Rawlsian Affirmative Action: Compensatory Justice as Seen from the Original Position *
ABSTRACT: In A Theory of Justice, John Rawls presents a method of determining how a just society would allocate its "primary goods"-that is, those things any rational person would desire, such as opportunities, liberties, rights, wealth, and the bases of self-respect. (1) Rawls' method of adopting the "original position" is supposed to yield a "fair" way of distributing such goods. A just society would also have the need (unmet in the above work) to determine how the victims of injustice ought to be compensated, since history suggests that social contracts are likely to be violated. This paper is an attempt to determine the remedial measures that would be selected using Rawls' method. I contend that only two of the three most widely used "affirmative action" policies would be selected from the original position. I also sketch another compensatory policy that would pass Rawls' fairness test.
I.
Affirmative action is public policy designed to compensate the victims of injustice. (2) To be thus disadvantaged, in Rawls' scheme of things, is to have suffered in some way from having had less than one's fair share of the primary goods (62). This measure, according to Rawls, ought to be determined by the two principles that would be selected in the original position (17-22). The "first principle," which is "lexically prior" to the second, dictates that each member of society be granted every shareable personal liberty, a liberty being shareable just in case one's exercising of it would not prevent others from doing so (60-1, 250). The "second principle" states that the other primary goods are to be distributed in an egalitarian fashion unless...
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...with compensating the victims of injustice.
(3) Having done my best here to defend what follows as a reasonable extension of Rawls' system, I would add that I am not wed to the idea that it be taken as such. If the connection between ideal and nonideal theory is not as I have portrayed it, if the latter is not to be circumscribed by the former, then the ensuing views on affirmative action may simply be understood as those that would follow if one were apply Rawl's method, against his own stricture, to the issue of compensatory justice.
(4) In correspondence and in "A Puzzle About Economic Justice In Rawls' Theory," Social Theory and Practice, vol. 4 #1, pp. 1-27.
(5) "A Puzzle About ..., " p. 3.
(6) Ibid., p. 7.
(7) Ibid., pp. 12-13.
(8) Thomas Nagel, "The Policy of Preference," in Mortal Questions (London: Cambridge Univ. Press, 1979) pp.91-105.
The unsustainable growth of welfare is becoming a big issue in the United States. The government is spending money it does not have to support people it cannot afford. Welfare only adds more debt to our country. Welfare could be a wonderful aid if people used it with justice, but welfare only creates lazy dependent people. Welfare should only be a resource someone can turn to when you are out of all your options, and are in desperate need of help. In this day and age it has turned into a way of life for some people. Too many Americans would rather turn to government assistance than to get back on their feet themselves. Welfare is being taken advantage of.
I will begin this paper by making clear that this is a critique of Rawls and his difference principle and not an attempt at a neutral analysis. I have read the Theory of Justice and I have found it wanting in both scope and realism. The difference principle proposed by Rawls, his second principle is the focus of my critique. While this paper will not focus solely on the second principle, all analysis done within this essay are all targeted towards the scope of influence that Rawls treats the second principle with.
The discipline of nursing has long attempted to establish itself as a professional identity with a distinct knowledge base. In order for nursing to separate itself from other professions, it must inaugurate foundational nursing theory. Theory is an essential component to the nursing profession, because it defines and clarifies nursing concepts, and the purpose of nursing practice, which distinguishes nursing from other caring professions (McEwen, 2011). Additionally, "theory offers structure and organization to nursing knowledge and provides a systematic means of collecting data to describe, explain, and predict nursing practice" (McEwen, 2011, p. 23). Theory is the foundational component to the complex, continuously evolving nursing profession, as it enhances nursing knowledge, guides nursing practice and research, and helps in establishing and advancing the identity of the profession of nursing.
