...Acknowledgement With the genuine gratitude I wish to thank every person who has come into my life and inspired, touched and illumined me through their presence. I thank almighty God for giving me all the blessings for my life, all for His kind presence in all my activities. I would like to thank Rev. Dr. Johnson Neelanirappel for his valuable guidance and for generously sharing his time, knowledge, love and energy to guide me in the right path for the completion of this thesis. I would also like to acknowledge and express my gratitude to the following people for their glorious support and contributions to my journey and the completion of this thesis. I pay homage to the librarian of Santhom library Rev. Dr. Sebastian Chalackal and all other librarians for helping me in the collection of data for the completion of this work. Fro generously sharing their wisdom, love and time I pay gratitude to my entire batch mates of Dazzlers. Conveying my sincere thanks to all the members of Sevana social group I wind up. general introduction Human is a rational and social being. Society is an unavoidable factor for human being. There are a lot of things to keep as a social being to human. To maintain a good relationship with others, there are certain written and unwritten rules. The person who keeps this rules called ‘just man’. There are different faces to the concept ‘justice’. A brief study about the concept ‘justice’ is an important today...
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...opportunities to do as well as the upper classes. Sometimes it is due to their own decisions that they are in the position they are in but many times they are just recipients of bad luck. The next group of people are the people who are lazy and still think they deserve to have the same success as the next level of the monetary food chain. These individuals believe fairness is them being handed what others work very hard for. This is not that same idea of fairness that most of the rest of the country subscribes to . The third group is the individuals who thrives. These people are the upper-middle class and upper class who worked hard to get educations and/or build up their skills in a particular field which allows them to thrive (Lawhead 588) Does Rawls have a point? Yes. It becomes apparent that those who work hard and have success should not be held back by those who do not have the same success. If everyone receives the same “equal” share the more successful people would have no reason to work hard and truly be successful because they will always have the same as everyone else. At the same time it cannot be forgotten that there is a group of hard workers that are still unable to truly be successful and society cannot allow these people to fall too far behind (Lawhead...
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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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...and reality often clash when applied to everyday. In the most optimal society justice is served by punishing criminals so that law abiding citizens can live their lives in peace. The reality is that criminals receive punishments that are less than justice demands and the non-criminals are cheated. This short paper examines justice theories, the utilitarian view, modern justice view and the security based justice. It is important to consider individual justice, mob justice and societal justice as separate institutions. To better understand these institutions the next section explains justice theories. Justice Theories In this section two types of justice will be discussed: Rawl's Theory of Justice as Fairness and Libertarianism. Rawls focused on a hypothetical model in order to describe his form of justice. In this hypothetical model individuals are required to choose fundamental principles of basic institutions of a given society (Ilstu). The result choices made by the members of this society will be both fair and just. The two principles are as follows: Equal Liberty and Difference. "The Equal Liberty Principle states each person is to have the maximum civil liberties compatible with the same liberty for all (Ilstu)". These would be the principles of the United States Constitution; all American citizens are privileged to receive full civil liberties based on the laws of the land. "The Difference Principle states inequalities are permissible only if (a) they can...
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...According to Phelps (1987), Distributive justice concerns the nature of a socially just distribution of goods in a society. A society where related inequalities in outcome do not surface would be considered a society guided by the principles of distributive justice. The concept includes the available quantities of goods, the process by which goods are to be distributed, and the resulting distribution of the goods to the members of the society. Distributive justice concentrates on outcomes. (Phelps, 1987) Distribution in economics refers to the way total output, income, or wealth is distributed among individuals or among the factors of production. Factors included in this are labor, land, and capital (Atkins, Bourguignin, ed., 2000). In general theory and the national income and product accounts, each unit of output corresponds to a unit of income. One use of national accounts is for classifying factor incomes and measuring their individual shares, as in National Income (Atkins, Bourguignin, ed., 2000). But, where focus is on income of persons or households, adjustments to the national accounts or other data sources are frequently used. Here, interest is often on the fraction of income on the factors that might affect them such as, globalization, tax policy, technology, etc.. (Atkins, Bourguignin, ed., 2000) Governments continuously make and change laws affecting the distribution of economic benefits and goods in their societies. Almost all changes, from the standard tax...
