Quote:

            “All social values – liberty and opportunity, income and wealth, and the social bases of self-respect – are to be distributed equally unless an unequal distribution of an, or all, of these values is to everyone’s advantage. Injustice, then, is simply inequalities that are not to the benefit of all. Of course, this conception extremely vague and requires interpretation” (Rawls 54.)  

Comment:

            I was able to pull this quote from the end of part 11, “Two Principles of Justice.” Within this sections Rawls defines what he believes are the two most basic principles of justice based upon the original position he defines above in part 4. This quote in particular jumped out at me because he is elaborating on the second principle he defines as “social and economic inequalities are to be arranged so that they are both (a) reasonably expected to be to everyone’s advantage, and (b) attached to positions and offices open to all” (Rawls 53.) Initially this second principle made sense to me, however as I kept reading and read the quote I have selected to highlight above, I found myself questioning the reasoning behind such a quote.

            After reading the quote on page 54 my initial instinct was that Rawls was defining a utilitarian society.  However, it would seem that Rawls argues that not to be the case closer to the end of this section. From my understanding Rawls is attempting to say that inequality is sometimes fair or just. This relates to my discussion last week about how equality is not the same as equity. I believe that Rawls would agree with such a statement. To further this thought, I would like to hone in on the concept of opportunity that Rawls discusses as what makes unequal distribution of values to be just.

            I may be jumping too far, but I would like to connect this view point to the American Dream, a belief that one can go from rags to riches, everyone has a chance to “make it” in this country. Many people have come to America for this very reason and yet it seems that some people are unable to catch the illusive dream. I would like to argue that it is almost impossible to have equal opportunity with an unequal distribution of values. I say this because within any society there is a structure or a system and in order to progress in the said system one must have access to certain tools, such as an education. There are many instances of this access being denied to many individuals in this country both today and throughout our history. For example, under Jim Crow laws black Americans were denied the right to an education comparable to the education of white Americans. They were denied the same resource and tools, which I believe robbed them of the access to the social values Rawls discusses. I think Rawls discusses a compelling argument, however I am not so sure that the two principles of justice he discusses are neither universal or plausible in real societies today.

Question:

            What would Rawls think of the way modern America operates? Would he consider it to be a just society the follows the two principles he set forth? Why or why not?