Naomi Zack Reading

Naomi Zack Reading Notes

• Ideals of justice often fall short in addressing real-life injustices.

• John Rawls's A Theory of Justice has inspired philosophers to focus on "nonideal theory" to reduce injustice in unjust societies.

• Addressing unfair public policy and systemic racism may require a more direct approach to injustice.

• Applicative justice involves applying principles of justice that are currently "good enough" for whites to nonwhite groups, based on comparative treatment.

• “Social information just dribbles in, bit by bit, and we simply get used to it. A single story about a person really hits home at once, but the grinding injustices of daily life are endured. It is easy to ignore them and we do” Judith Shklar

• Ideal theory about justice spans from Plato’s Republic to John Rawls’s A Theory of Justice, with extensive analysis in political philosophy.

• Rawls emphasizes understanding justice through ideal theory before addressing injustice.

• Ideal theory examines institutional principles of justice in a stable society where laws are obeyed, while partial compliance theory deals with principles for addressing injustice.

• Rawls argues that ideal theory provides the foundation for addressing practical problems of justice.

• Critics argue ideal theory is too abstract to correct real-world injustices, as it assumes a "well-ordered" society.

• People prioritize correcting immediate, specific injustices (e.g., theft, murder, or racial profiling) over abstract notions of ideal justice.

• Injustice is addressed through specific punishments and systemic changes to prevent recurrence.

• Non ideal theories of justice, for societies without compliance with just laws, use ideal theory as a standard for building just institutions.

• Nonideal theory focuses on achieving justice incrementally through morally permissible, politically feasible, and effective actions.

• Injured or indignant parties may prioritize immediate justice over long-term goals or theoretical ideals.

• Reactive attitudes like indignation, blame, and a desire for punishment strongly focus on addressing specific injustices.

• Ideal and nonideal theories lack practical guidance for addressing immediate and specific injustices, especially race-related issues.

• Philosophical models of justice often assume unrealistic total compliance or rely on abstract concepts disconnected from observable realities.

• Historically, justice models have sometimes justified dominance by certain groups, such as Locke’s Second Treatisereflecting landed gentry interests.

• While inspiring legal frameworks, such as constitutions, early justice language often limited rights to select groups (e.g., white male property owners).

• Over time, justice has expanded to include more groups, but not universally.

• Applicative justice involves extending existing practices of justice to new groups, addressing real situations within a broader context of partial justice.

• Examples of applicative justice include voting rights and housing rights for excluded groups.

• Narratives can motivate social change by illustrating and advocating for justice extensions.

• Applicative justice seeks to address unjust treatment by comparing it to how those already treated justly are handled.

• It uses a comparative approach, such as analyzing disparities in how young Black and white males are treated by police.

• This approach adopts a pragmatic view of government as a dynamic process shaped by interest group contention, beyond laws and institutions.

• Justice rights, while ideally inviolable, are constantly subject to political bargaining and social interests in practice.

• Moral outrage or critiques of white supremacy alone lack the power to effect change without action.

• Practical changes, such as improving police-community relationships or modifying engagement rules, may have causal power to reduce injustices.

• Applicative justice emphasizes altering social realities over applying abstract justice theories.

• Better theories of justice, even if racially egalitarian, cannot guarantee just practices without changes in the political and social mix.

• Unjust laws can coexist with just practices, and just laws with unjust practices, underscoring the importance of pragmatic solutions.

• Applicative justice rejects reliance on normative pronouncements and focuses on shifting real group interests to drive change.

• Opponents of racial justice have historically acted to block progress rather than engaging solely in theoretical arguments.

• Race and justice

  • Justice for groups requires that many members be treated justly, while injustice can arise from the mistreatment of a few.

  • Unjust treatment disrupts group cohesion, as it signals vulnerability to other members.

  • Disparate treatment within a collective (e.g., whites and Blacks in the U.S.) undermines “justice for all” principles, though it often fails to incite change.

  • Apathy and self-absorption of the justly treated majority, who perceive justice rhetoric as exclusive to them, contribute to inaction.

  • Applicative justice compares group treatment to address injustice without relying on ideal or nonideal theories.

  • "Minorities" in this context refers to oppressed groups, even if numerically larger (e.g., Blacks under apartheid).

  • The gap between written laws and social realities exposes hypocrisy, bias, or systemic white supremacy.

  • Political philosophers should construct “maps” (realistic assessments) rather than “blueprints” (ideal visions).

  • Applicative justice faces resistance from politics, ignorance, media misrepresentation, business interests, and public prejudice.

  • Disproportionate African American incarceration stems from systemic factors: racial profiling, media sensationalism, for-profit prisons, and law-and-order politics.

  • Contributing factors include intergenerational poverty, unemployment, undereducation, and systemic racial profiling.

  • Applicative justice calls for addressing these issues through concrete practices and legal reforms.

• The history of applicative justice

  • The history of applicative justice is not well-reflected in moral and political philosophy but has existed as a political practice addressing injustice.

  • Reactions to injustice vary and depend on unique historical contexts (e.g., political retaliation).

