Where did Rawls go wrong?

[Publius]

I'm currently in a class on normative ethics and we're discussing Rawls conception of justice and, therefore, his conception of the state. I've read Rawls before, and consider myself a Rawlsian.

But I'd like to know where people farther left than Rawls think that he goes wrong. His hypothetical methodology of assessing rules for a society "behind a veil of ignorance" seems, to me, a pretty unimpeachable methodology for arriving at the correct principles of justice.

I have a hard time finding anything to disagree with in Rawls account or argument, and therefore I can't see how one can easily fend off his social democratic conclusions.

Two options immediately present themselves: You could argue that proper reasoning in Rawls hypothetical starting situation would result in a consensus around a genuine Communist society, which is, perhaps, a plausible approach.

Or you could take issue with his methodology of arriving at justice by use of the hypothetical scenario he uses. But this latter tasks seems quite a bit more difficult.

For example, Rawls argues that inequality in wealth, power, capital, etc. is to be tolerated in a society to the extent that it works to everyone's benefit. You could either argue that only true communism would be to everyone's ultimate benefit OR you could argue that this is the wrong principle of justice.

So what is it that you find in Rawls that you disagree with. And I don't mean this merely in the sense which you obviously disagree with him because he's not a communist or anarchist, but in the substantive sense: how was he actually wrong?

[Left-Reasoning]

The very idea of universalizability itself is in error. It ignores marginality completely.

The reason that a diamond is worth more than a slice of bread is the reason that universalizability fails.

[Publius]

The very idea of universalizability itself is in error. It ignores marginality completely.

The reason that a diamond is worth more than a slice of bread is the reason that universalizability fails.

What?

Are we talking about the same thing?

[Left-Reasoning]

What?

Are we talking about the same thing?

Comrade, as I understand it Rawls's "veil of ignorance" is little more than a tweak of Kant's universalizability principle. The very notion itself is absurd and fallacious.

[Die Neue Zeit]

His contribution to "liberal justice" was a major stepping stone towards bourgeois political correctness. Every idea to the right or left outside the sphere of "liberal justice" is deemed politically incorrect.

[Publius]

His contribution to "liberal justice" was a major stepping stone towards bourgeois political correctness. Every idea to the right or left outside the sphere of "liberal justice" is deemed politically incorrect.

Not at all true.

Rawls actually revised his theory greatly and, in my opinion unnecessarily, in order to make it MORE not less tolerant of radically different viewpoints.

Rawls' theory of political liberalism is very tolerant of dissent and disagreement. If I had my copy of Political Liberalism with me I'd quote some passages.

[Publius]

Comrade, as I understand it Rawls's "veil of ignorance" is little more than a tweak of Kant's universalizability principle. The very notion itself is absurd and fallacious.

It's similar in some ways, but different in some important respects.

First, even to the extent that it's the same your criticism misses the mark. No consequence of Kantian or Rawlsian reasoning would produce problems like you mention with the diamonds vs. bread.

Second, it's importantly different in that it's less of a purely logical device and more of a thought experiment. Whereas Kant thought morality consisted in the principle of universalizability Rawls just thinks the veil of ignorance is a hypothetical tool for reasoning about justice.

Rawls doesn't hold to any principle of 'universalizability', as far as I know. His theory allows for particularism, or treating people differently. For example, there would be marginal taxation where the rich would be heavily taxed and that income would be used to aid the poor or disabled.

So I don't think this criticism applies.

[whore]

i would have to go with the "only true communism would be to everyone's ultimate benefit" rather than "you could argue that this is the wrong principle of justice".

it's actually been a while since i looked at rawls, so i can't give an exact answer.

anyway, does he give an evidence to suggest that under his veil people would be self-interested? or is this just assumed? not only that, even if people are ignorant, presumably they have some idea of the "good", why can it be assumed that all people have the same idea?
http://everything2.com/title/Problems+with+John+Rawls%2527+Veil+of+Ignorance

further more, this hypothisis is of no use in the real world. we can't use it as the basis for deciding a new society. different people will have different opinions and biases as to what would actually come out of such a scenario.

anyway, i can't be bothered just now to continue.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Theory_of_Justice

[ComradeMan]

Poor old Rawls seemed to be attacked from Left, Right and Centre.

