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CSC-208
Readings for Week 4 of the term – April 22-24

This set of reading covers the Justice and Fairness ethical framework. I have set this
reading up a little differently than the readings for Utilitarianism and the “rights” approach
of Immanuel Kant. This single .pdf document is the reading you need to do. You need to
read all of this! But I have made it convenient for you… the reading is all here, there are no
web links to follow.
This reading begins with a brief summary of the five ethical frameworks we study. I have
included this to review what we covered in the first three weeks of the course, and to give
you an overview of the two remaining frameworks (Social Contract, and Virtue Ethics)
beyond Justice/Fairness. This material also provides more than 10 questions that you can
use as the basis for your ethical analysis under the Justice/Fairness framework.
Make sure you read all of the pages of this reading. You may find that a small writing
assignment materializes this week in class based on some of the things I have included
here. I have indicated where in these readings I might focus a question or two on. Written
responses are a handy way of taking attendance in class! I think they are fun. At least for
me!

 Jim

Thinking Ethically: A Framework for Moral Decision Making 2

Justice and Fairness 5

The Veil of Ignorance, fair divisions, Gandhi's "Talisman" and

8
John Rawls' Justice Ethics

The Fairness Approach 13

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Thinking Ethically:
A Framework for Moral Decision Making
Developed by Manuel Velasquez, Claire Andre, Thomas Shanks, S.J., and Michael J. Meyer1

Note: This is a summary of the five ethical frameworks we study in CSC-208. I have made it the first
(brief) reading for the fourth week of the term to summarize what we have covered already and to
outline in general terms the remaining frameworks. –JJ)

Moral issues greet us each morning in the newspaper, confront us in the memos on our desks, nag
us from our children's soccer fields, and bid us good night on the evening news. We are bombarded
daily with questions about the justice of our foreign policy, the morality of medical technologies
that can prolong our lives, the rights of the homeless, the fairness of our children's teachers to the
diverse students in their classrooms.
Dealing with these moral issues is often perplexing. How, exactly, should we think through an
ethical issue? What questions should we ask? What factors should we consider?
The first step in analyzing moral issues is obvious but not always easy: Get the facts. Some moral
issues create controversies simply because we do not bother to check the facts. This first step,
although obvious, is also among the most important and the most frequently overlooked.
But having the facts is not enough. Facts by themselves only tell us what is; they do not tell us
what ought to be. In addition to getting the facts resolving an ethical issue also requires an appeal
to values. Philosophers have developed five different approaches to values to deal with moral
issues.

1. The Utilitarian Approach

Utilitarianism was conceived in the 19th century by Jeremy Bentham and John Stuart Mill to help
legislators determine which laws were morally best. Both Bentham and Mill suggested that ethical
actions are those that provide the greatest balance of good over evil.
To analyze an issue using the utilitarian approach we first identify the various courses of action
available to us. Second, we ask who will be affected by each action and what benefits or harms will
be derived from each. And third, we choose the action that will produce the greatest benefits and
the least harm. The ethical action is the one that provides the greatest good for the greatest
number. [Added by JJ: Act Utilitarianism applies this to individual actions. Rule Utilitarianism
applies this to a generalized rule that expresses the nature of the action and asks what would
happen if everyone followed the rule—would the result in the most typical case be, in sum, positive
or negative.]

2. The Rights Approach

The second important approach to ethics has its roots in the philosophy of the 18th-century thinker
Immanuel Kant, and others like him, who focused on the individual's right to choose for herself or
himself. According to these philosophers what makes human beings different from mere things is

1 This material is from the Markkula Center for Applied Ethics of the University of Santa Clara, Santa Clara,
California, at http://www.scu.edu/ethics/practicing/decision/thinking.html. I have just put it into a “print-
friendly” format since the print-friendly link at the web site appears not to work.  Jim Janossy