  • Applicative justice can be traced through historical corrections to legal injustices, such as the Emancipation Proclamation, Brown v. Board of Education, and the Civil Rights Act.

  • Western political philosophy has few canonical texts starting from injustice, focusing instead on utopian ideals (e.g., Rousseau, Mill, Marx).

  • Recent shifts emphasize deconstruction of government and social structures, with contributions from thinkers like Agamben, Sen, Shelby, Mills, and Haslanger.

  • Africana philosophy reflects the survival strategies and existential struggles of Black Americans under oppression (e.g., Lucius Outlaw’s work).

  • Contemporary efforts in addressing injustice often fall under nonideal theory or cultural analysis rather than standalone theories of injustice.

  • Amartya Sen's comparative capabilities approach addresses practical human issues, contrasting with Rawls’s institutional focus.

  • Agamben critiques extreme government practices but leans towards revolutionary possibilities, which are seen as unlikely in the U.S. context.

  • The Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR) focuses on preventing injustice pragmatically to maintain peace rather than offering a comprehensive justice theory.

  • The UDHR emphasizes human rights violations as a cause of rebellion, highlighting the need to protect rights to avoid tyranny and oppression.

  • The UDHR serves as an inspirational document addressing past injustices but relies on human actions and practices to effect real change.

• Voting rights and residential segregation

  • US voting policies and residential segregation demonstrate a conflict between just law and unjust practices.

  • The Voting Rights Act of 1965 sought to protect Black citizens' voting rights but has been undermined by legal barriers like voter ID laws.

  • Voter ID laws are debated: proponents argue they prevent fraud, while opponents claim they disproportionately obstruct poor, nonwhite, and elderly citizens.

  • The 1968 Fair Housing Act banned racial discrimination in housing, but practices perpetuating segregation persisted.

  • Federal and local government policies historically enforced residential segregation through zoning, housing projects, and restrictive covenants.

  • Subsidies for white-only suburban developments and discriminatory urban renewal plans contributed to segregated housing patterns.

  • Segregation in housing markets limited African Americans' opportunities for homeownership and intergenerational wealth accumulation.

  • Additional legal measures and enforcement are needed to ensure formal laws like the Fair Housing Act achieve their intended outcomes.

  • Discriminatory housing industry practices and ignorance of segregation's history highlight gaps between written law and social reality.

  • Ownership theories should address how property rights have been used to restrict freedoms and perpetuate racial inequality.

• A note on the narrative

  • Achieving racial justice for nonwhites comparable to that of whites is a practical task requiring concrete action in specific situations.

  • Just laws and principled ideals inspire but do not directly change reality.

  • Narrative has the potential to motivate action by activating emotions and moral feelings, bypassing purely cognitive political content.

  • Mainstream media coverage of police homicides of unarmed Black individuals has highlighted injustices but failed to create widespread consensus on racial justice.

  • The video of Walter Scott's killing provided a rare case of shared judgment about police misconduct, leading to immediate charges against the officer.

  • Blacks and whites in the US lack a shared narrative on race relations, with divergent perspectives on privilege, equality, and responsibility.

  • Whites often resist acknowledging systemic racial advantages, while Blacks reject narratives minimizing structural barriers to equality.

  • A new, accessible narrative is needed to bridge divides, fostering mutual understanding and a collective drive for change.

  • Barack Obama’s early narrative of racial progress was briefly unifying but ultimately failed to address broader systemic issues or satisfy both communities.

  • A new narrative must clarify the meaning of racial difference and outline a shared vision for the future of race relations in the US.

Reading summarizer

Introduction

• The handbook edited by Naomi Zack focuses on social justice and race. Key themes include ideal theory, nonideal theory, and the need for applicative justice to combat injustice.

Ideal and Nonideal Theories of Justice

• Ideal Theory: Originates from Platonic concepts, culminating in John Rawls's work. It establishes principles of justice in a compliant society.

• Nonideal Theory: A response recognizing that societies often do not comply with just laws and seeks to address injustices through gradual corrective measures.

  • Quotes from Rawls indicate that ideal theory is necessary to systematically understand pressing justice problems.

• Applicative Justice: A concept advocating for the practical application of justice principles to rectify injustices between groups, particularly in racially biased contexts.

Critique of Ideal Theory

• Rawls's ideal theory is criticized as too abstract, making it ineffective for correcting real-world injustices. It focuses on thought experiments rather than specific injustices.

• Addressing injustice requires immediate actions based on recognizable events of wrongdoing (e.g., theft, police profiling) rather than theoretical frameworks.

• Nonideal theories depend on ideal theory metrics but often neglect urgent needs of those wronged by injustice.

Applicative Justice Defined

• Applicative Justice seeks to directly compare and address injustices faced by marginalized groups versus the treatment of dominant groups in society.

  • Examples include comparative treatment of young black males versus young white males by law enforcement.

  • Emphasizes empirical, pragmatic approaches, reflecting on historical injustices shaped by interest group politics rather than abstract moral discourse.

Race and Justice

• Groups need collective justice; the unjust treatment of a few can disrupt norms within a larger community.

