their upcoming society. They must design their society behind what Rawls calls the Veil of Ignorance. Rawls says in his book titled the A Theory of Justice, “No one knows...
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...Natural Law Theory & Aristotle’s Virtue Ethics, & Recent Theories of Rights: Rawls & Nozick. Natural Law Theory: Natural Law theory in ethics is not to be confused with the laws of nature as put forward by physicists or other natural scientists, but they are related and do overlap. In moral domains, we are not concerned to give a mathematical, experimentally based theory of ethics or justice, but we are concerned with the general order of nature and how human life is nestled in and depends on that order. For example, life (& its preservation) depends on observing the necessities and limitations of nature, how we are dependent on food, shelter, parents and a community and the satisfying of other natural needs for life to exist, continue and prosper. The most prominent philosophers & political thinkers in this line of thought include the following: ancient - Plato, Aristotle, & later Cicero & other Roman statesmen; medieval - St. Augustine, St. Thomas Aquinas & other thinkers in the Judeo-Christian tradition; modern - John Locke, & of course Thomas Jefferson & the “founding fathers” of the American republic. According to almost all of these authors, the natural order ultimately depends upon a first ordering principle that established the relation between man and nature. That first principle is commonly referred to as God or Creator, as indicated, for example, in the opening of Jefferson’s Declaration of Independence. One line of reasoning introduced by Plato is based...
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...philosophy which considers extending the traditional boundaries of ethics from only including hum and to non-humans. There are many ethical decisions that human beings make with respect to the environment. Humans are been considered of rational agents because they have clear preference, models uncertainty via expected values, and always to perform the action with the optimal expected outcome of itself. The action of the rational agent performs depends on the preference, the agents information of its environment, the actions, duties and obligation available and the estimated or actual benefits and the chances of success of the action. I will be arguing that rational agents have a moral obligation towards the environment. Using Peter Singer and John Rawls to argue for and Immanuel Kant to counter argue my arguments. Singer (2011) states rational agents should explore the values of preserving the wild nature; he believes that sentient beings who are capable of experiencing pain including non-humans affected by an action should be taken equally into consideration in assessing the action. Singer regards the animal liberation movement as comparable to the liberation movements of women and people of different colour skin (Singer, 2011). Unlike the environment philosophers who attribute intrinsic value to the natural environment and its inhabitants, Singer and utilitarians in general attribute intrinsic value to the experience of pleasure or interest satisfaction as such, not to the beings...
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...Natural Law Theory & Aristotle’s Virtue Ethics, & Recent Theories of Rights: Rawls & Nozick. Natural Law Theory: Natural Law theory in ethics is not to be confused with the laws of nature as put forward by physicists or other natural scientists, but they are related and do overlap. In moral domains, we are not concerned to give a mathematical, experimentally based theory of ethics or justice, but we are concerned with the general order of nature and how human life is nestled in and depends on that order. For example, life (& its preservation) depends on observing the necessities and limitations of nature, how we are dependent on food, shelter, parents and a community and the satisfying of other natural needs for life to exist, continue and prosper. The most prominent philosophers & political thinkers in this line of thought include the following: ancient - Plato, Aristotle, & later Cicero & other Roman statesmen; medieval - St. Augustine, St. Thomas Aquinas & other thinkers in the Judeo-Christian tradition; modern - John Locke, & of course Thomas Jefferson & the “founding fathers” of the American republic. According to almost all of these authors, the natural order ultimately depends upon a first ordering principle that established the relation between man and nature. That first principle is commonly referred to as God or Creator, as indicated, for example, in the opening of Jefferson’s Declaration of Independence. One line of reasoning introduced by Plato is based...
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...Rawls’ Veil of Ignorance Rawls assumes that behind the veil of ignorance one would select the best decision that adheres to the two principals of justice. However, the lack of knowledge provided behind the veil of ignorance seems to do more harm than good to the decision maker. For example, if one behind the veil were to choose their economic system for their society; they might have a hard time selecting between a free market or socialized economy based off of simple facts. Though both have been practiced in reality it is not entirely possible to truly understand which competing scenario works the best for all participants given the amount of sample time and other factors that have influenced economics for the past 100 years. Therefore, from a rawlsian perspective one would not know which system provides the better benefits least advantaged. Behind the veil of ignorance one would only know the general facts about the world that they are entering, and even the restriction on the lack of knowledge of one’s personal place with in the system would not do much to solve the problem without more concise data, which is prohibited behind the veil. The lack of specific data handicaps the decision maker behind the veil of ignorance, potentially leading them to selecting the least right decision for their society. Even with reflective equilibrium this would allow decision makers unknowingly break the second principal of justice, thus unraveling his argument, as to truly understand the...
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...Justice is another important ethical standard. Justice involves protecting individual rights, or preventing an injustice to an individual. Justice also requires us to compare cases to avoid discriminating or treating people differently who are alike in relevant respects. Succinctly, it means treating people fairly. Issues involving questions of justice and fairness are usually divided into three categories, that of distributive justice, retributive justice and compensatory justice. Distributive justice, a theory based on writings of John Rawls, perhaps the most basic category, is concerned with the fair distribution of society’s benefits and burdens. Rawls felt that everything must be done in an act of achieving fairness throughout. He also did not want anything to be done that may hurt or damage another person. For example, Rawls felt that throughout a society, every demographic should be allowed the same treatment and goods as any other. The poor should receive the same health care as the rich, etc. (Lamont, 2002). Questions of distributive justice arise when different people put forth conflicting claims on society’s benefits and burdens and all the claims cannot be satisfied. The essential cases are those where there is a insufficiency of benefits such as jobs, food, housing, medical care, wealth and income as compared with the numbers and desires of the people who want these goods. The other side of the coin is that there may be too many burdens, that of unpleasant...