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that people have dignity based on their ability to choose freely what they will do with their lives,
and they have a fundamental moral right to have these choices respected. People are not objects to
be manipulated; it is a violation of human dignity to use people in ways they do not freely choose.
Of course, many different, but related, rights exist besides this basic one. These other rights (an
incomplete list below) can be thought of as different aspects of the basic right to be treated as we
choose.
 The right to the truth: We have a right to be told the truth and to be informed about
matters that significantly affect our choices.
 The right of privacy: We have the right to do, believe, and say whatever we choose in our
personal lives so long as we do not violate the rights of others.
 The right not to be injured: We have the right not to be harmed or injured unless we
freely and knowingly do something to deserve punishment or we freely and knowingly
choose to risk such injuries.
 The right to what has been agreed upon (promised): We have a right to what has been
promised by those with whom we have freely entered into a contract or agreement.
In deciding whether an action is moral or immoral using this second approach we must ask, “Does
the action respect the moral rights of everyone?” Actions are wrong to the extent that they violate the
rights of individuals; the more serious the violation, the more wrongful the action.

3. The Fairness or Justice Approach

The fairness or justice approach to ethics has its roots in the teachings of the ancient Greek
philosopher Aristotle, who said that "equals should be treated equally and unequals unequally." The
basic moral question in this approach is: How fair is an action? Does it treat everyone in the same
way or does it show favoritism and discrimination?
Favoritism gives benefits to some people without a justifiable reason for singling them out;
discrimination imposes burdens on people who are no different, in relevant ways, from those on
whom burdens are not imposed. Both favoritism and discrimination are unjust and wrong.
This approach and some elements of the Social Contract were used by John Rawls in forming his
ethical theory of Justice and Fairness. He extended the concept of “fairness” to include the Kantian
idea of an ethical person considering the well-being of the other members of society to the extent
that policies of social justice are emphasized. These policies seek to equalize opportunity and the
access to the “goods” of society to the least-advantaged member on a priority basis.

4. The Social Contract Approach (Common-Good Approach)

This approach to ethics assumes a society comprising individuals whose own good is inextricably
linked to the good of the community. Community members are bound by the pursuit of common
values and goals and by the obligations they have incurred due to the benefits provided to them by
society.
The common good is a notion that originated more than 2,000 years ago in the writings of Plato,
Aristotle, and Cicero. More recently, contemporary ethicist John Rawls defined the common good as
"certain general conditions that are... equally to everyone's advantage."
In this approach we focus on ensuring that the social policies, social systems, institutions, and
environments on which we depend are beneficial to all, and that everyone supports them through
taxes, service, and obedience. Examples of goods common to all include affordable health care,
effective public safety, peace among nations, a just legal system, and an unpolluted environment.

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Appeals to the common good urge us to view ourselves as members of the same community,
reflecting on broad questions concerning the kind of society we want to become and how we are to
achieve that society. While respecting and valuing the freedom of individuals to pursue their own
goals the common-good approach challenges us also to recognize and further those goals we share
in common.

5. The Virtue Approach

The virtue approach to ethics assumes that there are certain ideals toward which we should strive
which provide for the full development of our humanity. These ideals are discovered through
thoughtful reflection on what kind of people we have the potential to become. Virtues are attitudes
or character traits that enable us to be and to act in ways that develop our highest potential. They
enable us to pursue the ideals we have adopted. Honesty, courage, compassion, generosity, fidelity,
integrity, fairness, self-control, and prudence are all examples of virtues.
Virtues are like habits, that is, once acquired, they become characteristic of a person. Moreover, a
person who has developed virtues will be naturally disposed to act in ways consistent with moral
principles. The virtuous person is the ethical person.
In dealing with an ethical problem using the virtue approach, we might ask, What kind of person
should I be? What will promote the development of character within myself and my community?

Ethical Problem Solving

These five approaches suggest that once we have ascertained the facts we should ask ourselves five
questions when trying to resolve a moral issue:
 What benefits and what harms will each course of action produce, and which alternative
will lead to the best overall consequences?
 What moral rights do the affected parties have, and which course of action best respects
those rights?
 Which course of action treats everyone the same, except where there is a morally justifiable
reason not to, and does not show favoritism or discrimination?
 Which course of action advances the common good?
 Which course of action develops moral virtues?
This method, of course, does not provide an automatic solution to moral problems. It is not meant
to. The method is merely meant to help identify most of the important ethical considerations. In the
end, we must deliberate on moral issues for ourselves, keeping a careful eye on both the facts and
on the ethical considerations involved.
But these questions do provide a starting point for benefits and harms to be identified, their extent
recognized in some qualitative if not quantitative measure, and the results produced by each
question (and the ethical framework behind it) documented. That is the basis of rational ethical
thought—and the basis on which you must conduct your ethical analyses! -JJ

