EGALITARIANS’ VIEW

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Business Ethics MGT610

LESSON 10

EGALITARIANS' VIEW

Some egalitarians have tried to strengthen their position by distinguishing two different kinds

of equality: political equality and economic equality. Political equality refers to an equal

participation in, and treatment by, the means of controlling and directing the political system.

This includes equal rights to participate in the legislative process, equal civil liberties, and

equal rights to due process. Economic equality refers to equality of income and wealth and

equality of opportunity. The criticisms leveled against equality, according to some egalitarians,

only apply to economic equality and not to political equality.

Capitalists argue that a society's benefits should be distributed in proportion to what each

individual contributes to society. According to this capitalist view of justice, when people

engage in economic exchanges with each other, what a person gets out of the exchange should

be at least equal in value to what he or she contributed. Justice requires, then, that the benefits a

person receives should be proportional to the value of his or her contribution. Quite simply:

"Benefits should be distributed according to the value of the contribution the individual

makes to a society, a task, a group, or an exchange."

The main question raised by the contributive principle of distributive justice is how the "value

of the contribution" of each individual is to be measured. One long-lived tradition has held that

contributions should be measured in terms of work effort. The more effort people put forth in

their work, the greater the share of benefits to which they are entitled. The harder one works,

the more one deserves. A second important tradition has held that contributions should be

measured in terms of productivity. The better the quality of a person's contributed product, the

more he or she should receive.

Socialists address this concern by stating that the benefits of a society should be distributed

according to need, and that people should contribute according to their abilities. Critics of

socialism contend that workers in this system would have no incentive to work and that the

principle would obliterate individual freedom.

The libertarian view of justice is markedly different, of course. Libertarians consider it wrong

to tax someone to provide benefits to someone else. No way of distributing goods can be just or

unjust apart from an individual's free choice. Robert Nozick, a leading libertarian, suggests this

principle as the basic principle of distributive justice:

"From each according to what he chooses to do, to each according to what he makes

for himself (perhaps with the contracted aid of others) and what others choose to do

for him and choose to give him of what they've been given previously (under this

maxim) and haven't yet expended or transferred."

"If I choose to help another, that is fine, but I should not be forced to do so." Critics of this

view point out that freedom from coercion is a value, but not necessarily the most important

value, and libertarians seem unable to prove outright that it is more important to be free than,

say, to be fed. If each person's life is valuable, it seems as if everyone should be cared for to

some extent. A second related criticism of libertarianism claims that the libertarian principle of

distributive justice will generate unjust treatment of the disadvantaged. Under the libertarian

principle, a person's share of goods will depend wholly on what the person can produce through

his or her own efforts or what others choose to give the person out of charity.

Business Ethics MGT610

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:

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

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

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

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

b) 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.

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