The Idea of Justice

by Amartya Sen

  j u s t i c e a n d t h e w o r l d There are indeed schools of thought which insist, explicitly or by implication, that all the distinct values must be reduced ultimately to a single source of importance. To some extent that search is fed by fear and panic about what is called non-commensurability – that is, irreducible diversity between distinct objects of value. This anxiety, based on the presumption of some alleged barriers to judging the relative importance of distinct objects, overlooks the fact that nearly all appraisals undertaken as a part of normal living involve prioritization and weighing of distinct concerns, and that there is nothing particularly special in the recognition that evaluation has to grapple with competing priorities.* The fact that we understand perfectly clearly that apples are not oranges, and that their virtues as food vary in different dimensions – from pleasure to nutrition – does not keep us transfixed with indecision every time we face a choice between the two in deciding what to eat. Those who are insistent that human beings cannot cope with determining what to do unless all values are somehow reduced to no more than one, are evidently comfortable with counting (‘is it more or is it less?’) but not with judgement (‘is this more important than the other?’).

  The plurality of reasons that a theory of justice has to accommodate relates not only to the diversity of objects of value that the theory recognizes as significant, but also to the type of concerns for which the theory may make room, for example, on the importance of different kinds of equality or liberty.† Judgements about justice have to take on board the task of accommodating different kinds of reasons and evaluative concerns. The recognition that we can often prioritize and order the relative importance of competing considerations does not, however, indicate that all alternative scenarios can always be completely ordered, even by the same person. A person may have clear views on some rankings and yet not be sure enough about some other comparisons. The fact that a person can reason his or her way David Hume, given the latter’s proto-utilitarian inclinations. Bentham would, of course, fit the description more easily than Hume.

  * This question was discussed in Chapter 11, ‘Lives, Freedoms and Capabilities’, in the specific context of evaluating the relative importance of distinct capabilities.

  † The inescapable pluralities within the broad ideas of equality and liberty were examined in Chapter 14, ‘Equality and Liberty’.

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  t h e i d e a o f j u s t i c e into rejecting slavery or the subjugation of women does not indicate that the same person must be able to decide with certainty whether a 40 per cent top rate of income tax would be better than – or more just than – a top rate of 39 per cent. Reasoned conclusions can easily take the form of partial rankings, and, as has been discussed earlier, there is nothing particularly defeatist in that acknowledgement.

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  If incomplete resolution can be a part of the discipline of an individual’s evaluative assessment, it plays an even more prominent part in what public reasoning can be expected to yield. When dealing with a group, there is need for accommodation not only of different individuals’ respective partial rankings, but also of the extent of incompleteness that may exist in a shared partial ranking on which different individuals can reasonably agree.* It was Mary Wollstonecraft’s claim that if and when people examine with impartiality the reasons for respecting women’s basic freedoms, they will agree that

  ‘reason calls for this respect’. The actual disagreements that exist may be removed through reasoning, helped by questioning established prejudices, vested interests and unexamined preconceptions. Many such agreements of real significance can be reached, but this is not to claim that every conceivable problem of social choice can be settled this way.

  Plurality of reasons can sometimes pose no problem for a definitive decision, whereas in other cases it can pose a serious challenge. The case of the three children with claims on a flute, discussed in the Introduction, illustrated the possibility of an impasse in trying to decide what would be the just thing to do. But the acceptance of a diversity of considerations does not entail that an impasse would necessarily arise. Even in the case of the three children, it may turn out that the child who has made the flute, Carla, is also the poorest, or the only one who knows how to play the flute. Or it might be the

  * This issue was discussed in Chapter 4, ‘Voice and Social Choice’.

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  j u s t i c e a n d t h e w o r l d case that the deprivation of the poorest child, Bob, is so extreme, and his dependence on something to play with so important for a plausible life, that the poverty-based argument might come to dominate the judgement of justice. There can be a congruence of different reasons in many particular cases. The idea of justice does, it would seem, include cases of different types, with easy resolution in some instances and very hard decisional problems in others.

  One implication of this line of reasoning is the recognition that a broad theory of justice that makes room for non-congruent considerations within the body of that broad theory need not thereby make itself incoherent, or unmanageable, or useless. Definite conclusions can emerge despite the plurality.* When the competing concerns reflected in that plurality have far-reaching merits, on the relative strength of which we remain partially undecided, then it would make good sense to try to see how far we can go even without resolving completely the problems of relative weights.† And sometimes we can go far enough for the theory to be of very considerable use in application, without sacrificing any of the rigorous demands of each competing line of argument.

