Max RogoskiJohn Rawls in Justice as Fairness and Robert Nozick in Anarchy, State, and Utopia present brilliant, subtly argued and conflicting… [630453]

Max RogoskiJohn Rawls in Justice as Fairness and Robert Nozick in Anarchy, State, and Utopia present brilliant, subtly argued and conflicting conceptions of justice with starkly different repercussions for a distributive state. The interplay and repartee between Rawls’ theory of justice as fairness and Nozick’s entitlement theory of justice is a rather dazzling display and could occupy anyone’s attention far beyond the scope of a five page paper. Any paper of this scope could only allow a superficial treatment of the theories, even with a narrow regard for Rawls’ difference principal. This paper seeks to argue that Rawls does construct a convincing set of arguments justifying his difference principle first with respect to the truism that there is no “moral desert” and second that society is as a form of fair social cooperation. Nozick’s critique is penetrating and extensive, although Rawls is able to respond to some arguments by a further refinement and clarification of justice as fairness. However, Nozick ultimately reveals that Rawls’ conception rests on principles for which he does not, or is unable to provide substantial justification. Nozick succeeds in making a reader realize that justice as fairness cannot appeal to truth or validity solely by a reasoned procession of arguments. Rawls himself acknowledges that specifically with regard to the difference principle, one must accept as given a basic foundation and evaluate the theory from a holistic perspective which may rely on strict deductive logic.A central component of Rawls’ justification of his difference1 principle is the idea that “we do not deserve (in the sense of moral desert) our place in the distribution of native endowments.”2 Rawls elaborates that this is a “moral truism” and asks the following rhetorical questions: Do people really think that they are (morally) deserved to be born more gifted than others? Do 1 Why bother with any difference at all? Since in the original position all parties are equally situated and all citizens are free and equal, shouldn’t they adopt an equal division of wealth? What might cause everyone to depart from a starting point of equal division? Rawls says that people will only agree upon inequality if it works to improve everybody’s situation. Inequality can be justified to cover the costs of training and education, as a method of incentive, and as an encouragement to take positions of responsibility, but only if such inequality benefits all. Thus the difference principle specifies that the more advantaged group, by improving their situation must make the least advantaged group better off as well.2 Justice as Fairness. p. 74

they think that they (morally) deserved to be born a man rather than a woman, or visa versa? Do they think they deserved to be born into a wealthier rather than into a poorer family? No.3 Rawls takes the trouble to clearly express that our “natural endowments” (ie. innate talents) are bestowed with no respect to merit of our own. And if a person does not deserve his natural intelligence, or superior athletic ability, he cannot claim to deserve or be entitled to the material benefits that his natural endowment gained him. A man can say as little about “deserving” his six figure salary as he can about “deserving” to be born with intelligence in America instead of Rwanda.4 We see how the absence of any moral desert leads to the conclusion that you are not entitled to your share in the resulting distribution of primary goods. Since the assignment of natural endowments is arbitrary and it does not matter which particular person receives a good endowment, in a free and equal democracy natural endowments should be regarded as collective assets.5 Whereby they should benefit everyone who will then have the primary goods requisite to exercise the fundamental moral powers of free and equal citizens. A more specific stipulation is that the gains of the well endowed must benefit the least well off (merely a restatment that natural endowments be treated as collective assets and benefit everyone). Another perspective is asking how to justify to the least well off their poor condition, since it is no fault of their own. The only valid justification for their realtively “poor” condition is that they are less “poor” as a result of the inequality than they would be if everything were equal.Embedded within Rawls’ justification of the difference principle is a view of “society as a fair system of cooperation between citizens regarded as free and equal”6 Reciprocity is an 3 Justice as Fairness. pp. 74-754 Nozick points out, rather flippantly, that at its logical extreme Rawls deny any sort of human autonomy. To clear up this misconception Rawls writes, “[Justice as fairness] does not say that we never deserve in an appropriate way the social position or the offices we may hold in later life, or the realized skills and educated abilities we may have after we have reached the age of reason,” and also “A basic structure… rewards people, not for their place in that distribution, but for training and educating their endowments.” A professional athlete may legitimately take credit for training hard every day to achieve the potential of her natural endowment. But to say that she deserved her natural athletic prowess – without which a person would have no hope of becoming a professional athlete no matter how hard she trained – is incorrect.5 The formulation of the original position and veil of ignorance is meant to help us see that this is true. That treating natural endowments as a collective assets is the what citizens would agree upon in the original position, and thus they would agree to the difference principle as a principle of justice.6 Justice as Fairness. p. 41

