PHIL 355 Exam 2 - Rawls & Marx

What is Garrison’s critique of Nozick?

Standard critique of libertarianism: It puts too much emphasis on individual choice

Garrison’s critique: The problem is the libertarian conception of self-ownership – everyone owns themselves, but the way libertarians think of it is mistaken

Escape example – you land on a desert island and someone says they’ll help you survive only if you agree to be their slave for life

According to Nozick, this contract is acceptable, since there was no force or fraud. The state — even the Minimal State — is obligated to enforce this contract by apprehending you if you try to escape. This seems wrong.

Libertarians don’t count bad circumstances as force (people having to work hard or under desperation in capitalism, drugs).

Self ownership says it is wrong to kill harm or enslave people against their consent. Self ownership protects your will (ability to give or not give your consent) - not your life body or labor power. Libertarians believe in negative rights because they don’t want to interfere in anyone’s choices.

Consent itself is not always sufficient for justice. In order for consent to be just or real, it must take place under certain conditions. Rawls believes parties need to be rational and equally situated in terms of knowledge and bargaining position - there does not have to be altruism.

Asymmetrical value claim

Also part of critique for libertarianism. According to libertarianism, the capacity of choice is to be protected before all other values are to be realized. The problem is libertarianism privileges choice completely over all other kinds of value.

What is the Original Position?

Rawls method -The Original Position is a (hypothetical) situation in which rational individuals try to come to agreement about principles for justice for the society they will live in. We decide what the state will do before we’re in it.

People are agreeing on very broad things – the principles of justice themselves. Principles guide basic structure (major political and economic institutions)

In the Original Position people want the greatest share of primary goods: basic goods everyone rationally wants

Primary goods – rights, liberties, opportunities, wealth, and the social bases of self-respect (the way society treats its members as being worthy of respect) - primary goods are a thin theory of good which is less controversial than a thick theory of good.

People are selfish but want to maximize their own share of primary goods so a just society won’t be their main goal. People don’t bring a conception of justice into the Original Position — it comes out of the Original Position (justice as fairness)

Veil of Ignorance

A condition placed on the parties in the Original Position in which they know basic empirical facts (political science, economics, psychology, and sociology), but people don’t know aspects of their identity (class, race, gender), their psychology and particular beliefs, and their characteristics (healthy or talented)

Veil of Ignorance allows us to come to an agreement about principles of justice - What we agree on should be acceptable to everyone. Veil of Ignorance also blocks morally irrelevant features from biasing the contract - you won’t disadvantage members of some gender / race / class because you might turn out to be them, so this makes everyone equally situated

The principles of justice must emerge from a fair contract (justice as fairness)

Objections to Rawls’s Method

Objection 1: Hypothetical Contracts Aren’t Binding

Rawls: It’s not an actual contract but it models our actual values

People being born as rich is luck – morally irrelevant – this thought experiment shows us how to enact our values

Objection 2: It’s Hypothetical Because It’s Impossible

Rawls: We don’t have to actually forget our biases or identity – we just have to imagine what decisions we’d make if we did

Previous Theories of Justice and the Original Position

People in the Original Position will reject utilitarianism in case they are the minority (ie: Alex in the mob example) – the Original Position incorporates the separateness of persons

People in the Original Position will reject libertarianism in case they are a racial minority / unhealthy / poor (minimal state)

How the Original Position Will Select Principles

Everything socially valuable should be distributed equally unless an unequal distribution is to the benefit of all

Civil liberties — rights should be equal as unequal rights are not to the benefit of all

Economic opportunities should be equal

Economic resources can be unequal since that can benefit everyone

Lexical priority

First principle must be satisfied before the second principle and so on. Principles are ranked based on their importance.

Rights > more money

Rawls’s First Principle of Justice

The Equal Basic Liberties Principle — each person has a right to the most extensive basic liberties which are compatible with a similar liberty for others

Basic liberties - freedom of religion, liberty of conscience and freedom of thought, freedom of occupation and a right to personal property, safety, due process, political rights and liberties

Right to property is not unlimited, some must be taken for redistribution. People in the Original Position are open to redistribution since it may be necessary for them to secure primary goods if they are disadvantaged.

