Brief Notes on Rawls Theory of Justice Tom Atchison

Rawls argues that:

1. The basic idea of the social contract tradition is a good one, but we need to make one adjustment: the choice of basic rules will be fair only if it is made from behind "a veil of ignorance." That is, we should imagine that the people who are trying to agree on a contract (a set of rules) are ignorant of what their specific place or role in society will be. We should imagine that they don't know what race or gender or class they will belong to, what talents or disabilities they will have, or even what their personal tastes and preferences will be. If they were ignorant of all these things, then they would not be tempted to try to skew the social rules to benefit themselves, and they could agree on rules that were fair to everyone.

2. If people were choosing fundamental principles 'behind a veil of ignorance,' it would be rational for them to use the very conservative (risk-avoiding) 'maximin' rule of choice. This rule says that you should choose the option that has the best ‘worst case outcome’. That is, for each option on your menu, consider what is the worst possible outcome that might result if you choose that option. Then choose the option where that worst possible outcome is as good as it can be.

3. If they followed this rule, they would choose Rawls' two principles of justice. That is they would choose principles that called for:

1. protection of civil and political liberties (because these are of fundamental importance to one's ability to pursue one's own plan of life, whatever it is)

2. minimization of inequalities of wealth, power, authority, and so on, except when these inequalities are

a. open to everyone under conditions of fair equality of opportunity, and

b. to everyone's benefit -- as when the possibility of earning greater rewards motivates individuals to work harder and contribute more to a socially useful enterprise (Rawls calls this “the difference principle”).

4. Taxes to support programs that expand opportunities (like public education) and provide what Rawls calls a 'social minimum' (what others sometimes call a 'social safety net') are not unfair to those who are better off, because:

1. Their ability to earn higher incomes is only partly a result of their own effort. It depends on the presence of a social context in which those efforts can bear fruit. (Without that social context – the institutions and practices of an ongoing society – a person’s individual effort would not generate much wealth.)
2. It is also largely a result of good fortune: Either inherited social advantages like wealth, connections, or access to better-than-average education or inherited natural advantages like intelligence, creativity, or athletic ability. (According to Rawls, even your ability to develop your natural talents by working hard, practicing, studying, etc. is dependent on a kind of luck. You will have acquired the character traits necessary to do these things, he says, only if you were lucky enough to be born into "happy family or social circumstances.")