• The persistence of unjust treatment is often normalized, requiring a focus on direct comparisons between races to challenge systemic injustices.

• Applicative justice starts from existing injustices, emphasizing that laws and practices must ensure equitable treatment for all.

Historical Context of Applicative Justice

• Applicative justice is not a new concept; its practices, such as historical legal corrections (e.g., Emancipation Proclamation, Civil Rights Act), showcase extensions of justice to previously excluded groups.

• Many philosophical texts haven’t prioritized conditions of injustice; instead, traditionally utopian visions of politics were often presented.

Contemporary Discussion

• Modern political philosophy increasingly recognizes the urgency of addressing injustices directly, through historical and social critiques.

• Notable individuals articulate varying approaches to combating contemporary injustices within a nonideal framework.

• The Universal Declaration of Human Rights reflects concerns over past injustices and the need for protective laws but offers no specific justice theory.

Challenges in Voting Rights and Residential Segregation

• Voting Rights Act (1965) and Fair Housing Act (1968) illustrate the contradictions between proclaimed rights and ongoing injustices.

  • New legislative measures (like photo ID laws) can hinder access to voting, disproportionately affecting marginalized communities.

  • Historical governmental policies facilitated racial segregation, which still shapes housing practices today.

Narrative as a Tool for Change

• Effective narratives can bridge gaps and motivate social change through emotional engagement rather than rigid arguments.

• The case of Walter Scott exemplifies how shared narratives can reveal injustices and galvanize public action.

• A unified narrative addressing contemporary race relations is necessary to foster mutual understanding and compel collective action for justice.

Naomi Zack lecture notes

• Ideal, nonidealm and empirical theories of social justice: the need for application justice in addressing injustice

• Black feminist theorist and critical race theory

• applicative justice  as empirical theory 

• implementing “applicative justice” framework to social policy in eliminating racial injustice in the US

  • Work towards the elimination of injustice

• integrating institutional premises of justice, ideal theory assumes:

  • correcting injustices requires knowledge about what justice is

  • a stable society where citizens obey the law

• criticizes rawls

• in order to correct injustice one needs to know what justice is

  • Naomi Zack says that this is still not enough on its own

• rawls uses “contracttarian reasoning” in his theory of justice:

  • free and rational individuals would choose to govern the terms of their political associations

• rawls presents a liberal egalitarian outlook to the problem of the relationship between the ideals of liberty and equality: “justice as fairness”

• Political liberty alongside extensive socioeconomic equality: Social and economic inequalities are to be arranged so that they are both:

  • a. To the greatest benefit of the least advantage

  • b. Attached to offices and positions open to all under conditions of fair equality of opportunity (Rawls 1971, 302).

• Ideal theory requires methodological tying with the race related dimensions of social and economic inequalities.

• Involving race into conceptual repertoire of political philosophy is necessary to revert the historical impacts and outcomes (institutional failures in granting rights and freedoms to members of racialized communities) of the political construction of Western nations

• Political philosophy bears responsibility to implement race and race-relations into political theory so that it can enact normative ideals of justice in real-life tangibly

• Naomi Zack on Rawlsian Ideal and Non-ideal Theories of Justice

  • “Ideal and non-ideal theories do not generate practical bridge principles”(Zack, p. 549).

  • The real topic to be interrogated in political philosophy should be “how immediate injustice can be corrected”(550).

  • Zack invites philosophers to start drawing road-maps for justice: “injustice theory”

• “The main question driving non ideal theory is how to construct a model or picture of justice that will result in the future correction or avoidance of present injustice.

• Ideal and non ideal theories do not generate practical bridge principles

  • blueprint: a plan; versus bridge: the action 

• According to Naomi Zack, writing normative or prescriptive scripts and formulating positive just laws are not sufficient to eliminate racially unequal and unjust social practice

• necessary to develop an approach to justice that begins with injustice, in real situations where there is already some degree of justice in a larger whole

• new groups is applicative justice, a concept with substantial history and intellectual precedent

• To improve conditions of justice, our theories need to start from injustices rather than a hypothetical of what justice is supposed to be

• A pragmatic approach to social ills:” Grounded on the social realm that relates to institutional arrangements and uses comparison

• Begins with conditions of injustice

•  “Governments are much more than the apparatus of state and written laws and court decisions...In reality, the rights secured by justice are constantly subject to political bargaining and living calculus of social interest” ( Zack 550).

• We need to start from this muddy ground and instead of creating normative content on behalf of the oppressed, theorists should work on finding practical tools to inflict and encourage change in the “living calculus of social interest.” 

• Find the injustice, find way the injustice occurs, the pattern of the injustice, and make the language and paradigm of the issue more tangible compared to abstract theories of injustice

• Political philosophical interrogations of justice should start with injustice

• Comparative empirical approach to group treatment

• A practical social mobility from injustices to justice by shifting the foundations of narrative

• but applicable justice is not only an abstract theory. Applicative justice requires comparisons of group treatment

• this gap between written law and social reality can. be viewed as hypocrisy 

• the contrast between the blueprints and maps is important to consider