Sociology, asked by sksanaullahkhan11223, 2 months ago

Explain the difference between the principles of rights and justice. What are some of the strengths and weaknesses of each principle?

Answers

Answered by kritirani8987

Answer:

Distributive Justice

First published Sun Sep 22, 1996; substantive revision Tue Sep 26, 2017

The economic, political, and social frameworks that each society has—its laws, institutions, policies, etc.—result in different distributions of benefits and burdens across members of the society. These frameworks are the result of human political processes and they constantly change both across societies and within societies over time. The structure of these frameworks is important because the distributions of benefits and burdens resulting from them fundamentally affect people’s lives. Arguments about which frameworks and/or resulting distributions are morally preferable constitute the topic of distributive justice. Principles of distributive justice are therefore best thought of as providing moral guidance for the political processes and structures that affect the distribution of benefits and burdens in societies, and any principles which do offer this kind of moral guidance on distribution, regardless of the terminology they employ, should be considered principles of distributive justice.

This entry is structured in the following way. After outlining the scope of the entry and the role of distributive principles, the first relatively simple principle of distributive justice examined is Strict Egalitarianism, which calls for the allocation of equal material goods to all members of society. John Rawls’ alternative distributive principle, which he calls the Difference Principle, is examined next. The Difference Principle permits diverging from strict equality so long as the inequalities in question would make the least advantaged in society materially better off than they would be under strict equality. Some have thought that neither strict equality nor Rawls’ Difference Principle capture the important moral roles of luck and responsibility. The “Luck Egalitarianism” literature comprises varying attempts to design distributive principles that are appropriately sensitive to considerations of responsibility and luck. Desert-based principles similarly emphasize the moral roles of responsibility and luck but are distinct because they approach these factors through claims about what people deserve because of their work.

Advocates of welfare-based principles (of which utilitarianism is the most famous) do not believe the primary distributive concern should be material goods and services. They argue that material goods and services have no intrinsic value but are valuable only in so far as they increase welfare. Hence, they argue, distributive principles should be designed and assessed according to how they affect welfare, either its maximization or distribution. Advocates of libertarian principles, by contrast to each of the principles so far mentioned, generally criticize any distributive ideal that requires the pursuit of specific ‘patterns’, such as maximization or equality of welfare or of material goods. They argue that the pursuit of such patterns conflicts with the more important moral demands of liberty or self-ownership. Finally, feminist critiques of existing distributive principles note that they tend to ignore the particular circumstances of women, so feminists tend to argue for principles which are more sensitive to facts such as that women often have primary responsibility for child-rearing and on average, spend less of their lifetimes than men in the market economy.

1. Scope and Role of Distributive Principles

2. Strict Egalitarianism

3. The Difference Principle

4. Equality of Opportunity and Luck Egalitarianism

5. Welfare-Based Principles

6. Desert-Based Principles

7. Libertarian Principles

8. Feminist Principles

9. Methodology and Empirical Beliefs about Distributive Justice

Bibliography

Strict Egalitarianism

The Difference Principle