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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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...Journal of Business Ethics (2009) 85:147–156 DOI 10.1007/s10551-008-9934-6 Ó Springer 2008 What’s Wrong with Executive Compensation? Jared D. Harris ABSTRACT. I broadly explore the question by examining several common criticisms of CEO pay through both philosophical and empirical lenses. While some criticisms appear to be unfounded, the analysis shows not only that current compensation practices are problematic both from the standpoint of distributive justice and fairness, but also that incentive pay ultimately exacerbates the very agency problem it is purported to solve. KEY WORDS: executive compensation, distributive justice, pay disparity, incentive alignment Introduction Few academic theories have been adopted as widely as the application of agency theory (Jensen and Meckling, 1976) to the structure of executive pay in modern corporations. After prominent suggestions that the inherent conflict of interest that exists between stockholders and corporate managers – or ‘agency problem’ – could be mitigated through the structure of managerial incentives (e.g., Jensen and Murphy, 1990a), the prevalence and size of stock option grants to senior executives have expanded increasingly and substantially (Hall and Murphy, Jared D. Harris, Assistant Professor teaches both Ethics and Strategy courses in Darden’s MBA program, and a doctoral seminar on corporate governance and ethics. His research centers on the interplay between ethics and strategy, with a particular focus...
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...Shaw and Barry distinguish two forms of utilitarianism. What are these two forms? Briefly describe each. Utilitarianism is the idea that we should always act to produce the greatest possible balance of good over bad for everyone affected by our actions. Jeremy Bentham and John Stuart Mill, both philosophers, used the utilitarian standard to evaluate and criticize the social and political institutions of their day. And, as a result, utilitarianism has long been associated with social improvement. The two forms of utilitarianism are act utilitarianism and rule utilitarianism. Act utilitarianism, utilitarianism in its most basic version, states that we must calculate what the consequences are of a particular act in a particular situation, and what it will be for all those affected. And, if its consequences bring more total good than those of any alternative course of action, then this action is the right one and the one we should inform. Rule utilitarianism maintains that the utilitarian standard should be applied not to individual actions but to moral codes as a whole. The rule utilitarian asks what moral code, or set of morals, a society should adopt to maximize happiness. The principles that make up that code would then be the basis for distinguishing right actions from wrong actions. Same as any other theory, these theories can be thought to contain flaws- i.e. not being able to predict the future and this uncertainty can lead to unexpected results making the utilitarian...
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...In his book Economic Justice, Stephen Nathanson lists the first criterion necessary for a just economic system as the need for the well-being of all individuals to be maximized (18). According to Nathanson, the only way that this can be achieved is to have an economic system that is capable of fostering a market with topnotch production output. Producers and consumers only sell and buy for their own benefit and the “invisible hand” applies to the entire economy. If this quality is satisfied, then the market as a whole is improved by the participation of individuals for personal reasons, leading to the highest possible outcome of well-being within the community (19-20). According to Robert Nozick’s philosophy, this would not be an accurate way to decide on the justness of an economic system. He completely disregards the topic of well-being and does not see it applicable to the evaluation of such systems. He views that the only way to attain justice is through ‘voluntary exchanges’ that accompany the individual’s right to free will (Nathanson, 24). This is due to his historical, or procedural, theory of justice. Rather than judging whether an economic system is just by the end result – such as the well-being of citizens – he judges by the process of how individuals come to obtain their belongings (Nathanson, Blackboard). His two theories of ‘entitlement’ and ‘self-ownership’ support this claim, and they will be explained later in this paper. I disagree with this claim of maximum...
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...of fair equality of opportunity; and second, they are to be to the greatest expected benefit of the least advantaged members of society. I believe the idea is that social and economic inequalities are not wrong, or bad, in themselves. They only become indefensible when they don't operate to improve the position of the worst off. The capital should be used for purposes, which benefit the domestic market and does not in any way hamper the domestic necessity. Once capital is exported then the entire purpose of being available domestically is lost. Rawls theory states that what causes the least harm to the greatest population and the least harm to the least population should be implemented. This Theory states that exporting the goods abroad is gonna harm a great number and should not be implemented. The least harm is caused when capital goods for production is used domestically. This theory is also called the theory of justice where Rawls attempts to solve the problem of distributive justice by utilizing a variant of the familiar device of the...
