Rawls "a Theory of Justice" and its Critics.

• Author: Meikle, Victoria

Chandran Kukathas & Philip Pettit, Rawls "A Theory of Justice" and Its Critics. Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1990. Pp. xi, 169 [$6.95].

Thomas W. Pogge, Realizing Rawls. Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1989. Pp. 296 [$12.95].

Introduction

Two new books on John Rawls' theory (1) suggest constructive criticisms of his theory of justice, with a view to furthering the debate on its relevance and implications. While the two books cover some common ground in that they both respond to the libertarian and communitarian critiques of Rawls, their aims, and the audience to which they are pitched, are otherwise quite different.

In Rawls "A Theory of Justice" and its Critics, (2) Kukathas and Pettit provide an introductory discussion of Rawls' work, an assessment of the importance of his contractarian argument, and an evaluation of his work since 1971. References to the secondary literature on Rawls are limited to the major criticisms. (3) The expository sections are accurate on the whole, and would be accessible to the reader who is new to Rawls' work. While the discussion contains some useful insights, (4) the authors draw two conclusions which can be misleading. These conclusions are unfortunate, since the reader who is new to Rawls will naturally not be in a position to distinguish them from the more accurate portions of the exposition.

The first of these conclusions is that Rawls' contractarian approach is of much less importance than is generally thought. The authors argue that the case in favour of his two principles of justice rests much more heavily than is usually supposed on considerations of what is practicable--what the authors refer to as "feasibility"--rather than on considerations of what a conception of justice ought to be. (5) The second conclusion which may potentially be misleading is that, in his work from 1982 onward, Rawls "forswears Kantianism and recasts his philosophical enterprise as a political rather than a moral endeavour." (6)

Pogge's book, Realizing Rawls, (7) is divided into three parts: a detailed refutation of the libertarian and communitarian critiques; (8) a discussion of the implications of Rawls' principles of justice for the institutions of the nation state; (9) and an argument for their application at the international level. (10) Pogge's treatment is complex, and will be difficult for the reader to appreciate and evaluate unless he or she comes to it with a thorough knowledge of Rawls' work. The text is extensively referenced, and the book contains a useful and apparently complete list of Rawls' published work. (11) In his treatment of the libertarian and communitarian critiques, the author succeeds in cutting through a number of misunderstandings, and in bringing out fundamental points of contention between Rawls and his critics. There are, however, some problems in the way in which Pogge himself applies Rawls' theory to the basic structure of a nation state. In the final part of his book, he argues for the elaboration of just institutions first at the international level, and only secondarily at the level of nation states. In a world in which the existence of nation states is a given, dealing with issues of justice in this order may foreclose the possibility of reaching practicable conclusions.

Due to limitations of space, I will confine my review of these two thought-provoking books to three main issues. First I will look at the responses offered in each of the books to the best-known libertarian and communitarian critiques. In the second section, I will explain why I am not persuaded either by Kukathas' and Pettit's devaluation of the role of the contract in Rawls' theory, or by their characterisation of his more recent work. And finally I will elucidate two fundamental misinterpretations of the way in which Rawls' principles of justice were meant to operate which seem to underlie much of Pogge's discussion of their application to the basic structure of a nation state.

Responses to Nozick and Sandel

Both books make the point that, contrary to Nozick's contention, (12) the difference principle does not in fact require one to treat goods and benefits distributed by the institutions of a basic structure as "manna from heaven;" (13) nor does its realisation require continual ad hoc interference in otherwise just transactions between private individuals. (14) Kukathas and Pettit conclude that Nozick merely offers a "clearly defined alternative" (15) which does not constitute a critique of Rawls' theory, and the discussion is Left at a draw between the two conceptions of justice.

Pogge, however, favours Rawls' position on the basis that patterns of distribution created by the operation of institutions of a basic structure are relevant to the assessment of the justice of those institutions. There are two types of explanation, he argues, for social phenomena, one at the "micro" level, the level of the particular instance, the other at the "macro" or statistical level. (16) As there are two levels of explanation, so there are two levels of meaning:

[W]e cannot, conceptually or causally, evaluate what we are doing to others without understanding the structure of the ground rules that give meaning to our actions and omissions and determine their (often remote) repercussions. (17) An adequate evaluation of the social justice of our actions must take this second level of explanation into consideration:

The social injustice blacks have suffered as victims of the institution of slavery does not consist of a multitude of wrongs committed against them by their ("unjust") slaveholders.... We must reform institutions. (18) Pogge thus sets out the fundamental difference between Rawls' and Nozick's respective approaches to justice: the relevance, for issues of social justice, of patterns of distribution, and therefore of differences in the treatment afforded citizens by the institutions making up a basic structure. In my view, once Nozick's "manna from heaven" and "ad hoc interference" objections have been dealt with, the conclusion that, of the two, Rawls' position is preferable, is irresistible.

Kukathas and Pettit give a fairly accurate account of the main steps in Sandel's critique (19) of Rawls' work, though they concede rather too much in accepting Sandel's account of Rawls' views as "clear and accurate." (20) In his more thorough and more insightful treatment, Pogge sets forth two mistaken ideas on which Sandel's criticisms are centred. First, Sandel adopts Nozick's point that parties in the original position regard natural endowments as a collective asset. (21) Second, Sandel maintains that Rawls is committed, by virtue of his position that natural endowments are arbitrary from a moral point of view, to an unacceptable conception of the self; a self tenuously connected to its natural endowments and barren of attachments and interests that it regards as fundamental to its identity, or "constitutive." (22) Pogge points out, rightly, that Rawls does not question that the better endowed should have control over the development of their gifts, and that the real controversy is over what political, economic and social advantages should flow to them as a result of developing and exercising these special endowments. (23) It is in this context that Rawls asserts the arbitrariness of relatively greater natural endowment, and the consequent injustice of admitting it, per se, as a basis for claims to greater political, social and economic advantages.

During the course of a discussion which is ultimately persuasive, Pogge makes it clear that it is the distribution of natural talents, not those talents themselves, that Rawls regards as a collective asset. (24) While Pogge admits that this may look like quibbling, I believe that it is crucial. Natural differences in the talents of individuals give rise to the potential for political, economic and social hierarchies, and make it possible for such hierarchies to be efficient, to result in more goods and benefits of all types for the members of a collective than would be generated if all citizens were treated as equally well-endowed. Hierarchies establish different social positions, some relatively advantaged and others relatively disadvantaged. The operation of the social, economic and political institutions of a particular society determines which social positions will be more highly valued; these in turn determine which talents and skills will be more rewarded.

No individual alone, however gifted, can generate a more favourable position in a hierarchy. The relative advantage that results when a person develops a highly valued endowment is made possible by the particular institutions of the society in which he or she lives. Unless we are prepared to assume, as Rawls is not, that the mere fact of better endowment gives rise to greater moral worth, and that the appropriate recognition of such moral worth consists in greater social and economic rewards, there is no reason not to view the distribution of endowments as a collective asset. To agree to do so creates the possibility that the relative advantage of the naturally better endowed may ultimately constitute a benefit for all. That hierarchies can be just only if they benefit all citizens is fundamental to Rawls' theory.

2. The Original Position: An Alternative to "Thinking Directly" About Social Justice

   The thrust of the argument presented by Kukathas and Pettit is that the role of the contract in Rawls' theory, even as originally set out in A Theory of Justice, is much less important than many have taken it to...