This article updates several previous pieces from Issues in Ethics by Manuel Velasquez - Dirksen Professor of
Business Ethics at Santa Clara University and former Center director - and Claire Andre, associate Center
director. "Thinking Ethically" is based on a framework developed by the authors in collaboration with Center
Director Thomas Shanks, S.J., Presidential Professor of Ethics and the Common Good Michael J. Meyer, and others.
The framework is used as the basis for many programs and presentations at the Markkula Center for Applied
Ethics. This article appeared originally in Issues in Ethics V7 N1 (Winter 1996)

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Justice and Fairness

Developed by Manuel Velasquez, Claire Andre, Thomas Shanks, S.J., and Michael J. Meyer1

When Beatrice Norton was fourteen she followed in her mother's footsteps and began working in a
cotton mill in South Carolina. In 1968, after a career in the mill, she had to stop working because of
her health. Years of exposure to cotton dust had resulted in a case of "brown lung," a chronic and
sometimes fatal disease with symptoms similar to asthma and emphysema. In 1977, she testified at
a congressional hearing asking that the government require companies to provide disability
compensation for victims of the disease similar to the compensation companies provided for other
similar diseases.
I worked in the dust year after year ... I got sicker and sicker. In 1968 I suddenly had no
job, no money, and I was too sick to ever work in my life again. State legislators have
proven in two successive sessions that they are not going to do anything to help the
brown lung victims, so now we come to you in Washington and ask for help. We've
waited a long time, and many of us have died waiting. I don't want to die of injustice.
Another woman, Mrs. Vinnie Ellison, spoke bitterly about the way her husband had been treated
when the illness caught up with him after twenty one years at a cotton mill:
In the early sixties he started having trouble keeping up his job because of his
breathing. In 1963 his bossman told him that he had been a good worker but wasn't
worth a damn anymore and fired him. He had no pension and nothing to live on. My
husband worked long and hard and lost his health because of the dust. It isn't fair that
the mill threw him away like so much human garbage after he couldn't keep up his job
because he was sick from the dust.
To Mrs. Norton and Mrs. Ellison receiving compensation for the debilitating effects of brown lung
similar to that given to other diseases was a simple matter of justice. In making their case their
arguments reflected a very long tradition in Western civilization. In fact no idea in Western
civilization has been more consistently linked to ethics and morality than the idea of justice. From
the Republic, written by the ancient Greek philosopher Plato, to A Theory of Justice, written by the
late Harvard philosopher John Rawls, every major work on ethics has held that justice is part of the
central core of morality.
Justice means giving each person what he or she deserves or, in more traditional terms,
giving each person his or her due. Justice and fairness are closely related terms that are often
today used interchangeably. There have, however, also been more distinct understandings of the
two terms.
 Justice usually has been used with reference to a standard of rightness.
 Fairness often has been used with regard to an ability to judge without reference to one's
feelings or interests; fairness has also been used to refer to the ability to make judgments
that are not overly general but that are concrete and specific to a particular case.

1 This material is from the Markkula Center for Applied Ethics of the University of Santa Clara, Santa Clar,
California, at http://www.scu.edu/ethics/practicing/decision/justice.html. I have just put it into a “print-
friendly” format since the print-friendly link at the web site appears not to work.  Jim Janossy

