Justice And Immanuel Kant's Notion Of Justice

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The conception of justice in western philosophy through the work of John Rawls and comparison with Immanuel Kant’s Notion of justice

Definition Of Justice
Johns Rawls describes justice as “The first virtue of social institutions just as truth is of systems of thought”. The origin of the word Justice comes from jus (Latin) which stands for Right or Law. Justice can be regarded as the most fundamental of all virtues in western philosophy and is such a very crucial issue that it has been debated about right from the days of Plato to the modern era. Although it is very difficult to characterize what the word Justice stands for, examining it throughout the ages gives us a basic idea as to what it essentially meant. The ancient Greek moralists Cephalus and Polemarchus stated that “Justice is doing good to friends and harm to enemies”. This can be classified as a very simplistic understanding as for this maxim to be perfect a person’s selection of friends should be foolproof, which in many cases is not as Socrates points out in The Republic. This representation of justice almost sounds like a patriotic statement and could have been framed with intention of controlling empires by framing the ‘other’ as the enemy. It could have also been used as propaganda on the battlefield. Thrasymachus, the eminent Greek moralist described Justice as the “Interest of the stronger”. It can be termed as a naturalistic approach in which the animalistic traits of man dominated. The statement “might is right” can also be attributed to Thrasymachus. The strongest individual or the government frames the rules and dominates over the others. The rules of justice are the rules of the ruling class. It almost tries to equate Justice with power. But as ma...

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...ss as a foundation for sound ideas about justice as happiness can vary from person to person and depends on a lot on the situations which exist at that particular time. According to him Freedom should be the benchmark of justice as it provides a universal reference. Freedom in one way or the other generally holds the same meaning for people unlike happiness which is a very subjective feeling and depends on many factors. According to Kant, if a person is free he is independent of constraints imposed by the arbitrary will of the others. Kant’s doctrine of morality looks to be on certain ground without any trace for ambiguous references. John rawls take on the ‘original position’ was also very crucial for solving the problem of expression unresolved in Kant’s works.The work of Kant was a stepping stone for John rawls to upgrade his theory to a new standard.

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