Affirmative action is an attempt by the United States to amend a long history of racial discrimination and injustice. Our school textbook defines affirmative action as “a program established that attempts to improve the chances of minority applicants for educational or employment purposes, although they may have the same qualifications, by giving them leverage so that they can attain a level that is equal to caucasian applicants” (Berman 522). There are people that support and oppose this issue. Opponents of affirmative action have many reasons for opposing this issue, one of them being that the battle for equal rights is over, and that this advantage made for people of color discriminates against people that are not of color. The people that defend affirmative action argue this advantage is needed because of how badly discriminated the people of color once were. Because of the discrimination that once was these people claim that they are at a disadvantage, and always have been, therefore equality of opportunity is needed. It is also said that affirmative action is used to encourage diversity and integration. This paper will discuss the history of affirmative action, how it is implemented in society today, and evaluate the arguments that it presents.
Fawcett, J. (2001). The nurse theorists: 21st-century updates - - Dorothea E. Orem. Journal of Nursing Science Quarterly, 14(1), 34-38. doi: 10.1177/08943180122108021.
To make good nursing decisions, nurses require an internal roadmap with knowledge of nursing theories. Nursing theories, models, and frameworks play a significant role in nursing, and they are created to focus on meeting the client’s needs for nursing care. According to McEwen and Wills (2014), conceptual models and theories could create mechanisms, guide nurses to communicate better, and provide a “systematic means of collecting data to describe, explain, and predict” about nursing and its practice (p. 25). Most of the theories have some common concepts; others may differ from one theory to other. This paper will evaluate two nursing theorists’ main theories include Sister Callista Roy’s
After long years of suffering, degradation, and different sorts of discrimination which the disadvantaged group of people had experienced, the “Affirmative Action Law” was finally passed and enforced for the very first time on September 24, 1965. The central purpose of the Affirmative Action Law is to combat racial inequality and to give equal civil rights for each citizen of the United States, most especially for the minorities. However, what does true equality mean? Is opportunity for everyone? In an article entitled, “None of this is fair”, the author, Mr. Richard Rodriguez explains how his ethnicity did not become a hindrance but instead, the law became beneficial. However, Mr. Richard Rodriguez realized the unfairness of the “Affirmative Action” to people who are more deserving of all the opportunities that were being offered to him. Through Mr. Rodriguez’s article, it will demonstrates to the reader both favorable, and adverse reaction of the people to the Affirmative Action, that even though the program was created with the intention to provide equality for each and every citizen, not everyone will be pleased, contented, and benefit from the law.
McIntyre, M. & McDonald, C. (2014). Nursing Philosophies, Theories, Concepts, Frameworks, and Models. In Koizer, B., Erb, G., Breman, A., Snyder, S., Buck, M., Yiu, L., & Stamler, L. (Eds.), Fundamentals of Canadian nursing (3rd ed.). (pp.59-74). Toronto, Canada: Pearson.
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In Madame Bovary, Gustave Flaubert’s incorporation of confined spaces reveals Emma’s literal and metaphorical imprisonment. Starting from her adolescence, Emma becomes held back from the world at both the convent, and the farm. Flaubert depicts these confinements as literal. Later, Charles, her husband, physically overpowers her when they meet, and metaphorically suppresses her throughout the rest of the marriage. Finally, Emma imprisons herself when she becomes ill, and mentally encloses herself from her husband and the rest of the world. This continues with her affairs as she incarcerates herself once again from the world. These acts of confinements expose Emma’s reclusive nature.
Written in 1857, Gustave Flaubert's Madame Bovary has become a literary classic. Emma Bovary is a middle class country girl with a taste for rich things; she marries a doctor and has a little girl. Her husband, Charles, adores her and thinks that she can do no wrong. He overlooks the sign of her adultery, telling himself that her unhappiness is caused from her poor health, and forgives her excessive spending. Madame Bovary's excessive desires seem to come from her excessive reading of novels in which life seemed, to her, perfect. She "tried to find out what one meant exactly in life by the words felicity, passion, rapture, that had seemed to her so beautiful in books" (45). Through Emma, Flaubert illustrates that not being satisfied with what one is given in life leads to a sorrow.
Van Den Haag, Earnest, and John Conrad. The Death Penalty: A Debate. New York: Plenum Press, 1997.
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