John Rawls theory of Justice

John Rawls was a top political scientist and an academician of the United States. He was born in
1921 and passed away in 2002. His famous work is – A theory of Justice which was first published
in 1971 and its revised edition was published in 1990.
John Rawls was a firm opposer of utilitarianism, which held the view that just or fair actions are
the ones that bring the greatest amount of good for the greatest number. He condemned
utilitarianism because he opined that it paves the way for governments to function in ways that
bring happiness to a majority but ignore the wishes and rights of a minority.

The purpose of principles of social justice is to ensure that the distribution of the benefits and
burdens of society is just or fair to all its members. The basic institutions of society should,
according to Rawls, be so constructed as to ensure the continuous distribution of social primary
goods to all the members of society in a fair or just manner.

• Social primary goods are goods, which are distributed by the basic structure of a society.
They include rights and liberties, powers and opportunities, and income and wealth.

1. Definition of Justice:-
Rawls says that the conception of justice is an inherent nature of our social as well as
practical life. Barker has expressed a similar idea. However, in the opinion of Raw ls “Justice in
the first virtue of social intuitions as truth is of system of thought”. Justice is related to the social
institutions which guide and mould the actions and ideas of social beings.
We cannot imagine of a well ordered society whose core concept is not justice. Justice binds all
men and institutions of society.
It is also the important task of the social institutions to allocate judiciously the privileges and
advantages for the people of society. Constitution, social, political and economic arrangements
are included into these social institutions. Thus justice may conveniently be regarded as a social
principle which determines the ways and procedure of distributing the rights and duties for the
members of society. He further calls justice a social scheme on the basis of which rights, duties,
opportunities and condition are allotted. Thus justice is both a principle and a scheme.
Rawls’ theory of justice consists of “certain distributive principles for the basic structure of
society”. In the light of this analysis John Rawls defines justice in the following words. “The
concept of justice I take to be defined by the role of its principles in assuming rights and duties
in defining the appropriate division of social advantages. A conception of justice is an
interpretation of this role”. Justice is, thus, an interpretation of principles that are suggested for
the distribution of rights and duties and at the same time division of social advantages among all
the members of body politic.

2. Justice as Fairness:-
The main theme of Rawls’ theory of justice is it is interpreted as fairness. The dictionary
meaning of fairness is appropriateness or just: In Rawls’ conception that arrangement can be
called just or appropriate which does not create any scope of partiality or inappropriate. The
principles for the distribution of rights, duties and advantages will be applied in such manner
as will give no controversy.
Rawls explains the term fairness in the following way:
“I shall try to use this principle to account for all requirements that are obligations as distinct
from natural duties. This principle holds that a person is required to do his part as defined by
the rules of an institution when two conditions are met, first the institution is just (or fair)
that is it satisfies the two principles of justice and second, one has voluntarily accepted the
benefits of the arrangement”.
From the above definition of fairness we can form certain features some of which are the
following:
 1. According to John Rawls fairness denotes obligations. Obligation means an act which
a person morally or legally is bound to do. Obligations are different from natural
duties.

2. When a person is legally or morally bound to do an act or perform a duty his liberty
will be restricted.

3. Fairness also implies that the members of the society are engaged in advantageous
cooperative venture. Here two things are important. Individuals cooperate with each
other. This cooperation places all the individuals participating in the act creates an
atmosphere of mutual advantages for them all. This means that cooperation will
create no disadvantage to anybody.

4. Rawls further says that the institutions must be fair or just. They must keep
themselves above parochial interests. In many societies there are such institutions
which have been created to serve group’s interests and such institutions cannot serve
the interests of justice.

5. General public will accept the arrangements of the institutions ungrudgingly. They will
have no reservations or objections.

6. While discussing the nature of obligation one point is required to be mentioned here.
Obligations give rise to the performance of duties which are not moral duties. The
institutional or constitutional obligations impose duties upon individuals.

The constitutional or institutional obligations induce a man to perform some duties which
ensure the realisation of justice. The performance of institutional duties enables an individual
to manage a democratic society and furtherance of general welfare. We, therefore, conclude
that the obligations with a strong emphasis on its nature, institutional arrangement and to
actively cooperate with the duties made by the institution or any other official declaration are
included into the fairness principle.
When the condition of fairness is fully satisfied the concept of justice will not remain far behind.
We thus see that fairness, defined by Rawls, in his own way, practically constitutes the core of
the theory of justice. But in close analysis it will be found that it is nearer to the traditional idea
of justice which states that justice means to give everyone his due share.

3. Principles and Procedural steps for achieving Fairness:-

In A Theory of Justice (1971), Rawls introduced a universal system of fairness and a set of
procedures for achieving it. He advocated a practical, empirically verifiable system of
governance that would be political, social, and economic in its effects.
Rawls’s justice theory contains three principles and five procedural steps for achieving
fairness.