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In any case, a notion of “desert”2 is crucial to both justice and fairness. The Nortons and Ellisons of
this world (see above quotes), for example, are asking for what they think they deserve when they
are demanding that they be treated with justice and fairness. When people differ over what they
believe should be given, or when decisions have to be made about how benefits and burdens should
be distributed among a group of people, questions of justice or fairness inevitably arise. In fact,
most ethicists today hold the view that there would be no point of talking about justice or fairness if
it were not for the conflicts of interest that are created when goods and services are scarce and
people differ over who should get what. When such conflicts arise in our society we need principles
of justice that we can all accept as reasonable and fair standards for determining what people
deserve.
But saying that justice is giving each person what he or she deserves does not take us very far. How
do we determine what people deserve? What criteria and what principles should we use to
determine what is due to this or that person?
Principles of Justice
The most fundamental principle of justice—one that has been widely accepted since it was first
defined by Aristotle more than two thousand years ago—is the principle that "equals should be
treated equally and unequals unequally." In its contemporary form this principle is sometimes
expressed as follows: "Individuals should be treated the same, unless they differ in ways that are
relevant to the situation in which they are involved." For example, if Jack and Jill both do the same
work, and there are no relevant differences between them or the work they are doing, justice
demands that they should be paid the same wages. And if Jack is paid more than Jill simply because
he is a man, or because he is white, then we have an injustice—a form of discrimination—because
race and sex are not relevant to normal work situations.
There are, however, many differences that we deem as justifiable criteria for treating people
differently. For example, we think it is fair and just when a parent gives his own children more
attention and care in his private affairs than he gives the children of others; we think it is fair when
the person who is first in a line at a theater is given first choice of theater tickets; we think it is just
when the government gives benefits to the needy that it does not provide to more affluent citizens;
we think it is just when some who have done wrong are given punishments that are not meted out
to others who have done nothing wrong; and we think it is fair when those who exert more efforts
or who make a greater contribution to a project receive more benefits from the project than others.
These criteria:
 need
 desert (ie., deserving)2
 contribution
 effort
we acknowledge as justifying differential treatment.
On the other hand, there are also criteria that we believe are not justifiable grounds for giving
people different treatment. In the world of work, for example, we generally hold that it is unjust to
give individuals special treatment on the basis of age, sex, race, or their religious preferences. If the
judge's nephew receives a suspended sentence for armed robbery when another offender unrelated
to the judge goes to jail for the same crime, or the brother of the Director of Public Works gets the

2Desert is easily one of the most readily confusing words in the English language when used in connection
with ethics. In common use this word can mean a geographic area that is hot and sandy, to abandon
something or someone, or something eaten at the end of a meal. The last meaning is most relevant here,
implying the appropriate “ending” or “outcome” or “result” deriving from the word “deserve” as the root.

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million dollar contract to install sprinklers on the municipal golf course despite lower bids from
other contractors, we say that it's unfair. We also believe it isn't fair when a person is punished for
something over which he or she had no control, or isn't compensated for a harm he or she suffered.
And the people involved in the "brown lung hearings" felt that it wasn't fair that some diseases
were provided with disability compensation, while other similar diseases weren't.
Different Kinds of Justice
There are different kinds of justice. Distributive justice refers to the extent to which society's
institutions ensure that benefits and burdens are distributed among society's members in ways that
are fair and just. When the institutions of a society distribute benefits or burdens in unjust ways,
there is a strong presumption that those institutions should be changed. For example, the American
institution of slavery in the pre-civil war South was condemned as unjust because it was a glaring
case of treating people differently on the basis of race.
A second important kind of justice is retributive or corrective justice. Retributive justice refers to
the extent to which punishments are fair and just. In general, punishments are held to be just to the
extent that they take into account relevant criteria such as the seriousness of the crime and the
intent of the criminal, and discount irrelevant criteria such as race. It would be barbarously unjust,
for example, to chop off a person's hand for stealing a dime, or to impose the death penalty on a
person who by accident and without negligence injured another party. Studies have frequently
shown that when blacks murder whites, they are much more likely to receive death sentences than
when whites murder whites or blacks murder blacks. These studies suggest that injustice still exists
in the criminal justice system in the United States.
Yet a third important kind of justice is compensatory justice. Compensatory justice refers to the
extent to which people are fairly compensated for their injuries by those who have injured them;
just compensation is proportional to the loss inflicted on a person. This is precisely the kind of
justice that was at stake in the brown lung hearings. Those who testified at the hearings claimed
that the owners of the cotton mills, where workers had been injured, should compensate the
workers whose health had been ruined by conditions at the mills.
The foundations of justice can be traced to the notions of social stability, interdependence, and
equal dignity. As the ethicist John Rawls has pointed out, the stability of a society—or any group, for
that matter—depends upon the extent to which the members of that society feel that they are being
treated justly. When some of society's members come to feel that they are subject to unequal
treatment the foundations have been laid for social unrest, disturbances, and strife. The members of
a community, Rawls holds, depend on each other, and they will retain their social unity only to the
extent that their institutions are just. Moreover, as the philosopher Immanuel Kant and others have
pointed out, human beings are all equal in this respect: they all have the same dignity, and in virtue
of this dignity they deserve to be treated as equals. Whenever individuals are treated unequally on
the basis of arbitrary and irrelevant characteristics their fundamental human dignity is violated.
Justice is a central part of ethics and should be given due consideration in our moral lives. In
evaluating any moral decision we must ask whether our actions treat all persons equally. If not we
must determine whether the difference in treatment is justified: are the criteria we are using
relevant to the situation at hand? But justice is not the only principle to consider in making ethical
decisions. Sometimes principles of justice may need to be overridden in favor of other kinds of
moral claims such as rights or society's welfare. Nevertheless, justice is an expression of our mutual
recognition of each other's basic dignity and an acknowledgement that if we are to live together in
an interdependent community we must treat each other as equals.
The views expressed do not necessarily represent the position of the Markkula Center for Applied
Ethics at Santa Clara University. This article appeared in Issues in Ethics V3 N2 (Spring 1990).