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...community and the organization. This paper will briefly compare and contrast the various theories of economic Justice of Fairness, Distributive Justice, Utilitarianism, Capitalism and Morality, and Socialism; and reveal the one theory I believe to be the most practical; and the best theory of economic justice as it applies to the “fairness in hiring and promotions, and employees’ rights and duties.” Justice of Fairness includes components of the Principle of Liberty that every one deserve the right to basic liberties; and the Principle of Equality falls in line with the distributive justice for social and economic liberties to be arranged so that they are the greatest benefit of the least advantaged and fair equality of opportunity. Rawls’ point of view on the Justice as Fairness is to be fair and impartial in making decisions about fundamental principles of justice. In order to adopt this point of view is to insure impartiality of judgment, remove any knowledge of personal general...
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...United States, an astonishing 80% of the poll agreed that the legalization of marijuana should be put into effect (St. Pierre 1). One philosopher who would probably side with this 80% is John Rawls, the creator of the “Theory of Justice”. In his theory, Rawls states that we, as a society, should treat things with a veil of ignorance. This meaning to work out the basic principles in a society, one should pretend that they know nothing about our social classes, laws, or anything else (Rawls 12). The specs on marijuana would suggest it is harmless, but it is natural that for every argument against the legalization of marijuana, there is an argument for it. Face it; marijuana’s prohibition in the United States has not stopped its production, possession, or recreational use. This fact leaves many scratching their heads as to why the substance has not yet been legalized. John Rawls, a great American philosopher, would have, most likely, been against the idea of marijuana being illegal. In his main work, the “Theory of Justice”, Rawls pushes hard for a just government and a just society. He argues that not knowing the position of our society on certain issues, along with some pretend ignorance, would lead us to make better decisions (Rawls 13). Along with the “Theory of Justice”, Rawls also created...
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...Social justice: a key for Utopian society. An Utopian society is a concept that was developed by Thomas moore in 1516; which stands for the fact of having a perfect and ideal society where there is no terrorism, corruption, or crime and in which it exists an economic, social and political justice that makes all the population equal in rights and wealth distribution. To start, an utopian society cannot be achieved easily. The state should go through many political, social, and economical reforms and sacrifices. In this paper; I will be dealing with one specific topic; which is the social justice and how it can help forming a democratic society where equality and solidarity principles exist. In addition; I will focus on some principles such as human rights and property distribution within the society. To develop this term “social justice”; we should first try to define it. Social justice means creating a society with principles that consist of solidarity; human rights respect, and providing an acceptable social life conditions. It means also the freedom of access to all goods and services provided by the government. First of all; social justice derives from different religious roots and perspectives, Judaism agrees about its importance in people’s lives and its positive impact on their religious beliefs and practices. Moreover; Christianity focuses on people’s dignity as an essential tool of justice, also Christianity insists on helping poor people because they suffer more to...
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...to rectify the wrongdoing.1 Both federal and state statutes and regulations have been created to protect these individuals from various forms of retaliation. Even without a statute, numerous decisions encourage and protect whistleblowing on grounds of public policy. While many of us can see the criminal and political ramifications of whistleblowing there is still one area that can often be seen as a more personal one…that of the ethical debate. As stated in Lars Lindblom’s article Dissolving the Moral Dilemma of Whistleblowing, “The ethical debate on whistleblowing concerns centrally the conflict between the right to political free speech and the duty of loyalty to the organization where one works.”2 The political philosophy of John Rawls that can be applied to this dilemma, show that the requirement of loyalty, in the sense that is needed to create the moral dilemma of whistleblowing, is inconsistent with that theory. In this sense, there is no moral dilemma of whistleblowing. This position has been labeled extreme in that it says that whistleblowing is always morally permitted. In a discussion and rejection of Richard De Georges’ criteria on permissible whistleblowing, it is pointed out that the mere rejection of loyalty will not lead to an extreme position and harms can still be taken into account....
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...A Theory of Justice, by John Rawls Tier III 415A Home Page A Theory of Justice, by John Rawls, The Belknap Press of Harvard University Press, 1971. This outline of an extended book review is based in large part on notes composed by Darrell Huwe. I have attempted with limited success to understand Rawls' book - please do not regard this as being in any sense an authoritative summary of Rawls' thought. I personally find this book particularly difficult to penetrate, perhaps because my training is in the physical sciences rather than philosophy, and I generalize quite beyond the evidence when I suspect that others also find it less than accessible. I hope that this review is helpful. The Chronicle of Higher Education has published an article, "The Enduring Significance of John Rawls", by Martha Nussbaum. John Rawls died at age 81 on November 24, 2002. Dick Piccard General Conception All social primary goods - liberty and opportunity, income and wealth, and the bases of self-respect are to be distributed equally unless an unequal distribution of any or all of these goods is to the advantage of the least favored. Social Contract John Locke: Free people need to agree on some ground rules in order to live together in harmony. Utilitarianism John Stuart Mill and Jeremy Bentham: Act so as to maximize good (pleasure) in the aggregate. Later twist: minimize pain. From either perspective, your actions are judged good or bad depending on the consequences they have for you and...
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