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PHI 2010-0001
May 1, 2017 Distributional Justice
John Rawls believes that a society’s view on justice should be focused on the idea
of fairness. He makes sure that his theory of “justice as fairness” is strictly political and
not metaphysical, or based on abstract reasoning. Rawls explains that justice as fairness
can be accomplished in a society through a form of distributive justice. In a
hypothetically perfect justice, all citizens agree to a political agreement where they are all
seen as equal and free. But since everyone is subject to the same rights and political
power in society, a common discussion that arises in distributive justice is how property
should be distributed in the name of justice.
Rawls solves this issue by providing a point of view that citizens of this society
should use to conduct justice; this point of view is be demonstrated by Rawls’s “veil of
ignorance” as a device for representation. The concept of the veil of ignorance is
supposed to put the user in a state of mind where he/she does not know anything of
his/her sex, race, or individual taste, even though it is very unlikely for one to block all
their personal interests. The removal of all identity, needs, and desires is supposed to
leave the person in a completely unbiased and political mindset; this is the state that
Rawls describes as the “original position.” In the mindset of this original position, Rawls
decides that justice should be defined by two main principles.
The first principle, or liberty principle, focuses more on the political justice of the
citizens, and it states that all citizens hold an equal right to the most extensive total
system of basic liberties. This principle, which resembles one of an egalitarian society,
entitles all citizens of the society to the same amount of liberties so that no individual can
politically overpower any other individual or group. This principle also implicates that
because it is a political justice, people have the liberty to choose their identity with no
effect on their lives from the view of the society as a whole. For example, a citizen of the
society could convert from one religion to another, or drop affiliation with any religion,
and still be seen as the same identity. Although this form of justice provides all their
citizens with equal rights, the society will still have citizens that differ in wealth and/or
class in the social hierarchy. These social and economic indifferences are resolved with
Rawls’s second principle to justice. The second principle, or the difference principle,
actually accepts these inequalities under two conditions: the first part, which is also an
egalitarian concept, states that inequalities must be attached to offices and positions