I think his earlier work could be seen as be apologetic for the social injustices of our time and also perhaps accused of the "Texas Sharp Shooter" effect in that they put a cicrle around what is deemed valid and ignore other variables- a critic that, in all fairness, could be levelled against a lot of academic/scientific work.

Nozick cricitced the work from a minimal statist position, Nozick was then criticised by Rothbard from an anarcho-capitalist position.

Rawls evaluation of socio-economic systems breaks down into:-

Laissez-faire capitalism
Welfare-state capitalism
State socialism
Property-owning democracy
Liberal-democratic-socialism
As I understand it that Rawls comes to the conclusion that only property owning democracy and liberal socialism are feasible, he then states that political liberalism is not practical either.

He does not seem to handle other socio-economic-political systems at all- anarchist positions in particular.

Although his intentions appear fair enough he does not seem to be able to break out of the mould of thinking about society and state, and from a non-statist position that makes it difficult for some.

Personally I find that whole veil of ignorance idea a little hard to swallow too.
:D

[Demogorgon]

He fails to realise that inequality itself is crippling to society. Relative poverty is an extremely unpleasant condition and empirical evidence shows that the more inequality is, the poorer society's health, standards of education, level of democracy and the higher the crime rate and so forth.

So Rawl's position that inequality is justified insofar as it benefits the least well off can only work in cases where it is taking people out of absolute poverty. Plainly an equalsociety where everybody is dying of starvation is worse than an unequal one where everyone has enough to eat but beyond that inequality itself is a great evil and will cause far more harm than the poor being slightly worse off in absolute terms.

[ComradeMan]

He fails to realise that inequality itself is crippling to society. Relative poverty is an extremely unpleasant condition and empirical evidence shows that the more inequality is, the poorer society's health, standards of education, level of democracy and the higher the crime rate and so forth.

So Rawl's position that inequality is justified insofar as it benefits the least well off can only work in cases where it is taking people out of absolute poverty. Plainly an equalsociety where everybody is dying of starvation is worse than an unequal one where everyone has enough to eat but beyond that inequality itself is a great evil and will cause far more harm than the poor being slightly worse off in absolute terms.


I agree. Apart from that I often think this very learned men forget that we are not just dealing with abstract concepts and statistics but with human beings. These kinds of apologetic works don't do much to alleviate anything on the ground.

If I live in poor, shabby municipal housing with no work, poor education and limited access to healthcare etc in a crime ridden neighbourhood etc etc, am I supposed to think "Oh well, Rawls says it's just a natural part of society and justified too because otherwise there would be no progression in society....", :)

[Publius]

i would have to go with the "only true communism would be to everyone's ultimate benefit" rather than "you could argue that this is the wrong principle of justice".

it's actually been a while since i looked at rawls, so i can't give an exact answer.

anyway, does he give an evidence to suggest that under his veil people would be self-interested?

As opposed to what, self-sacrificing?



or is this just assumed? not only that, even if people are ignorant, presumably they have some idea of the "good", why can it be assumed that all people have the same idea?

It isn't.

But remember that you're abstracted away from your worldly opinions and conceptions of the good.



http://everything2.com/title/Problems+with+John+Rawls%2527+Veil+of+Ignorance

That paper sucks.

I'd give it a B- if I were the professor.



further more, this hypothisis is of no use in the real world. we can't use it as the basis for deciding a new society. different people will have different opinions and biases as to what would actually come out of such a scenario.

anyway, i can't be bothered just now to continue.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Theory_of_Justice

We can use hypothetical reasoning in the real world.

We do it all the time.

That's what Rawls in fact did.

[Publius]

Poor old Rawls seemed to be attacked from Left, Right and Centre.

Inadequately, in my opinion.



I think his earlier work could be seen as be apologetic for the social injustices of our time and also perhaps accused of the "Texas Sharp Shooter" effect in that they put a cicrle around what is deemed valid and ignore other variables- a critic that, in all fairness, could be levelled against a lot of academic/scientific work.

Really?

