How to Think Politically

by James Bernard Murphy

  No society will be just, Rawls claims, if it operates like a lottery, where our individual fortunes in life are determined by the random effects of luck. No one has a legitimate claim to the good fortune they may accidentally benefit from, such as natural talents and inherited wealth, just as those with physical handicaps or who suffer misfortune in life do not deserve the bad consequences that may arise from such accidents. These random effects are ‘arbitrary from a moral point of view’ and therefore should have no bearing on our prospects and opportunities in life, according to Rawls. They are simply not fair. Instead, people should ‘agree to share one another’s fate’ as a way of addressing the arbitrary and uneven impact of luck so that everyone enjoys an equal opportunity to live a good life, however they understand that. Goods and resources should be distributed according to fair principles of justice, not blind chance.

  But what might these principles be, and how will we find them? In answering these questions, Rawls invites his readers to consider what distribution of wealth and property they would choose if, under an imaginary ‘veil of ignorance’, they knew nothing about their own circumstances in life. This thought experiment is intended to get us to consider such principles independently of our personal circumstances, which are likely to skew our judgement towards our own selfish interests. This idea is similar to a courtroom, where jurors are deliberately kept in the dark about irrelevant facts about the defendant so their judgement in the case is not biased. That’s why we say that justice is blind: it does not and should not see what is not relevant. If jurors are told some irrelevant but incriminating fact about a defendant during a trial, the judge should instruct them to disregard it. This does not mean that they literally forget it, since it is not possible to will yourself to forget something. But they set knowledge of it aside when deliberating about the case, to ensure fairness. If we do not know where we will end up in society when thinking about justice, then even a selfish person will choose impartially. Rawls calls this ‘justice as fairness’.

  By this method, a rationally self-interested person would choose the safest option, in case he ends up at the bottom of the heap in an unequal society. That way, he is no worse off than anyone else. Specifically, according to Rawls, reasonable and impartial people under an imaginary ‘veil of ignorance’ about their position in society would choose two principles of justice to govern the basic structure of the society and ensure a fair distribution of its goods. First, equal liberty for everyone. Second, inequalities would be allowed only where they are of ‘the greatest advantage to the least-advantaged members of society’ (what he calls the ‘difference principle’) and there is equal opportunity to hold offices and positions. Equal liberty for Rawls includes basic political rights and freedoms, such as freedom of speech and assembly and voting and running for public office. These are goods we would choose if we knew nothing about ourselves since they are things ‘a rational man wants whatever else he wants’. You don’t need to know anything about yourself or your position to desire these basic liberties, which Rawls assumes all reasonable people would want. Controversially, he specifically excludes the right to own ‘certain kinds of property (e.g. means of production) and freedom of contract as understood by the doctrine of laissez-faire’. So there is no right to own large-scale enterprises and important resources that are the basic components of a modern industrial economy, such as factories, banks and utilities, which together constitute the ‘means of production’. Contrary to John Locke, no one has a right to own and dispose of property that they have legitimately (as Locke sees it) acquired in a just society without limit. So inheriting wealth from your rich parents, for example, is unfair, as that is just a matter of good luck, and luck is contrary to justice. Rawls believed that a just society should neutralize the effects of random events on people’s life prospects to the degree that this is possible. Justice requires that the basic structure of society be ordered so that accidental advantages and disadvantages are treated as a common asset of the whole society rather than of individuals, which is similar to Marx’s idea of communism (‘from each according to his abilities, to each according to his needs’). For example, someone born with a physical handicap should not have to bear the extra costs that arise from it, since it is not their fault. Equally, a person born with great natural intelligence should not benefit from this ability, which they have done nothing to deserve. That is why Rawls is seen as a leading example of what is now called ‘luck egalitarianism’.

  But Rawls is no Marxist. In A Theory of Justice he claims that reasonably impartial people under the ‘veil of ignorance’ would agree to some wealth inequality if (and only if) it improves the wellbeing of the poorest in society. In some circumstances, allowing a few to acquire more than others may grow the economy and thereby improve the circumstances of the least well off if some of it reaches them too. So, for example, letting someone who is particularly talented earn a lot more than others is permissible only if the extra he earns also benefits the poorest in society, perhaps by increasing tax revenues that can be redistributed to the poor in an expanding economy. Unlike Rousseau, Rawls is against rounding down to achieve equality, making everyone poorer in order to make everyone more equal. Rousseau agreed with Socrates that wealth corrupts morals, so he favoured a society that was materially poor (although not desperately so) and equal, something Rawls finds perverse. Rawls’s prudence has been viewed by many Marxists and socialists as a sell-out to capitalism. However, he later claimed that liberal principles of justice may actually be incompatible with even a modified form of capitalism.

