JOHN RAWLS' THEORY OF JUSTICE:The Ethics of Care

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Business Ethics MGT610

LESSON 11

JOHN RAWLS' THEORY OF JUSTICE

John Rawls' theory of justice as fairness is an attempt to bring many of these disparate ideas

together in a comprehensive way. According to his theory, the distribution of benefits and

burdens in a society is just if:

3. Each person has an equal right to the most extensive basic liberties compatible with

equal liberties for all (the principle of equal liberty); and

4. Social and economic inequalities are arranged so that they are both:

c) To the greatest benefit of the least advantaged (the difference principle), and

d) Attached to offices and positions open fairly and equally to all (the principle of

equal opportunity).

Rawls tells us that Principle 1 is supposed to take priority over Principle 2 should the two of them

ever come into conflict, and within Principle 2, Part b is supposed to take priority over Part a.

Principle 1 is called the principle of equal liberty. Essentially, it says that each citizen's

liberties must be protected from invasion by others and must be equal to those of others. These

basic liberties include the right to vote, freedom of speech and conscience and the other civil

liberties, freedom to hold personal property, and freedom from arbitrary arrest. Part of Principle

2 is called the difference principle. It assumes that a productive society will incorporate

inequalities, but it then asserts that steps must be taken to improve the position of the most

needy members of society, such as the sick and the disabled, unless such improvements would

so burden society that they make everyone, including the needy, worse off than before. Part b

of Principle 2 is called the principle of fair equality of opportunity. It says that everyone

should be given an equal opportunity to qualify for the more privileged positions in society's

institutions.

Therefore, according to Rawls, a principle is moral if it would be acceptable to a group of

rational, self-interested persons who know they will live under it themselves. This incorporates

the Kantian principles of reversibility and universalizability, and treats people as ends and not

as means. Some critics of Rawls point out, however, that just because a group of people would

be willing to live under a principle does not mean that it is morally justified.

Two final types of justice are retributive and compensatory justice, both of which deal with

how best to deal with wrongdoers. Retributive justice concerns blaming or punishing those

who do wrong; compensatory justice concerns restoring to a harmed person what he lost when

someone else wronged him. Traditionally, theorists have held that a person has a moral

obligation to compensate an injured party only if three conditions pertain:

1. The action that inflicted the injury was wrong or negligent.

2. The action was the real cause of the injury.

3. The person did the action voluntarily.

The most controversial forms of compensation undoubtedly are the preferential treatment

programs that attempt to remedy past injustices against groups.

Business Ethics MGT610

The Ethics of Care

As the Malden Mills fire and rebuilding shows, there are perspectives on ethics that are not

explainable from the point of view of utilitarianism, rights, or Kantian philosophy. The owner

had no duty to rebuild (or to pay his workers when they were not working) from any of these

perspectives; still, he maintained that he had a responsibility to his workers and to his

community. Rather than being impartial (which all of these theories maintain is crucial), this

owner treated his community and workers partially.

This is central to the point of view known as the ethics of care, an approach to ethics that many

feminist ethicists have recently advanced. According to this method, we have an obligation to

exercise special care toward the people with whom we have valuable, close relationships.

Compassion, concern, love, friendship, and kindness are all sentiments or virtues that normally

manifest this dimension of morality. Thus, an ethic of care emphasizes two moral demands:

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