I don't quite see how Rawls is an apologist for injustice. He has, by design, created a system for minimizing injustice.

How did he not succeed?



Nozick cricitced the work from a minimal statist position, Nozick was then criticised by Rothbard from an anarcho-capitalist position.

But both of those accounts have several problems, the first being they don't ACTUALLY refute Rawls, they just ignore him.

I've read Anarchy, State, and Utopia and Nozick does not refute Rawls methodology in any satisfactory way.



Rawls evaluation of socio-economic systems breaks down into:-

Laissez-faire capitalism
Welfare-state capitalism
State socialism
Property-owning democracy
Liberal-democratic-socialism

As I understand it that Rawls comes to the conclusion that only property owning democracy and liberal socialism are feasible, he then states that political liberalism is not practical either.

What?

He has a book called Political Liberalism where he talks about that as the fundamental goal of his philosophy...



He does not seem to handle other socio-economic-political systems at all- anarchist positions in particular.

Although his intentions appear fair enough he does not seem to be able to break out of the mould of thinking about society and state, and from a non-statist position that makes it difficult for some.

Maybe.

But how is he WRONG?

None seems to be answering that question. People SAID he was wrong, or he didn't talk a lot about this theory or that. But what mistake did he actually make that undermines his reasoning about the proper social system?

I'm just not seeing any good refutation of his conclusion.



Personally I find that whole veil of ignorance idea a little hard to swallow too.
:D

I think it's actually rather intuitive.

[Publius]

He fails to realise that inequality itself is crippling to society.

No he doesn't.


Relative poverty is an extremely unpleasant condition and empirical evidence shows that the more inequality is, the poorer society's health, standards of education, level of democracy and the higher the crime rate and so forth.

Then relative poverty, to the extent that it has these bad effects, wouldn't be allowed in Rawls' society because it would'nt be to the benefit of the worst well off

It'd be to their harm.

This is exactly the kind of situation Rawls' theory deals with best.



So Rawl's position that inequality is justified insofar as it benefits the least well off can only work in cases where it is taking people out of absolute poverty.

That's just false.

It would require a country to have a substantial social safety net, probably more than even the most liberal European countries currently have, though something in that ball park.


Plainly an equalsociety where everybody is dying of starvation is worse than an unequal one where everyone has enough to eat but beyond that inequality itself is a great evil and will cause far more harm than the poor being slightly worse off in absolute terms.

Yes, but in either case Rawls would prefer the best option: the best option for the worst off.

[Publius]

I agree. Apart from that I often think this very learned men forget that we are not just dealing with abstract concepts and statistics but with human beings. These kinds of apologetic works don't do much to alleviate anything on the ground.

If I live in poor, shabby municipal housing with no work, poor education and limited access to healthcare etc in a crime ridden neighbourhood etc etc, am I supposed to think "Oh well, Rawls says it's just a natural part of society and justified too because otherwise there would be no progression in society....", :)

That's a complete misreading of Rawls.

Rawls absolutely did not think that conditions like what you describe make for the best option for the worst off in society.

Rawls' position is quite clear: whatever social system is best for the poorest members of society is preferred.

Is the social system that allows you to livein such conditions better for you than it is for those richer than you? Nope.

Rawls is opposed to it then.

Inequality only exists insofar is it helps YOU, as one of the less well off members of that society. If any other arrangement of property in the society were better for the worst off than the current, Rawls would prefer THAT arranegment.

You can say that only total equality could satisfy this. But that's a different criticism then the one you're currently leveling and, I would add, not a very plausible one.

[Dooga Aetrus Blackrazor]

I haven't dealt with Rawls in awhile so I may be remembering incorrectly, but here are some points against him:

1. He does not adequately dismiss utilitarianism.
2. He advocates inequality alongside control of said material resources. Even a communist society can allow people to overwhelmingly provide someone with more resources, but the people maintain control over those resources. Giving a person more material resources gives them political power and corrupts society.
3. His veil of ignorance is unrealistic. People need to make decisions on the basis of probabilities. While we shouldn't be able to exploit a 2% minority because it would've been "unlikely we are part of that minority," we do need to be able to engage in dangerous collective activities like nuclear power.
4. He assumes people are self-interested. While this is a useful position because it assumes the least, it's evident that people are altruistic "to certain degrees." His theory does not adequately address this.
5. He does not adequately address the potential malleability of human nature as it applies to the possibility of creating a better society.
6. He does not adequately address the issues that arise from market-based inequalities. People gain power advantages, others become resentful, society losing cohesion.
7. All other variables consistent, equal societies are happier than unequal ones. People have a natural disposition towards favoring equality in society.