  Since Rawls was mainly concerned about what justice is (basically), he said relatively little about how to implement it. He does tell us that a strong and active state is required, in his words, ‘to preserve an approximate justice in distributive shares by means of taxation and the necessary adjustments to the rights of property’. This probably means a progressive income tax and significant restrictions on inheritance, both of which are already normal across the developed world. It also entails laws to regulate prices and prevent concentrations of ‘unreasonable market power’, also universal (to a greater or lesser degree) in most mature Western economies, although not to the extent that Rawls would like.

  It is not surprising that many have concluded that A Theory of Justice is an elaborate justification of post-war, welfare-state capitalism as the system most compatible with the principles of justice it defends. However, Rawls later denied this, openly questioning whether the inequalities that such a system produces really are compatible with those principles after all. In his book Justice as Fairness: A Restatement, published a year before his death, he argues that no form of capitalism, however modified and regulated, can uphold his two principles of justice; a fair society requires something more radical, what he vaguely calls a ‘property-owning democracy’ or even a socialist state in which major utilities and enterprises are owned by the government rather than by private individuals. In other words, political liberalism may require a socialist (or social democratic) economy.

  A Theory of Justice provoked decades of intense debate among scholars that turned into a veritable industry, dominating academic political philosophy in the English-speaking world for more than a generation. To a considerable extent, liberal political philosophy became indistinguishable from academic political philosophy itself, largely because of Rawls. His ideas proved highly stimulating while narrowing the scope of theorizing about politics. During those years the United States became very much more diverse, posing serious challenges to liberal theory and practice to accommodate an increasingly broad range of belief systems, religions and values. In his next major work, Political Liberalism, Rawls addressed these challenges directly.

  Contrary to ancient philosophers such as Plato and Aristotle, Rawls thinks it is both unreasonable and unrealistic in diverse societies to expect everyone to agree in principle or in practice on a single form of life that is uniquely good. Reasonable people will disagree on the ends of
life. But they can and should still agree on limited political principles that will allow them to co-operate peacefully in spite of the deeper metaphysical differences that divide them. Between individuals and communities of belief that accept them, such principles are like the rules of a game agreed between opposing teams and applied impartially by a judge or referee, in the form of the state. The alternatives to this approach are either coercing everyone to submit to one set of comprehensive beliefs or a protracted civil war without limits between competing groups and individuals, like the wars of religion that devastated seventeenth-century Europe. Neither of these options is consistent with an enduringly just and stable society, without which (as Hobbes saw) few other goods in life are possible. The price of lasting social peace in a society divided by diverse values and beliefs is refraining from coercing others into accepting your views, an attitude Rawls dubs ‘reasonableness’. This is not relativism, since diversity is still constrained by broad liberal principles of political justice. Nor is it monism, a belief in a single universal form of life for all, since it accepts a diversity of legitimate conceptions of the good life. Rather, it is a middle way between relativism and monism that balances diversity and constraint. Such political liberalism combines a plurality of private beliefs with common public principles, something that Rawls considers the best and fairest way to manage our differences.

  But what is reasonable to a liberal like Rawls is not necessarily reasonable to everyone. For example, a person who truly believes in a sacred text whose commandments come from God would probably consider it quite unreasonable to subordinate them to secular principles of justice that prioritize ‘a fair scheme of cooperation’. The same is true of someone who believes in an afterlife with the prospect of eternal bliss or everlasting damnation. Anyone who does prioritize liberal political principles that favour peaceful co-existence over the commands of faith is unlikely to need much persuading by Rawls. As for the rest, calling them ‘unreasonable’ settles little, in theory or in practice, as what counts as reasonable is itself a matter of deep disagreement, and probably always will be. Any attempt to define what is ‘reasonable’ will end up as a circular argument. Moreover, a political philosophy that requires individuals to separate their private beliefs sharply from public principles is bound to raise questions about its purported neutrality.

  John Rawls is often credited with reviving serious political philosophy from the post-war recession it found itself in. He ambitiously addressed the most basic and fundamental questions in politics and ethics with a rare rigour and depth that changed the subject and set the terms of debate about political justice in the English-speaking world in the second half of the twentieth century. He offered the prospect that liberalism might be reconciled conceptually with both political and economic equality and deep cultural and religious diversity, thereby broadening liberalism in novel ways and breathing life into a political ideology that had grown intellectually stale and uninspiring to many. All of this is beyond serious dispute and is the foundation of Rawls’s critical importance in the history of political philosophy. But whether justice as fairness and political liberalism prove to be the final word on the mounting challenges that confront liberal societies is far less certain today.