Principles:-
The principles are (i) an “original position,” (ii) a “veil of ignorance,” and (iii) unanimity of
acceptance of the original position.

(i) By original position, Rawls meant something similar to Hobbes’ understanding of the
state of nature, a hypothetical situation in which rational people can arrive at a
contractual agreement about how resources are to be distributed in accordance with
the principles of justice as fairness. This agreement was intended to reflect not
present reality but a desired state of affairs among people in the community.

(ii) The veil of ignorance is a condition in which people arrive at the original position
imagining they have no identity regarding age, sex, ethnicity, education, income,
physical attractiveness, or other characteristics. In this way, they reduce their bias and
self-interest.
Veil of ignorance

John Rawls argues that the only way we can arrive at a fair and just rule is if we imagine ourselves
to be in a situation in which we have to make decisions about how society should be organised
although we do not know which position we would ourselves occupy in that society. That is, we
do not know what kind of family we would be born in, whether we would be born into an ‘upper’
caste or ‘lower’ caste family, rich or poor, privileged or disadvantaged.

Rawls argues that if we do not know, in this sense, who we will be and what options would be
available to us in the future society, we will be likely to support a decision about the rules and
organisation of that future society which would be fair for all the members.

Rawls describes this as thinking under a ‘veil of ignorance’. He expects that in such a situation
of complete ignorance about our possible position and status in society, each person would
decide in the way they generally do, that is, in terms of their own interests.

• The merit of the ‘veil of ignorance’ position is that it expects people to just be their usual
rational selves: they are expected to think for themselves and choose what they regard to be in
their interest. The pertinent thing however is that when they choose under the ‘veil of ignorance’
they will find that it is in their interest to think from the position of the worst-off.

• Wearing the imagined veil of ignorance is the first step in arriving at a system of fair laws and
policies. It will be evident that rational persons will not only see things from the perspective of
the worst-off, they will also try to ensure that the policies they frame benefit the society as a
whole. Both things have to go hand-in-hand. Since no one knows what position they will occupy
in the future society, each will seek rules that protect them in case they happen to be born among
the worst-off. But it would make sense if they also try to ensure that their chosen policy does not
also make those who are better-off weaker because it is also possible that they could be born
into a privileged position in the future society. Therefore, it would be in the interests of all that
society as a whole should benefit from the rules and policies that are decided and not just any
particular section. Such fairness would be the outcome of rational action, not benevolence or
generosity.
There are two main aspects of the veil of ignorance: self-ignorance and public ignorance. Firstly,
it abstains the decision-maker from knowing anything about himself. It is essential for him to not
know his own position in society, because knowing may tempt him to make decisions that favour
his future self considering his private interests. For instance, a legislator having shares in a
company of a particular sector may strive to make laws favouring the future rise of that sector,
for himself to indirectly be profited by it. Secondly, it abstains the decision-maker from knowing
anything about the entities for whom he is making the decision. Such ignorance is crucial to avoid
the personal bias of the decision-maker.
(iii) Unanimity of acceptance is the requirement that all agree to the contract before it
goes into effect. Rawls hoped this justice theory would provide a minimum guarantee
of rights and liberties for everyone, because no one would know, until the veil was
lifted, whether they were male, female, rich, poor, tall, short, intelligent, a minority,
Roman Catholic, disabled, a veteran, and so on.

Procedural Steps:-
The five procedural steps, or “conjectures,” are:-
(i) entering into the contract,
(ii) agreeing unanimously to the contract,
(iii) including basic conditions in the contract such as freedom of speech,
(iv) maximizing the welfare of the most disadvantaged persons, and
(v) ensuring the stability of the contract.

These steps create a system of justice that Rawls believed gave fairness its proper place above
utility and the bottom line. The steps also supported his belief in people’s instinctual drive for
fairness and equitable treatment. Perhaps this is best seen in an educational setting, for example,
the university. By matriculating, students enter into a contract that includes basic freedoms such
as assembly and speech. Students at a disadvantage (e.g., those burdened with loans, jobs, or
other financial constraints) are accommodated as well as possible. The contract between the
university and students has proven to be stable over time, from generation to generation. This
same procedure applies on a micro level to the experience in the classroom between an
individual teacher and students. Over the past several decades—for better or worse—the course
syllabus has assumed the role of a written contract expressing this relationship.
Rawls gave an example of what he called “pure procedural justice” in which a cake is sh ared
among several people.
By what agreement shall the cake be divided? Rawls determined that the best
way to divide the cake is to have the person slicing the cake take the last piece.
This will ensure that everyone gets an equal amount. What is important is an
independent standard to determine what is just and a procedure for
implementing it.