unalienable feature of this cooperative society. Consider how successful the person with the most privileged natural endowment would fare in a situation without anyone else. It seems they would be able to maintain a standard of living at most marginally above a subsistence level. So when they enter into society, they are not producing on their own. All of their efforts rely on the concurrent efforts of the other members of society. Rawls states, “I think that in some form [reciprocity for a political conception of justice] is essential to democratic equality once we view society as a fair system of social cooperation.”7 Every individual’s achievement relies on the accomplishments of those who have come before him, and those who work with him, providing a wealth of services that he is freed from having to provide for himself. As such it is not unreasonable to see nearly all production as a effort that required the cooperation of all members within the social order. And in a society of fair cooperation, the least advantaged must benefit in a reciprocal way, for the distribution to be just. One slightly comparable way of phrasing this is to say it is not just if the most advantaged group gains wealth at the same time as the least advantaged group looses wealth, because it is only through the cooperation of the least well off that the advantaged have any money to speak of at all. This situation seems like unfair explotation because it violates the sense of reciprocity, and is a basis for justifying the difference principle.8 Nozick critiques Rawls’ distributive justice on several grounds, and one of the first reasons is that it constrains individual’s liberty to engage in voluntary transfers of wealth because that would disturb the just distribution. To that end Nozick provides the Wilt Chamberlain example and states that since people are willing to give him more money, the “just” pattern is disturbed by liberty. Thus any attempt to maintain a pattern would require that one must continually interfere to take resources from some person and chose to give to them to another. Rawls’ responds by saying that his distributive justice would need to interfere no more 7 Justice as Fairness. p. 1338 It should be noted that the two above principles are the most basic justifications for the difference principle once the prior principles of justice have already been accepted and adopted!

continually than “familiar forms of taxation.”9 Even Nozick concedes a minimal manner of redistribution to ensure security for everyone in the state, so this objection to patterned distributions, while it is well reasoned (and contains other facets), does not hold much power with this reader or, it seems with the American public, who do in fact pay taxes.The first consideration is a critiques of any sort of distributive system of justice, while two of Nozick’s other main arguments are directed specifically at Rawls’ theory. The first arguments seeks to prove that Rawls’ notion of social cooperation is entirely wrong. Nozick illustrates this with the example of ten Robinson Crusoes who land on ten islands with different endowments and stipulates that the least well off Robinson Crusoe cannot make claims of justice on the others because each received their outcome entirely through their own efforts. In a state of absolute social noncooperation, Rawls’ theory cannot apply. Then Nozick seeks to establish that there is nothing substantial behind “social cooperation” beyond a series of sequential voluntary exchanges which should not raise special problems about the end distribution. In essence he is seeking to supplant Rawls’ conception of social cooperation with his theory of justice in transfers. Nozick also questions the central role of the least well off in Rawls’ theory. He argues that Rawls does not consider why the better endowed group would agree to the demands placed on them by the least well off, and why they do not propose similar demands.10 Nozick thinks that Rawls has not provided sufficient justification so that the favored group would not complain “at being required to have less in order than another B might have more than he otherwise would.”11 Nozick’s other central argument is that Rawls has not sufficiently proven the logical connection between arbitrary natural endowments and the validity of a distribution to nullify the effects of natural differences. Nozick presents four logical chains for this conclusion and refutes 9 Justice as Fairness. p. 5110 Specifically he imagines the better endowed would make a similar proposal and say: “Look worse endowed: you gain by cooperating with us. If you want our cooperation you’ll have to accept reasonable terms. We propose these terms: We’ll cooperate with you so long as we get as much as possible….” on p. 195 of Anarchy, State and Utopia. 11 Anarchy, State and Utopia. p. 197