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The Veil of Ignorance, fair divisions,

Gandhi’s “Talisman” and Rawls’ Justice Ethics 1
From Wikipedia, my own thoughts, and other sundry sources… --JJ

The Veil of Ignorance is a concept that has been in use by other names for centuries by philosophers
such as Immanuel Kant, John Stuart Mill, and John Rawls. The modern usage was developed by John
Rawls in A Theory of Justice, a book published in 1971. It’s a method of determining the morality of
a certain issue such as a division of resources based on the following thought experiment: parties to
the “original position” know nothing about their own particular abilities, tastes, and position within
the social order of society. The Veil of Ignorance blocks off this knowledge such that one does not
know what burdens and benefits of social cooperation might fall to him/her once the veil is lifted.
With the knowledge of the outcome and result for their own benefit blocked, parties to the original
position must decide on principles for the distribution of rights, positions and resources in their
society. As Rawls put it, "...no one knows his place in society, his class position or social status; nor
does he know his fortune in the distribution of natural assets and abilities, his intelligence and
strength, and the like". The idea is to render obsolete those personal considerations that are morally
irrelevant to the justice or injustice of principles meant to allocate the benefits of social
cooperation.
For example, in the imaginary society, one might or might not be intelligent, rich, or born into a
preferred class. Since one may occupy any position in the society once the veil is lifted, the device
forces the parties to consider society from the perspective of all members, including the worst-off
and best-off members.

Achieving Fairness
Let’s explore the thinking behind a fair division of resources that is in some way analogous to the
Veil of Ignorance, except that in this case self-interest is harnessed to produce a fair outcome in a
less abstract way. Some tools have been developed to help thinking along these lines. We first
consider a riddle, the answer to which I will leave in doubt until a later time. We’ll then consider a
related “protocol” for a fair division of a resource, and finally a “talisman”2 by Mahatama Ghandi to
guide public policy thinking along lines that are fair and equitable across a society. As a final
exercise in your own decision making about political issues facing the nation you can after this
experience apply Ghandi’s talisman to situations we, as a nation, face today—if you dare.

Let’s divide this cake: I cut, you choose

In problems of fair division, divide and choose is a two-party proportional envy-free ”allocation
protocol.” The protocol also works for dividing an undesirable, as in chore division. In this method
one person divides a good or resource into what he or she believes are equal halves, and the
other person chooses the "half" he or she prefers. Thus the person making the division has an
incentive to divide as fairly as possible: if they do not divide equally they will likely receive an

1 The start of this is a short article found at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Veil_of_ignorance. I have

reformatted it and edited it slightly to make it more convenient for our purposes in this course. I have then
added considerably more material to this introduction as a combination of additional material from
WikiPedia, other sources, and my own thinking.  JJ
2 In this use of the word “talisman” it means a procedure or protocol, not a magical charm, but like an

incantation thought to produce a specific intended effect this talisman can produce an intended effect.

