Abstract
Amartya Sen argues that for the advancement of justice identification of ‘perfect’ justice is neither necessary nor sufficient. He replaces ‘perfect’ justice with comparative justice. Comparative justice limits itself to comparing social states with respect to degrees of justice. Sen’s central thesis is that identifying ‘perfect’ justice and comparing imperfect social states are ‘analytically disjoined’. This essay refutes Sen’s thesis by demonstrating that to be able to make adequate comparisons we need to identify and integrate criteria of comparison. This is precisely the aim of a theory of justice (such as John Rawls’s theory): identifying, integrating and ordering relevant principles of justice. The same integrated criteria that determine ‘perfect’ justice are needed to be able to adequately compare imperfect social states. Sen’s alternative approach, which is based on social choice theory, is incapable of avoiding contrary, indeterminate or incoherent directives where plural principles of justice conflict.
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Notes
See for instance the contributions to the special issue ‘Social Justice: Ideal Theory, Non-ideal Circumstances’ in Social Theory and Practice, 34 (July 2008); guest editors Ingrid Robeyns and Adam Swift.
The adjective ‘transcendental’ may create confusion because it usually refers to an a priori source of knowledge or to ‘transcendentalism’ in the sense of belief in the existence of things that transcend sense-experience and the possibility of transcendent metaphysics (Blackburn 2005: 368; Honderich 1995: 878). With respect to John Rawls’s theory (which is the main target of Sen’s argument) the phrase ‘transcendental justice’ seems less adequate, because Rawls applies the method of ‘epistemic abstinence’ and emphatically denies that his theory has a metaphysical or transcendental foundation (Rawls 1996: 10, 97). Besides, Sen’s designation ‘perfect justice’ may conceal that Rawls’s theory concerns a ‘realistic utopia’ – justice that is realistically achievable within the limits of the permanent conditions of imperfect human nature – rather than an unfeasible idealistic kind of justice. Rawls: ‘Our hope for the future of our society rests on the belief that . . . a reasonably just, though not perfect, democratic regime is possible’ (2001: 4; emphasis added). Thus, in this context the terms ‘transcendental’ and ‘perfect’, used by Sen, are less fortunate. That is why I put them between inverted commas.
Rawls’s theory of justice orders and integrates competing criteria or principles of justice. It assigns lexical priority to equal basic liberties over equal opportunities and it ranks the latter over the Difference Principle. The Difference Principle, in turn, integrates efficiency of welfare distribution with concern for the worst-off.
In section 7 (‘Intuitionism’) of his A Theory of Justice Rawls gives insightful examples of interpersonally different intuitive balances between principles.
Cf. Rawls 1999: 115–6.
For instance, the multiple criteria or contributory values relevant to comparing two paintings may consist of creative quality, expressiveness, innovative character, authenticity, historical and contemporary significance, etcetera. Together these contributory values constitute an integral covering value with respect to which the paintings can be compared.
This does not mean that the problem for Sen applies only to complex (multidimensional) conceptions of justice and not to simple ones. There is a possible problem in all cases in which we do not have a determinate and unambiguous standard of comparison, irrespective of whether this standard is simple or complex. Indeed, how is it possible to compare two social states if we do not know the relevant and right standard of comparison, even if we suppose that the standard is simple, say ‘utility’ or ‘legitimate entitlement’. It makes a lot of difference if we compare the degrees of justice of two social states with respect to the former or the latter standard of justice.
See also Rawls 1999: 33, 56, 65.
Of course, the aggregation problem only applies to multiple (more than two) relevant factors that may be ordered differently. As most theorists, including Sen, recognize, this applies to justice as a multifaceted concept.
For a proof see Allingham 2002: 99–101. A clear and concise summary and explanation of the problematic issue of rationality and coherence of democratic decisions in general and with respect to distributive justice in particular are given in chapter 6, ‘Democracy and dictatorship’: 106–110.
This is one of the reasons why Rawls applies the devices of the original position and the ‘veil of ignorance’, in which the agents are detached from their conceptions of the good and comprehensive beliefs, expecting that it promotes an (overlapping) consensus on the ranking of principles. The various individual perspectives are replaced by the perspective of an ‘impartial spectator’, see below.
See also the concise and illuminating discussion of this problem by Wolf 1998: 58–67 (‘Appendix: The Irrationality of Majority Rule’).
I owe this point to an anonymous referee.
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The paper is a result of research conducted at the Erasmus University Rotterdam for the project ‘The Transition from Ideal to Nonideal Theories of Justice’ (head: Ingrid Robeyns). The research was financed by a grant of the Netherlands Organization for Scientific Research (NWO). I thank Anca Gheaus, Ingrid Robeyns, Anders Schinkel and two anonymous referees for their constructive comments.
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Boot, M. The Aim of a Theory of Justice. Ethic Theory Moral Prac 15, 7–21 (2012). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10677-011-9308-5
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10677-011-9308-5