  The competing criteria will yield different rankings of alternatives, with some shared elements and some divergent ones. The intersection

  – or the shared elements of the rankings – of the diverse orderings generated by the different priorities will yield a partial ordering that ranks some alternatives against each other with great clarity and internal consistency, while failing altogether to rank other pairs of

  * This issue relates closely to the tendency of ‘participants in legal controversies to try to produce incompletely theorized agreements on particular outcomes’, as Cass Sunstein has discussed illuminatingly in his far-reaching essay, ‘Incompletely Theorized Agreements’, Harvard Law Review, 108 (May 1995). While Sunstein focuses on the possibility of a practical agreement without a consensus on the theory that lies behind that choice (and this is indeed an important issue in legal as well as non-legal decisions), I am trying to clarify a related but somewhat different question. It is being argued here that considerable heterogeneity of perspectives can be accommodated internally within a capacious theory, generating partially complete rankings which help to separate out plausible decisions (if not ‘the best’ decision) from clearly rejected proposals.

  † The acceptance of an unresolvable diversity of views is, however, a last resort, rather than a first option, since all disagreements need to be critically examined and assessed first, as was discussed in Chapter 1, ‘Reason and Objectivity’.

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  t h e i d e a o f j u s t i c e alternatives.* The commonality of the shared partial ranking can then be seen as the definitive outcome of that broad theory. Definitive conclusions are of use as and when they emerge, without there being any necessity to look for something of a guarantee that a ‘best’ or a

  ‘right’ choice must invariably emerge in every case in which we are tempted to invoke the idea of justice.

  The basic issue here, which is simple enough when shorn of the analytical formalities, is the need to recognize that a complete theory of justice may well yield an incomplete ranking of alternative courses of decision, and that an agreed partial ranking will speak unambiguously in some cases and hold its silence in others. When Condorcet and Smith argued that the abolition of slavery would make the world far less unjust, they were asserting the possibility of ranking the world with and without slavery, in favour of the latter, that i
s, showing the superiority – and greater justice – of a world without slavery. In asserting such a conclusion they were not also making the further claim that all the alternatives that can be generated by variations of institutions and policies can be fully ranked against each other. Slavery as an institution can be assessed without evaluating – with the same definitiveness – all the other institutional choices the world faces. We do not live in an ‘all or nothing’ world.

  It is important to emphasize, particularly to avoid a possible misunderstanding, that the agreed acceptance that is sought is not exactly the same thing as complete unanimity of different persons’ actual preference rankings over the domain of the reasoned partial ordering.

  There is no presumption here that every slave-owner must opt for renunciation of his rights over other human beings – rights that are given to him by the established laws of the land. The claim that Smith or Condorcet or Wollstonecraft made was, rather, that arguments in defence of slavery would be overwhelmed by the case for abolition, given the requirements of public reasoning and the demands of impar-

  * There are well-defined mathematical resolutions in the identification of the domain of clear-cut decisions when the intersection that emerges from surviving plural criteria has incompleteness, on which see my Collective Choice and Social Welfare (San Francisco, CA: Holden-Day, 1970; republished, Amsterdam: North-Holland, 1979); also ‘Interpersonal Aggregation and Partial Comparability’, Econometrica, 38 (1970), and ‘Maximization and the Act of Choice’, Econometrica, 65 (1997).

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  j u s t i c e a n d t h e w o r l d tiality. The elements of congruence of surviving impartial reasonings form the basis of a partial ordering underlying the claims of manifest enhancement of justice (as was discussed earlier). The basis of a partial ordering aimed at comparisons of justice is the congruence of the conclusions of impartial reasonings, which is not the same thing as the requirement of complete agreement of the personal preferences entertained by different individuals.*

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  To be useful, a social ranking must have some substantive coverage, but need not be complete. A theory of justice has to rely fundamentally on partial orderings based on the intersection – or commonality – of distinct rankings drawing on different reasons of justice that can all survive the scrutiny of public reasoning. In the particular example of the three approaches to allocating the flute (discussed in the Introduction), it is quite possible that no unanimity may emerge at all in the rankings between those three alternatives. If we are specifically concerned with a choice between precisely those three alternatives, we shall not be able to obtain help from a ranking that is incomplete in that choice.

  On the other hand, there are a great many choices in which a partial ordering with specific gaps could give us a great deal of guidance. If, for example, through critical scrutiny of reasons of justice, we can place an alternative x above both y and z, without being able to rank y and z against each other, we can comfortably go for x, without having to resolve the dispute between y and z. If we are less lucky, and scrutiny of reasons of justice does not yield a ranking between x and y, but places both x and y above z, then we do not have a specific

  * There is clearly a connection here with the distinction between the demands of

  ‘rationality’ and those of ‘reasonableness’ discussed in Chapters 8, ‘Rationality and Other People’ and 9, ‘Plurality of Impartial Reasons’. That distinction has Rawlsian roots, but in its use here there is more acceptance of surviving plurality of impartial reasons than is accommodated in the Rawlsian principles of justice (as was discussed in Chapter 2, ‘Rawls and Beyond’).

