John Rawls
(1921-2002)
John Rawls’s famous work, ” A Theory of Justice” published on 1971 holds the basis of egalitarianism, where he was focused on creating a society which is fair and just. Egal is an archaic word for equal or at the same level be it social, political, economic or civil rights.
To support this idea, Rawls derived two principles of Justice – one being, everyone is entitled to basic freedom regardless of social class which includes freedom of speech, freedom to own a personal property, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. The other one is the Difference Principle, which brings forth equality to all so as long the less fortunate is better off too.
Rawls then create a thought experiment called “Original Position” to support his principles. Society, or our Self is to be placed behind a Veil of Ignorance – the veil being that they will not know their place in society. For instance, they will not know if they would be rich or poor, a lighter skin color or a darker one, with or without religion, or even their intelligences and abilities. Certainly if one has no clue on these things, then he or she will have to choose the principles Fairest to all.
Question is, are these principles really practical in our fast and competitive society? No. As I doubt we could constantly place ourselves behind the veil of ignorance for too long. Rawls argues that inequality could be justified by redistribution of benefits to the least privileged. In certain circumstances such as working life, we want to earn what we work for. Philosopher Robert Nozick, a colleague of Rawls in Harvard points out that resources are produced by people and that people have rights to the things they produce. Thus, redistribution to improve this condition would be unfair and that would lead to people working involuntarily for others and deprive people of the goods and opportunities they have created through time and effort. (Nozick,1974)
This is of course acceptable if we voluntarily choose to do so.
Take for instance the job of a fisherman, his days spent fishing under harsh environments out in the rough seas are later rewarded with nothing but some of his catch being distributed equally among his townsfolk who do not know how to fish. It would be unsurprising if this fisherman would choose to hide some of his catch just so less would be taken from him.
Now we don’t want that, do we?