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undesirable (lesser) portion! This rule is a concrete application of the Veil of Ignorance. Be prepared
to explain why!
Divide and choose assumes the parties have equal entitlements. The goods are assumed to be
divisible in any way and the values of the parts to be additive. But in actuality each party may value
the parts differently. The divide and choose method does not guarantee each person gets exactly
half the cake by their own valuations and so may not produce an “equal” division in the sense of the
worth to each party. For example if the cake is baked in this way (looking down at it):

and the cutter divides the cake as shown by the dashed line, the cake has been equally divided. But
if both people like chocolate cake more than vanilla the person who cut the cake will not get as
much cake to their liking and will regard that as “less good” than the part the other person chose.
Here’s an interesting question though: how would it affect the thinking of the cutter if the Veil of
Ignorance were applied to this by having the first person to choose determined at random after the
cut by the tossing of a coin?3 If the cutter liked chocolate and cut the cake along the dividing line
between vanilla/chocolate they might in that case get all of the chocolate cake or none of it! Would
it be worth the risk, or would it be advantageous to cut it perpendicular to that line so as to at least
be assured of getting at least half of the half chocolate?

The Bass-Ackwards Horse Race

An eccentric king rules over the desert kingdom of Melanoma which is located east of the sun and
west of the moon. He decides to have a horse race to which two riders will each bring their own
horse. But the king decrees that unlike the usual case where the first horse to cross the finish line
wins, in this race the last horse to cross the finish line will win! The winner will be the owner of that
horse. He will be honored with a sumptuous banquet at which the king will award him a crown of
gold and 100,000 silver talents (let’s situate this in Old Testament times). The loser however will
lose more than the race, he will lose his head. His severed head will be displayed on a pike at the
feast and the king’s troupe of merry trolls will do a maypole dance around it. The king commands
his Grand Vizier (the first among many hangers-on and yes-men) to arrange for this to be a fair
race—or the Grand Vizier’s own head is for the chop too. But the Grand Vizier, a wise and clever
fellow, quickly makes the appropriate arrangements and definitely plans to be at the feast in whole
and living form. What did the Grand Vizier do to insure that it’s a fair race? (This may be the subject

3Even more interesting variations of this can be proposed. What if both the cutter and the second party knew
the vanilla/chocolate preference of the other party? What if the cutter was, as shown, limited to cutting on a
vertical line but could rotate the cake before making the cut? What if we change the scenario to have a knife
moving from left to right and either person could shout “STOP!” to stop the movement and have the cut made
there, then the person who shouted “STOP!” first chooses first.

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of a pop quiz. You may be asked to write the answer out in a short written statement in class. So think
about it! It’s a question of arranging incentives, of course, in the proper way. Just as is arranging for a
fair division of resources…).

Mahatma Gandhi’s Talisman

An application of the Veil of Ignorance towards a recognition of the worst-off members of society is
captured in Mahatma Gandhi's Talisman, given in 1948.4 Gandhi was asked by a politician of the
newly established state of India, "How can I know that the decisions I am making are the best I can
make?" He answered:
"I will give you a talisman. Whenever you are in doubt, or when the self becomes too
much with you, apply the following test. Recall the face of the poorest and the weakest
man whom you may have seen, and ask yourself, if the step you contemplate is going to
be of any use to him. Will he gain anything by it? Will it restore him to a control over
his own life and destiny? In other words, will it lead to freedom for the hungry and
spiritually starving millions? Then you will find your doubts and yourself melt away."
But perhaps it is too idealistic to think that political decision-makers can actually accomplish this
feat of mind-work each time they are faced with a decision about public policy or the allocation of
resources. (Especially when the variables in their equation of decision-making are heavily
influenced by well-heeled lobbyists?) In recognition that a more definite “ethics” based on Gandhi’s
principles were needed, let’s look at John Rawl’s solution which he called a theory of justice.