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  Martha Nussbaum: The Self-Developer

  As a student at the elite Baldwin School in Bryn Mawr, Pennsylvania, Martha Nussbaum not only learned French, Latin and Greek but also began a lifelong passion for drama. There she wrote, staged and played the lead in a play based upon the life of French Revolutionary Maximilien Robespierre. Already in high school we find many of the qualities that have marked Nussbaum’s career as a moral and political philosopher. Her mastery of classical languages has led her to write books about Greek tragedy and about Aristotle; indeed, as we shall see, Aristotle remains her lifelong touchstone. Her passion for drama has led her to develop an insightful dialogue between philosophy and literature: she has always read philosophy in the light of literature and literature in the light of philosophy. Writing a play about Robespierre anticipated her lifelong passion for social justice and political reform – without embracing his infamous use of political terror! From a very early age, she set about developing her own remarkable talents and then devoted her life to advocating for more people to have the opportunities for self-development that she enjoyed at the Baldwin School.

  Nussbaum’s moral and political thought draws upon the whole Western tradition, from Plato to John Rawls. Like Aristotle, Nussbaum has always argued that the basic goal of moral and political life is the happiness of every individual human being. Again, like Aristotle, she defines happiness not in terms of having happy feelings but in terms of the development of one’s potential – what she calls human flourishing. Her whole scholarly life has been dedicated to exploring the meaning of human flourishing. What constitutes a truly happy human life? How do we measure human development? Nussbaum’s life as a political activist has been devoted to campaigning for those who have long been unjustly denied opportunities for flourishing, especially women, the poor and the disabled. She has also argued for greater opportunities for the flourishing of non-human animals.

  Human happiness or flourishing is more difficult to define than are the obstacles to that condition. Nussbaum’s early passion for ancient Greek tragedy introduced her to some of the main obstacles to happiness, such as death, ignorance, betrayal, calumny, war and political persecution. To this ancient list, we moderns could add addiction, divorce, dementia and unjust discrimination. Indeed, there are so many potential obstacles to a happy and flourishing life that we might be tempted to agree with Augustine that we can hope for happiness only in the next life – this life is a time of trial and suffering.

  Plato pioneered a strategy for protecting one’s flourishing from these dangers: to define happiness purely in terms of moral virtue. Recall that a virtue is an acquired disposition consistently to choose to do the right thing for the right reasons. According to Plato, each human being has a greater or lesser capacity to know what goodness requires and to achieve it. Of course, this capacity will not develop into a stable virtue without our being properly brought up (a matter of luck) and consistently making good choices. Once we acquire these virtues, we identify ourselves with them so that whatever happens to our bodies, or to our families, or to our property, or to our reputation, does not happen to us. Through the discipline of these moral virtues, I am self-sufficient and invulnerable: no evils can reach the inner citadel of my goodwill. We saw that Socrates was happy even while suffering unjust persecution and then execution: no external evil could threaten his unshakeable commitment to doing what is right. Plato’s Socrates often says ‘better to suffer injustice than to commit injustice’: suffering injustice cannot reach the true self, but to commit injustice is to harm oneself – that is, one’s virtuous will.

  Nussbaum is moved by the power of this Platonic vision of invulnerable moral self-sufficiency, but, ultimately, she rejects it. Following Aristotle, she argues that to be human is to inhabit a body and to love other people, especially friends and family. What this means is that we cannot retreat to an inner spiritual citadel where we are safe. Being human means always being vulnerable to tragedy, because our bodies are fragile and our relationships to those whom we love are also fragile. It is possible to attempt to detach ourselves from property, from reputation, from other people and even from our own bodies – indeed, some degree of such detachment is wise – but ultimately we find happiness and we flourish through these attachments. The Platonic strategy of self-sufficiency may save us from some kinds of tragic suffering but at the price of losing too much of our humanity: a pyrrhic victory, at best.

  Aristotle follows Plato by insisting on the necessity of possessing the moral and intellectual virtues for a happy and flourishing life. After all, most human suffering is self-inflicted: our foolish beliefs and our bad choices usually reflect a lack of virtue, which is at least partially our own fault. Nussbaum agrees with A
ristotle that developing moral and intellectual virtue is the best way to flourish. But even virtue, while necessary, is not sufficient to guarantee happiness. We remain vulnerable to many evils. It takes courage to embrace a life always held hostage to the danger of tragic suffering, but such courage is necessary for true human flourishing amid family, friends and fellow citizens. What is striking about Nussbaum’s approach to these issues is her ability to draw upon the insights found in ancient Greek drama and modern novels, as well as the classic works of philosophy.