Principle guarantees liberties themselves but not their equal worth/fair value (guaranteeing the equal worth of religion would require state funding to build them)

Exception is political liberties – everyone should have equal ability to hold office and influence outcomes of political decisions because political liberties influence all other policies the state will enact

Lexically prior to economic issues - rights > extra money

Applications of First Principle

Campaign Finance

Rawls is very critical of loose campaign finance laws — the decisions give everyone the same liberty to contribute to political campaigns and influence the political process, but because people have different amounts of money with which to do so, these liberties don’t have the same worth to everyone

Racial Profiling

Racial profiling – use of race as a method for pre-emptive screening for future criminals; alternative is randomized screening

Some may see it as rational (more effective) if there is a statistical correlation between race and crimes committed to prevent more crimes from happening — however oppression and stereotypes might skew this data. The argument is not that some races have a inherent disposition to this. Racial profiling which would prevent more crime pre-emptively = rational profiling

In the First Principle & Original Position, there is a balance between not wanting to be a minority who is racially profiled and not wanting to be the victim of a crime. Hosein says the most important of the primary goods is the social bases of self-respect — if racial profiling or rational profiling undermines this, people in the Original Position would be against it even if it could reduce crime (goes against Rawls’s first principle)

Inferior political status means the state discounting the interests and rights of members of one group compared to members of other groups. Someone having an inferior political status undermines the social bases of self respect — this is unjust

Just because you believe you do doesn’t mean it’s true — the question is whether it’s reasonable to believe this. If a group already has reason to distrust the state, racial profiling will exacerbate this and it is unjust.

Background & history are what make racial profiling problematic and the criminal justice system plays a very important role in our life - not profiling by itself. Racial profiling puts extra burdens on profiled groups.

Hosein does not argue racial profiling is ok as long as it’s based on good data or that it is never ok regardless of the data

Hosein argues that racial profiling is ok sometimes depending on whether the profiled group has preexisting reason to distrust the state - Would be ok to racially profile white men as school shooters

De jure - official policy, de facto - not official but still happens, both are bad

Rawls’s Second Principle of Justice

The Fair Equality of Opportunity Principle — social and economic inequalities must be attached to positions which are open to all under conditions of fair equality of opportunity

Formal equality of opportunity often is not enough as race/gender can influence your opportunities before applying for a job, and talents require cultivation, which depends on what resources are available

Fair equality of opportunity eliminates the influence of gender/race on life outcomes — Rawls believes life prospects should be determined by your talent and willingness to use your talents and willingness to use your talents; people with equal talents should have the same life prospects economically

Fair equality of opportunity requires a social minimum: basic services and resources everyone is entitled to:

Child allowances

Unemployment insurance

Government-funded healthcare

Guaranteed minimum income

Even if there aren’t equal resources, pursuing opportunities requires a level of basic resources

Application of Second Principle

School Funding

Schools are primarily funded through local and state property taxes — rich area public schools have more money. This directly affects the life outcomes of students based on their school

Funding of schools is formal but not fair equality of opportunity

Some may object to ensuring equal opportunities as one would have to restrict parents’ ability to give money which some may say violates parental rights (parental rights is more important than equality of opportunity)

Rawls’s Third Principle of Justice

The Difference Principle — social and economic opportunities must be arranged so that they are to the greatest benefit of the least advantaged

Inequality is the byproduct of a system which benefits the worst off

Ie: Entrepreneurship under a free market with reasonable tax rates, encourages innovation (iPhone). Without incentives for innovation we would be more equal but we would all be worse off, so this is an inequality that is acceptable.

Rawls wants to lessen inequality (lower the floor and raise the ceiling) to have fair equality of opportunity and not all inequalities benefit the worst off

Difference principle should not be applied to individuals – it is about the economic system / structure

Justifying inequality requires more than some benefit to the worst off — needs to be the greatest benefit to the worst off compared to alternatives

A lot of political debates are really about the difference principle - the minimum wage (reducing number of jobs for the poor), higher taxes on the rich (would this hurt economic growth) and welfare benefits to the poor (would this make it rational to not work)

Welfare state will be more generous under the Original Position - they want to make sure they’re not too badly worse off

Rawls does not believe equality of opportunity leads to the free market giving us what we deserve; Rawls believes the Difference Principle is necessary so everyone ends up ok even if they’re untalented because that’s just based on luck

Talents are luck — based on genetics or society valuing your talents (ie: Lebron being good at basketball)

Your willingness to use and develop your talents are based on luck

Distributing based on talent is just as arbitrary as distributing wealth based on race/class/gender

Rawls thinks it is a good idea to reward talent as it creates an efficient / productive economic system, but that is all the economy is — not a way to determine who deserves what

Application of Third Principle

Application: The Welfare State

Kenworthy believes social democratic capitalism (the Nordic Model) satisfies The Difference Principle. We should ignore outliers like Saudi Arabia or Norway who have lots of oil and little people.

Social democratic capitalism has democracy, capitalism, modest economic regulation, good education, a generous welfare state, and employment-oriented public services

Democratic socialism = generous welfare state

Benefits worst off in short-term, in long-term higher employment (welfare state is paired with employment-oriented public services) & are mutually supporting, growth is unaffected

Not based on work ethic, trust, or size