4. Two principles of justice

Rawls stated that in the original position, the members of a society would be led by reason
and self-interest to agree upon the following two principles of justice;

1. The Principle of Equal Liberty

As per the principle of equal liberty, all the people in the society must be given certain
liberties that are basic for human existence. Such liberties can not be infringed at any cost,
even if they may cause greater benefit to a larger mass of people. Some of the basic
liberties as stated by Rawls were the freedom of speech, assembly, thought and
conscience, liberties required to secure the rule of law, sanitation, wealth, and health.

However, Rawls does not consider the economic rights and liberties like freedom of
contract or the right to own means of production, etc. as basic liberties, because
economic progress cannot happen without the expense of the ones that do not happen
to belong to the larger group.
 2. The Principle of Difference and Fair Equality of Opportunity
Rawls’ second principle of justice states that social and economic inequalities are to be
arranged so that they are both –

1. To the greatest benefit of the least advantaged, and

2. Attached to offices and positions open to all under conditions of fair equality of
opportunity.

This has to satisfy two conditions: -

1. Principle of Fair Equality of Opportunity:- They are to be attached to offices and
positions open to all under conditions of fair equality of opportunity; Rawls’s
principle of fair equality of opportunity stipulates that the state should ensure fair
equality of opportunity in the educational, cultural and economic spheres as
well as provide unemployment and sickness benefits. These require an
interventionist, welfare state to run or aid schools, to regulate the economy, etc.
2. Difference Principle:- They are to be to the greatest benefit of the least-
advantaged members of society i.e. inequalities which are advantageous to the
better off but not to the least advantaged are unjust.
The Difference Principle is the second principle which states that any inequality
that is permitted in society should only be permitted on the basis that it benefits
the least favoured in society.

The Difference Principle says that inequalities are permissible only when the distribution of
goods benefits the poorest members of the society. He believes that this is a rational choice
because:
Conclusion

John Rawls stated that the modern-day society should be structured well enough that the people
are able to enjoy the maximum possible liberty keeping in mind that an individual’s liberty does
not harm the liberty or well-being of other members of society.

Also, certain inequalities are to be allowed in society if their absence brings more harm than
good. Finally, if there are inequalities such as the aforementioned, less fortunate members of
society should not suffer solely for their absence of resources to deal with them, and it must be
made sure that it’s not hard for them to occupy a position of power.

Rawls theory of justice can find concurrence with the one of the basic premises of the Indian
constitution that has provided for reservation to equalize the differences, and attempte d to undo
the historic injustices meted out to certain communities.

Distributive Justice

Distributive justice concerns the socially just allocation of resources. Distributive justice
concentrates on outcomes. Five types of norms of distributive justice:-

1. Equality: Regardless of their inputs, all group members should be given an equal
share of the rewards/costs. Equality supports that someone who contributes 20%
of the group's resources should receive as much as someone who contributes
60%.
2. Equity: Members' outcomes should be based upon their inputs. Therefore, an
individual who has invested a large amount of input (e.g. time, money, energy)
should receive more from the group than someone who has contributed very
little. Members of large groups prefer to base allocations of rewards and costs on
equity
3. Power: Those with more authority, status, or control over the group should
receive more than those in lower level positions.
 4. Need: Those in greatest needs should be provided with resources needed to meet
those needs. These individuals should be given more resources than those who
already possess them, regardless of their input.
5. Responsibility: Group members who have the most should share their resources
with those who have less.

Every since the birth of the society, justice has been one of the most important quests of human
endeavor. Justice means giving one what is due to him. As a principle of law, justice delimits and
harmonizes the conflicting desires, claims and interests in the social life of the people.

Social justice may be in the form of distributive justice or corrective justice.

(a) Distributive justice – falls within the legislative field. [because it is primarily their task to
make laws and rules for division or distribution of social goods (i.e. benefits and burdens)
amongst the members of the society.

(b) Corrective justice – falls within the area of courts. [it is concerned with the reversal of
wrongs, or the undoing of transactions. It may so happen that the legislature errs while
making such distribution, or though the legislature has not made any error, the
implementing authority makes an error or it is some other citizen who prevents another
from exercising his right. It is here that corrective justice steps in to set right the wrong
that is done. Corrective justice falls within the area of the courts. E.g. if the legislature
gives voting rights only to those above 5’ height – it would be unjust on the ground that
distributive justice is not taken care of by the legislature. Or if a person entitled to exercise
the right to vote is illegally prevented by the Officer as it is happened in Ashby v. White
(1703), corrective justice steps in and redresses the injustice. ].

