Toward a Human-Centered Economy and Politics: The Theory of Justice as Fairness from Rawls to Sen

Alfonso D’Amodio

doi:10.3390/philosophies5040044

Abstract

In this paper, I present the suggestion that a suitable theory of “justice as fairness” could offer a consistent path for solving many issues related to the actual crisis of the classical liberal model of economy and democracy, by substituting the abstract “equality” principle, with the concrete “equity” one in the notion of justice. After a short discussion of some main characters of the present worldwide crisis of the classical liberal model, I present two main theories of justice as fairness. John Rawls’ theory in political philosophy that emphasizes how really equitable judgements must overcome the equalitarianism of the Classical Liberalism, by considering the real possibilities of individuals and groups of accessing and enjoying commodities and utilities, as well as, the “basic liberties” defining the citizen equal dignity in the Modern State. Rawls propose, therefore, a notion of fairness compliant with the Kantian normativism, and a notion of fair distributive justice based on the ethical principle of the maximin, as a criterion for judging the righteousness of the State Institutions. The other theory of justice as fairness I discuss in this paper is an evolution of Rawls’ in the direction of the development of a “comparative distributive justice”, without any normativism. This theory is developed in the context of the newborn discipline of the “social choice theory”, formalizing social decision processes, with applications in economic, social, and political sciences. What characterizes Sen’s theory is its original synthesis between the Aristotelian notion of fairness, based on the “personal flourishing”, and Adam Smith’s ethical principle of the “extended sympathy”, by which making comparable different approaches to pursue the personal flourishing, i.e., for achieving “valued and valuable ways of being and of doing”, compliant with, and respectful of, different value systems.

Highlights

The economists are today the first ones in recognizing that the actual crisis requires a deep revision of the relationship between economy and the personal “welfare”—and more extensively, the personal “well-being”—of individuals and groups in our societies, putting newly and explicitly the economical science and practice at the service of the common good [1]
As Rawls put it, from behind the veil of ignorance, “no one knows his place in society, his class position, or social status; nor does he know his fortune in the distribution of natural assets and abilities, his intelligence and strength and the like” ([22], p. 118), so that the original position is essentially a position of “original fairness” among all citizens serving as abstract universal criterion for equitable political and economic choices
If there is a central question that can be seen as the motivating issue that inspires social choice theory, it is this: how can it be possible to arrive at cogent aggregative judgments about the society, given the diversity of preferences, concerns, and predicaments of the different individuals within the society? How can we find any rational basis for making such aggregative judgements as “the society prefers this to that” or

Summary

The Crisis of the Liberalist Vision of Society and Democracy

We observe an exponential growth at all levels of the worldwide debate in social, political, and economical sciences about the future of our society, and about the same democratic order of our institutions All this depends on the evident crisis of the classical liberalist vision that supported the modern vision of economy, society, and democracy, as well as their strict relationships in the Western Tradition. The economists are today the first ones in recognizing that the actual crisis requires a deep revision of the relationship between economy and the personal “welfare”—and more extensively, the personal “well-being”—of individuals and groups in our societies, putting newly and explicitly the economical science and practice at the service of the common good [1] This revision must necessarily include a suitable redefinition of the indices of economic development—starting from the notorious GDP—that must take into account much more factors, the environmental factors before all, on which a proper and more realistic measure of the social and economic development of a given country depends [2]. This must be centered on the rights and the needs of the persons, and on the fair development of their capabilities, in the context of his approach to the “social choice theory” (SCT)—of which Sen is one of its pioneers—based on his revolutionary idea of “a comparative distributive justice” (see [18] and [19], pp. 453–472)

The Scheme of the Present Contribution

A New Theory of the Social Contract

Individual and Collective Freedom and the Role of Institutions

From the Political Philosophy to the Social Choice Theory

From Institutions to Persons in Economy and Politics

Concluding Remarks