John Rawls and Justice/Fairness Ethics5

A Theory of Justice is a work of political philosophy and ethics by the late philosopher John Rawls
(1921-2002) published in 1971. In his book Rawls attempts to solve the problem of distributive
justice, the socially just distribution of goods in a society. Rawls argues for a principled
reconciliation of liberty and equality. Central to this effort is an account of the circumstances of
justice, inspired by David Hume, and a fair choice situation for parties facing such circumstances
similar to some of Immanuel Kant's views. Principles of justice are sought to guide the conduct of
the parties. These parties are assumed to face moderate scarcity and they are neither naturally
altruistic nor purely egoistic. They have their own agendas which they seek to advance but prefer to
advance them through cooperation with others on mutually acceptable terms. Rawls offers a model
of a fair choice situation, the “Original Position” with its Veil of Ignorance, within which parties
would hypothetically choose mutually acceptable principles of justice. Under such constraints
Rawls believes that parties would find his favored principles of justice to be especially attractive,
winning out over varied alternatives, including utilitarian and “rights” accounts.
Rawls develops what he claims are principles of justice through the use of an artificial device he
calls the Original Position in which everyone decides principles of justice from behind a Veil of
Ignorance:
"…no one knows his place in society, his class position or social status, nor does anyone
know his fortune in the distribution of natural assets and abilities, his intelligence,
strength, and the like. I shall even assume that the parties do not know their
conceptions of the good or their special psychological propensities. The principles of
justice are chosen behind a veil of ignorance."

4 For a most thorough look at this visit http://www.floorgroup.raumplanung.tu-

dortmund.de/FLOOR_Working_papers/FLOOR_WP008_B_Davy_S_Pellissery_Gandhis_talisman.pdf
5 Much of the information here originates in http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Theory_of_Justice which I have

edited to suit the purpose of this course.

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According to Rawls, ignorance of these details about oneself will lead to principles that are fair to
all. If an individual does not know how he will end up in his own conceived society he is likely not
going to privilege any one class of people but rather develop a scheme of justice that treats all fairly.
In particular, Rawls claims that those in the Original Position would all adopt a strategy which
would maximize the prospects of the least well-off (because they themselves might be a part of that
segment of society). Rawls seeks to use an argument that the principles of justice are what would
be agreed upon if people were in the hypothetical situation of the Original Position and that those
principles have moral weight as a result of that. It is not historical in the sense that it is not assumed
that the agreement has ever been, or even could ever have been, derived in the real world outside of
carefully limited experimental exercises.6
Rawls claims that the parties in the Original Position would adopt two principles which would then
govern the assignment of rights and duties and regulate the distribution of social and economic
advantages across society:
“They are the principles that rational and free persons concerned to further their own
interests would accept in an initial position of equality as defining the fundamentals of
the terms of their association.”
Rawls’ First Principle of Justice
Each person is to have an equal right to the most extensive basic liberty compatible with a similar
liberty for others. The basic liberties of citizens are
 the political liberty to vote and run for office
 freedom of speech and assembly
 liberty of conscience
 freedom to own personal property
 freedom from arbitrary arrest.
However, Rawls also says:
“Liberties not on the list, such as ownership of the means of production and freedom of
contract as understood by the doctrine of laissez-faire are not basic and so they are
not protected by the priority of the first principle.”
which means, of course, that some people may own more goods than others and accumulate wealth
beyond others.

Rawls’ Second Principle of Justice

Social and economic inequalities are to be arranged so that two conditions are met:
1. Social and economic inequalities are to be of the greatest benefit to the least-advantaged
members of society, consistent with the “difference principle.”
Rawls believed that this “difference principle” would be a rational choice for the
representatives in the Original Position because each member of society has an equal claim
on their society’s goods. Natural attributes should not affect this claim, so the basic right of
any individual, before further considerations are taken into account, must be to an equal

6 For these reasons Rawls’ theory has been criticized as overly idealistic and optimistic. While the principles
he strives for may be supremely fair they don’t into account entrenched interests and the powerful position in
which people who currently benefit from societal inequalities are able to situate themselves. While it is
conceivable that such individual might react as Rawls hoped in a contrived experiment or hypothetical
situation, it is almost absolutely certain they would not subsequently agree to relinquish and advantage they
currently enjoyed to actually implement such a system of ethics. It may be, at most, a goal to strive toward.