Distributive Justice:-

Distributive justice is concerned with the fair allocation or distribution of common

goods/benefits and common burdens among diverse members of a community. These benefits
and burdens span all dimensions of social life and assume all forms, including income, economic
wealth, political power, taxation, work obligation, education, shelter, healthcare, community
involvement and religious activities. In other words, the manifestation of distributive justice may
be found in the concept of wages, bonus, gratuity, subsidized ration to poor etc. which are
intended to secure minimum standard of living to needy and poor persons.

Elaborating the concept of distributive justice as one of the forms of social justice, Mr. Justice
A.P. Sen in the case of Lingappa Pochanna v. State of Maharashtra (1986,SC),

“Our Constitution permits and even directs to administer what may be termed as distributive
justice. The concept of distributive justice in the sphere of law making connotes, inter-alia, the
removal of economic inequalities and rectifying the injustice resulting from dealings, or
transactions between unequal in society. Law should be used as an instrument of distributive
justice to achieve a fair division of wealth among the members of society based upon the principle
from each according to his capacity, to each according to his needs.”

Aim of the Distributive Justice:-

The distributive justice demands equality in the distribution or allotment of advantages

or burdens(Reservation and Tax). The aim of distributive justice is to strike a balance in the socio-
economic structure of the society and bring balance between the conflicting interests of
individual citizens.

The Apex court in the case of Lingappa Pochanaa v. State of Maharashtra (1986), held that
distributive justice is aimed at lessening of inequalities by differential taxation, imposing ceiling
on holdings both agricultural and urban and regulating contractual transactions so that those
who have hitherto been deprived of their fortunes by unconscionable bargaining should be
restored their legitimate dues. Thus law should take upon itself the task of forced redistribution
of wealth so as to achieve a fair division of material resources among the members of society.

Indian Constitution and Distributive Justice:-

 The Indian Constitution lays down several provisions as to the manner in which to
attain distributive justice.

Article 38(1) provides that the state shall strive to promote the welfare of the people by securing
and protecting as effectively as it may, a social order in which justice -social, economic and
political shall inform all the institutions of national life. It also provides under Article 38(2) that
the state shall strive to minimize inequalities in income and endeavour to eliminate inequalities
in status, facilities and opportunities not only amongst individuals but also amongst groups of
people residing in different areas or engaged in different vocations. The new clause aims at
equality in all spheres of life. It would enable the state to have a national policy on wages and
eliminate inequalities in various spheres of life.

Article 39 requires the state to direct its policy towards securing the following principles:-

(a) Equal rights of men and women to adequate means of livelihood.

(b) Distribution of ownership and control of the material resources of the community to the
common good.
(c) To ensure that the economic system should not result in concentration of wealth and
means of production to the common detriment.
(d) Equal pay for equal work for both men and women.
(e) To protect health and strength of workers and tender age of children and to ensure that
they are not forced by economic necessity to enter avocation unsuited to their age or
strength.
(f) That children are given opportunities and facilities to develop in a healthy manner and in
conditions of freedom and dignity and that childhood and youth are protected against
exploitation and against moral and material abandonment.

Article 38 and 39 of the Constitution embody the jurisprudential doctrine of ‘distributive

justice’. The Constitution permits and even directs the state to administer what may be
termed ‘distributive justice’.
 Apart from the foregoing provisions, the recent trend of public interest litigation (also
called social interest litigation) has revolutionized the whole law relating to writ remedies
under the Constitutional provisions as provided in Article 32 and Article 226. Now even
an ordinary letter or prayer of petition to the Supreme Court under Article 32 to the High
Court under Art. 226, may be taken up and heard by these courts as a writ petition if it is
filed on behalf of some group of persons who themselves are unable to move the court
due to poverty, misery etc. That is, under PIL justice has been taken to the door-steps of
the poor and persons of meager resources.

Distributive justice as a better philosophy to bring social justice

▪ Reservation policy was used in India to give special preference to se ctions of society that
were earlier being deprived of equality of opportunity for centuries. Eg. Reservation to
SC/ST, Other Backward Classes, Transgenders, Persons with Disability, etc.

▪ Rawls' difference principle allows for the greatest benefit to the least advantaged, which
will allow the least advantaged social group to prosper at a faster rate.
▪ Distributive justice targets towards balanced empowerment eg. economic empowerment
go along with political empowerment, which maintain harmony even during social
changes.

Way forward
A balanced approach is required to create harmony between social justice and distributive
justice. Eg.: while reservation based on social group should continue to provide social justice, the
creamy layer should be introduced to prevent a section of underprivileged group to secure all
benefits to provide distributive justice.

In other words, distributive justice is a kind of social justice which seeks to ensure just and proper
distribution of not only goods, wealth and services but also of rights and opportunities.