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...BUS 309 WK 4 Quiz 3 Chapter 3 - All Possible Questions To Purchase Click Link Below: http://strtutorials.com/BUS-309-WK-4-Quiz-3-Chapter-3-All-Possible-Questions-BUS3094.htm BUS 309 WK 4 Quiz 3 Chapter 3 - All Possible Questions 1. Who is known for first holding that we should treat like cases alike? 1. Plato 2. Epicurus 3. Cicero 4. Aristotle 1. The topic of the proper distribution of burdens and benefits is known as 1. Distributive justice 2. Retributive justice 3. Economic welfare 4. Laissez-faire economics 1. Who made the violation of one’s moral rights the defining characteristic of injustice? 1. John Stuart Mill 2. Adam Smith 3. Karl Marx 4. Robert Nozick 1. Rawls’s theory of justice is 1. A libertarian theory 2. An egalitarian theory 3. A utilitarian theory 4. A retributivist theory 1. Justice for Mill was ultimately a matter of 1. Luck 2. Promoting social well-being 3. Property rights 4. Enforced equality 1. Brandt defends the equality of after-tax income on 1. Libertarian grounds 2. Deontological grounds 3. Utilitarian grounds 4. Egalitarian grounds 1. Libertarians assume that liberty means 1. Freedom 2. Noninterference 3. Equality 4. Liberation 1. Nozick begins with the premise that people have 1. Certain basic moral rights 2. Equality of income 3. Equality of opportunity 4. Certain basic positive rights 1. Nozick refers to the firm restrictions that rights impose as 1. Side constraints 2....
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...The main argument of this article comprises theories and social concepts of justice and defines implicit human obligations. Normative beliefs are sculpted by the idea of prerogative rights, which overlook the human responsibility to the well-being of all people in society. Simone Weil infers that the use of human rights objectifies what is given and allocated to an individual instead of reifying human accountability and impartiality to one another. Human rights that are specified to the individuals based on status in a community sets a negative framework of selfishness and unjust behavior that ultimately involves the absence of pure justice. According to Simone Weil, justice should be united with responsibility and obligation, which can be achieved by incorporating divine love and the justice of God into society. The perfection of justice is divine love, but for this divine love to radiate through all of humanity there is an unwritten order of attention, affliction, conviction and consent to the absence of God. Human rights equate to the extent of possession and value, which diminishes the meaning of justice. Justice shall be equated as a spiritual virtue that is based on compassion and love which in return illuminate’s human obligation. Simone notions that the human obligation is unconditional, it is a presumed responsibility to love thy neighbor and to endure the anguish of discomfort for the comfort of others. In other words, the main objective is to equalize the well-being...
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...1. Shaw and Barry distinguish two different forms of utilitarianism. What are these two forms? Briefly describe each and use examples. The two forms of utilitarianism that Shaw and Barry refer to are act utilitarianism and rule utilitarianism. The act utilitarianism states that we must ask ourselves what the consequences of a particular act in a particular situation will be for all those affected. If its consequences bring more net good than those of any alternative course of action, then this action is the right one and the one we should perform. Shaw and Barry talked about the theory of a woman on her death bed. She had $25,000 in cash under her bed and her dying wish was to give that to her nephew. Her nephew was a known drunk and would have squandered the money away. Another use for that money would be to give it to an orphanage where the money would have benefited the children for many years. If you use the act method, giving the money to the orphanage would have been the best thing to do because the most people would have benefited. But if you did this, would it be morally correct? This was not the dying woman’s wish. Rule utilitarianism maintains that the utilitarian standard should be applied not to individual actions but to moral codes as a whole. With the moral code, you would have to determine right from wrong. If you look at the sample given above about the dying woman’s wish to give her nephew the money, and you used the rule method, you would see that...
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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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...In Nozick’s first premise against distributive justices it says that the patterned principles of distributive justice takes away the wealth from the upper class who worked long and hard for their success. Nozick gives examples as to how this would be done, he concludes that through the process of distributive justice many people will benefit off the success of others. The next premise for this argument says that by acquiring wealth from someone else’s labor is equivalent to taking their time. This means that the principles of distributive justice, directs people to work harder so that others may benefit. This premise means that distributive justice takes more from those who have achieved success and redistributes their success to someone who didn’t earn it. Equally redistributing wealth applies that some people will be required to do more work so that others who barley pull their weight can have the same life style as those who put in more time at work. This claim means that some people will be required/directed to work more than he/she would want to because others needs have not been met. Nozick’s next premise says that if people are being forced to do certain and/or unwanted tasks for a period of time than others will decide what their purpose is and this takes away from their ability to make their own decisions. Making people do unwanted task takes away from someone’s ability to make their own decisions. This is one of Nozick’s main reasons as to why the patterned principles...
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