[Zanthorus]

I'm not really big on objective theories of ethics or justice which is basically what Rawls sytem is. The problem with these kind of things is that they always posit one schema of society as the logically "just" or "correct" one and then when it turns out that it's totally fucked up they just dismiss all the concerns by telling them that it's the logical, natural order of things and all attempts at changing it would be futile.

Most of human history gives us brilliant examples of this, from religous whackos justifying feudalism via the divine right of kings to the classical liberals defending the starvation conditions of the industrial revolution and the combination acts by the all powerful natural right of property.

Although from within the sphere of objective ethics Robert Paul Wolff's criticism in "Understanding Rawls: A Critique and Reconstruction of A Theory of Justice" that Rawls doesn't sufficiently defend against the criticism that capitalist social relations are founded on exploitation and injustice seems to hit the spot.

In that sense I guess the best reply to Rawls would be to point out the process of primitive accumulation (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Primitive_accumulation). The capitalist system is founded on violence and the expropriation of the labourers from the commons land. Any theory of "justice" that attempts to defend this is little more than petty apologism for the status quo.

[Demogorgon]

No he doesn't.

Then relative poverty, to the extent that it has these bad effects, wouldn't be allowed in Rawls' society because it would'nt be to the benefit of the worst well off

It'd be to their harm.

This is exactly the kind of situation Rawls' theory deals with best.

That's just false.

It would require a country to have a substantial social safety net, probably more than even the most liberal European countries currently have, though something in that ball park.

Yes, but in either case Rawls would prefer the best option: the best option for the worst off.
You are reading Rawls far too subjectively. He is judging "benefitting the most" largely in terms of material well being, as in he believes that a set of policies should be followed to enhance the material well being of the poor. He does not really get into subjective discussions of how inequality reflects society as a unit. After all he is justifying it by examining its effects on individuals.

Now obviously we can play all sorts of games with his theory, stating that if inequality is harming people in any way it violates his principles, but that would be using his views to argue a position he did not hold, his ideal society might be best described as an unequal capitalistic one with an extensive welfare state. That is a quite different one from that those who believe that inequality itself is inherantly damaging to society.

Or to put it another way he would clearly see an unequal Eastern European Society as definitely superior to say the Indian State of Kerala. That is because the poorest in Eastern Europe definitely have greater wealth than the poorest in Kerala. However many would argue that Kerala is a more pleasant place to live with its low inequality and high levels of human development.

[Demogorgon]

Double post. Apologies.

[Belisarius]

the problem with the veil of ignorance is that it is an impossible operation. you can never put yourself out of your social situation. i am always a certain member of a certain society, and whether i want it or not, i am marked by that society, so i can't be completely "ignorant". Taylor is an interesting read on this, he proposes there are "horizons of meaning", which means that we are imbedded in a culture and that thus our limits of thought are detemined by that culture.

[ComradeMan]

the problem with the veil of ignorance is that it is an impossible operation. you can never put yourself out of your social situation. i am always a certain member of a certain society, and whether i want it or not, i am marked by that society, so i can't be completely "ignorant". Taylor is an interesting read on this, he proposes there are "horizons of meaning", which means that we are imbedded in a culture and that thus our limits of thought are detemined by that culture.


My problem too.

Look, I'll admit, I am not expert on Rawls and my knowledge is probably not as deep as others here, in fact- it isn't it! :D But I have a few problems with his theories and the veil of ignorance doesn't work for me.

I also think that Rawls cannot break out of the statist mode of thinking and that is what limits him from my anarchist point of view.

I am not saying that everything Rawls states is wrong, but I do find his approach apologetic, statist and at times relying to much on concepts he has invented himself- seemingly, anyway.