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  t h e i d e a o f j u s t i c e choice that emerges from considerations of justice alone. And yet reasons of justice would still guide us to reject and shun altogether the alternative z, which is clearly inferior to both x and y.

  Partial orderings of this kind can have quite a significant reach; for example, if it is agreed that the status quo in the United States, which does not come anywhere close to universal medical coverage, is distinctly less just than a number of specific alternatives which offer different schemes of coverage for all, then on the grounds of justice we can reject the status quo of non-universal coverage, even if reasons of justice do not fully rank the alternatives that are all superior to the status quo. We have excellent reason to scrutinize and critically examine the arguments based on considerations of justice to see how far we can extend the partial ordering that emanates from that perspective. We have no great reason to turn down the help we get from the partial ordering that we end up with, even if it leaves some choices beyond reach. In the case of healthcare, we would have reason enough to press for universal medical care coverage through one of the specified ways, even if we are unable to agree on other issues of social choice.*

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  Debates about justice – if they are going to relate to practicalities –

  cannot but be about comparisons. We do not abstain from comparisons even if we are unable to identify the perfectly just. For example, it may well turn out that the introduction of social policies that eliminate widespread hunger, or remove rampant illiteracy, can be endorsed by a reasoned agreement that it would be an advancement

  * Rational choice would demand that one of the superior – but mutually unranked –

  alternatives be chosen, rather than sticking to the distinctly inferior status quo as a result of indecision regarding precisely which superior alternative is to be adopted.

  There is a lesson here from the old story of Buridan’s ass that failed to determine which of two haystacks in front of it was the better one, and died of starvation thanks to indefinite dithering. The demands of reasoning and rationality with incomplete orderings are discussed in my ‘Maximization and the Act of Choice’, Econometrica, 65 (1997), and Rationality and Freedom (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2002).

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  j u s t i c e a n d t h e w o r l d of justice. But the implementation of such policies could still leave out many improvements that we can propose individually and even accept socially. The identification of the transcendental requirements of a fully just society, if it were possible to make such an identification, would of course have a great many other demands on how to idealize an actual society – whether or not such changes could actually be implemented. Justice-enhancing changes or reforms demand comparative assessments, not simply an immaculate identification of ‘ the just society’ (or ‘the just institutions’).

  If the reasoning here is right, an approach to justice can be both entirely acceptable in theory and eminently useable in practice, even without its being able to identify the demands of perfectly just societies (or the exact nature of ‘just institutions’). The approach can include the understanding that different reasonable and impartial judges could sensibly differ on the identification – and even on the existence – of a transcendental alternative. Perhaps more importantly, the approach can recognize – and allow – the possibility that even a specific individual may not be fully resolved on the comparisons between the different alternatives, if he or she is unable to jettison, through critical scrutiny, every competing consideration save one.

  Justice is an immensely important idea that has moved people in the past and will continue to move people in the future. And reasoning and critical scrutiny can indeed offer much to extend the reach and to sharpen the content of this momentous concept. And yet it would be a mistake to expect that every decisional problem for which the idea of justice might conceivably be relevant would, in fact, be resolved through reasoned scrutiny. And it would also be a mistake to assume, as was discussed earlier, that since not all disputes can be resolved through critical scrutiny, we do not have secure enough grounds to use the idea of justice in those cases in which reasoned scrutiny yields a conclusive judgement. We go as far as we reasonabl
y can.

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  t h e i d e a o f j u s t i c e j u s t i c e a n d o p e n i m p a r t i a l i t y A question that remains is the reach and coverage of the reasonable evaluations that come from many different sides and many different lands. Is the exercise of impartiality – or fairness – to be confined within the borders of a country with a shared sovereignty, or within a culture with shared attitudes and priorities? That issue, discussed earlier (in Chapters 5–9), can be usefully recapitulated, given its importance to the approach to justice presented in this book.

  There are two principal grounds for requiring that the encounter of public reasoning about justice should go beyond the boundaries of a state or a region, and these are based respectively on the relevance of other people’s interests for the sake of avoiding bias and being fair to others, and on the pertinence of other people’s perspectives to broaden our own investigation of relevant principles, for the sake of avoiding under-scrutinized parochialism of values and presumptions in the local community.*

  The first ground, related to the interdependence of interests, is easy enough to appreciate in the world in which we live. How America responds to the barbarity of 9/11 in New York affects the lives of many hundreds of millions elsewhere in the world – in Afghanistan and Iraq, of course, but also well beyond these direct fields of American action.† Similarly, how America succeeds in managing its present economic crisis (the crisis of 2008–9 that is unfolding as this book is being completed) will have a profound effect on other countries that have trade and financial relations with America and still others who have business relations with those who have commerce with America.

  * These issues were discussed in Chapters 5, ‘Impartiality and Objectivity’, and 6,

  ‘Closed and Open Impartiality’.