each of the premises for these arguments as either inconsistent with Rawls’ theory, or insufficiently justified. The first premise of the last logical chain which is probably the closest to Rawls’ actual reasoning, is that “Holdings ought to be equal, unless there is a (weighty) moral reason why they ought to be unequal.”12 Nozick refutes this premise because he does not accept the high value placed on equality.In essence Nozick’s two direct critiques of Rawls’ theory, as outlined here, are attacks on the role that equality plays in Rawls’ conception of justice. The last instance clearly shows Nozick questioning why equality is a starting premise. Nozick does not hold that equality is a worthy goal. His highest good is the freedom to choose what you want, and to receive what you chose (as supported by his exclusively free market conception of society). Equality or welfare doesn’t matter when evaluating justice – only that acceptable means were used in obtaining what could be a vastly unequal distribution so that the least well off could hardly be considered free or equal.Rawls’ response to Nozick’s critique of his logical shortcomings is the most explicit and perhaps more powerful. He writes that he tried to present deductive reasoning as “a kind of moral geometry with all the rigor that name suggests, even though we grant our reasoning is highly intuitive and falls far short of that ideal.”13 Rawls further writes that rigorous deductive reasoning cannot be attained, and instead a political conception should be judged on “how well it identifies the more relevant considerations and helps us to balance them in more important particular cases….”14 In essence he says his theory is right if it is practically useful, and it is acceptable if it relies on intuition and not rigorous chains of logic. Rawls also respond briefly to Nozick’s appraisal of his idea of “social cooperation.” He argues that a conception of society as a fair system social cooperation is “deeply embedded” in a public culture of democracy15 and is 12 Justice as Fairness. p. 22213 Ibid. p. 13314 Ibid. p. 13415 Ibid. p. 25

favored over what Nozick presents as only a series of sequential market actions.16 Rawls also generally responds to Nozick’s entitlement theory with the claim that: “Should there be no such principle, the structure of social worlds and the general facts of nature would be to this extent hostile to the very idea of democratic equality.”17 Rawls’ response is clearly not sufficient to handle all of Nozick’s critiques. He does not take up how his reciprocal conception of society stands up to Nozick’s. He dismisses Nozick’s arguments by saying all of his claims needn’t be subject to logical exaction. There are many points in Nozick’s chapter on distributive justice that Rawls does not address fully or at all. This is not to say that his response fails. Yes, it is true that Rawls was unable to convincingly refute every one of Nozick’s points, and it is also true that his theory does not advance by the inexorable links of cold logic. This does not mean that Nozick “wins.” Rather, Nozick has highlighted the foundational premises in Rawls’ arguments. Nozick has argued logically that the arbitrariness of natural endowments is not sufficient to say a person is not entitled to their desert. Yet, intuitively Rawls’ argument rings far more true to me. I like equality. I think any theory that uses equality as a cornerstone is most likely a damn good theory. I like fair cooperation and reciprocity. Perhaps Rawls does not do enough to justify these, because he takes as his starting point a modern democracy which presumably already values those things. That is fine by me. The whole of his theory, and its beautiful conception of a just society stands together as a brilliant holistic counterpoint to Nozick’s critique.16 Though Rawls does not present examples or evidence for this we can illustrate situations in our own democratic culture that give clear preference to his claim. Antitrust laws and lawsuits show that our society believes that a monopoly is detrimental and should be regulated. Nozick would argue against such regulation since both parties are engaging in voluntary exchange. The public reason for this is that a monopoly is somehow unfair and does not have a place in a cooperative social environment because of its coercive power. Another, perhaps better example is legislation that defends worker’s rights. In the period of industrialization and even in the early 20th century we think of businesses “exploiting workers” by “forcing” them to work long hours for little pay and no benefits, often in situations dangerous to their health. As per Nozick the workers were engaged in a voluntary exchange with the owners of labor for wages. And yet legislation was passed limiting what employers could do, which also supports the notion that most people in a democratic culture view society as something that should be fair and cooperative, and unfettered market principals are not a sufficient basis for society.17 Justice as Fairness. pg. 76