Jim Janossy 2014

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share in material wealth. What, then, could justify unequal distribution? Rawls argues that
inequality is acceptable only if it is to the advantage of those who are worst-off. His
argument for this position rests heavily on the claim that morally arbitrary factors, such as
the family one is born into, shouldn't determine one's life chances or opportunities.
2. Social and economic inequalities are to be arranged such that offices and positions in
government and private industry are open to everyone under conditions of fair equality of
opportunity.
Fair equality of opportunity requires not merely that offices and employment are
distributed on the basis of merit but that everyone has a reasonable opportunity to acquire
the skills on the basis of which merit is assessed. This has profound implications for
equalizing opportunities for the quality of life, such as prenatal healthcare and health care
for the young which affects the ability to learn, and for educational opportunities. In neither
of these areas does American society as presently constituted appear just, and hence moral,
according to this principle.7
Philosopher and Nobel Prize-winning economist Amartya Sen critiques A Theory of Justice in his
2009 book The Idea of Justice. He credits Rawls for revitalizing the interest in the ideas of what
justice means and the stress put on fairness, objectivity, equality of opportunity, removal of
poverty, and freedom. However Sen states that ideas about a perfectly just world do not help
redress actual existing inequality. Sen faults Rawls for an over-emphasis on institutions as
guarantors of justice not considering the effects of human behavior on the institutions' ability to
maintain a just society. Sen believes Rawls understates the difficulty in getting everyone in society
to adhere to the norms of a just society defined as defined by Rawls.
Perhaps the most significant problem in Rawls’ conception of his basis for Justice ethics is the idea
that the people of which a society is composed could actually revert to a “clean slate” where
everyone started out as equal, which is what the Veil of Ignorance in this case requires. Not
hypothetically, but for real! In fact “revert” may an incorrect choice of words. If human society is an
outgrowth of evolutionary processes as theorized by Frans de Waal then dominance by some
members and subservience by others is probably the natural state; there most likely never was a
state of equality. If an actual society does not begin in a state of equality, or place itself into that
state in fact, conservative elements will certainly seek to maintain the status quo which provides
them advantage. They will not willingly relinquish the prerogatives and advantages they enjoy,
especially when those possessions make it possible for them to enforce the maintenance of the
status quo by control of the governmental structure.

7One need only look at publicly-available health and educational expenditures across American states to note
the extreme disparities in these areas. See http://kff.org/health-reform/issue-brief/the-coverage-gap-
uninsured-poor-adults-in-states-that-do-not-expand-medicaid and http://www.governing.com/gov-
data/education-data/state-education-spending-per-pupil-data.html.

Jim Janossy 2014

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The Fairness Approach1

Capsim, Inc.

Note: This is an appropriate summary for your consideration of Rawls’ Justice and Fairness Ethics. The
questions provided here are a good place to start in your ethical analysis based on this ethical
framework. --JJ

We are in the middle of reviewing popular western ethical theories you can use to debrief a case or
ethical dilemma.

The Fairness Approach focuses on these things across the spectrum of society:
 fair and equitable distribution of good and harm
 the social benefits and social costs.

The Fairness Approach starts with these premises:

 all equals should be treated equally
 those who are unequal due to relevant differences should be treated differently in a
manner that is fair and proportionate to their difference.
A classic example would be the payment of a group of employees at different salary levels based on
the contribution their work effort makes to the corporation’s profitability.

Here we assess our action in terms of its fairness to those affected by asking these
questions:
1. Are those who are similar in some relevant aspect treated similarly?
2. Are those who are different in some relevant way treated differently based on a legitimate
distinction and a standard of fairness?
3. Are some favored where they may receive certain benefits for no justifiable reason?
4. Is there a discriminatory practice where some, who are no different than others, bear a
burden that is not imposed on the rest?
5. What are the relevant factors that determine similarities and differences of those in a
group?
6. What is the fair course of action for all the stakeholders or all entities which may be affected
by the outcome?

1This material is from http://www.capsim.com/blog/five-ways-shape-ethical-decisions-fairness-approach, I

have reformatted it slightly to provide bullet and numbered lists replacing continuous sentences. According
to their web site, “Capsim is a global leader in business simulation technology and services designed to teach
business acumen in any learning environment.”

Jim Janossy 2014