progressivism, individualism, and the public ... - Telmarc Group

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The Telmarc Group PROGRESSIVISM, INDIVIDUALISM, AND THE PUBLIC INTELLECTUAL "… social justice is regarded as an aspect of distributive justice and indeed the two concepts are used interchangeably. Distributive justice is an idea with a very long pedigree … To elaborate, at least three assumptions have to be made before we can begin theorizing about social justice. First, we have to assume a bounded society with a determinate membership … a second, namely that the principles we advance must apply to an identifiable set of institutions whose impact on the life chances of different individuals can also be traced …The third premise follows naturally from the second, namely, that there is some agency capable of changing the institutional structure in more or less the way our favored theory demands." The broadband example just discussed follows this three prong rule. The bounded society is the US and there is a means to determine if the people getting the redistributed wealth can benefit, one would guess they would, yet the benefit is to them alone and not to all of society. If I raise horses in Montana and I want to sell the horses to people in New Jersey, then the current Administration would argue mutual benefit. That could be a stretch. Miller then continues 128 : "This raises the question whether social justice and individual liberty are necessarily at odd with each other … a widely held view is that public policy should trade off the conflicting demands of liberty and justice… They do so in two ways. First a central element in any theory of justice will account of the basic rights of citizens …. Second, one of the cost contested and intractable issues to arise in debates about freedom is whether and when lack of resources constitutes a constraint on freedom…" There is a clear conflict although Miller does not see it. In fact Miller details few if any realistic applications. Further social justice is not part of the Constitution but it has been put into law in various ways. One could view welfare as an application yet unemployment insurance is not, for the latter is an insurance which the recipient has contributed to and thus is owed as a contractual matter. Namely there is a quid pro quo involved. Miller continues 129: "An economic market may be viewed as a procedure whereby individuals who are entitled to various resources… deal with other individuals through the mechanism of contract and exchange… Consider the effects of introducing legislation preventing employers from discriminating on grounds of race or sex … Before this legislation . employers choose which jobs to advertise and which conditions to attach to them … The assumption behind the legislation is presumably that in this way a fairer allocation of jobs and income will be produced … It is of course possible to argue that the market 128 Miller, Social Justice, pp 12-13. 129 Miller, Social Justice, pp. 108-109. Page 120
The Telmarc Group PROGRESSIVISM, INDIVIDUALISM, AND THE PUBLIC INTELLECTUAL functions best when it operates according to classic laissez faire principles … This might be argued for on the grounds of justice …Whatever one thinks of this claim, it is surely the right way to go defending market freedom (indeed, there are places in Hayek's writings where he offers a defense … of this kind) … that problem of social justice is simply a grander problem faced by a parent at a children's tea party with a cake to divide among ten hungry children…" Miller here introduce Hayek and the laissez faire principle. This is a bit of a canard since Hayek was not a believer in pure laissez fair, which meant to him an unfettered market. He believed in the individual and the individual rights, namely equality in those rights. That perforce of the need to insure the rights requires Governmental oversight, oversight of the rights, whether that be property rights or any extension thereof. The birthday cake example is interesting. As the parent I bought or made the cake and as such I should have the right to distribute any way I wish, and I may give half to my child and the rest to everyone else of just cut it in equal parts. Perhaps I give a piece with a size inversely proportional to the BMI, weight of the child receiving it since they may already be too heavy. But justice means that if it is my property I have the right to do with it whatever I want. But I may make decisions based on various sets of principles which may differ from those held by the children. Again my right. I could transfer my property right to the ten children, then let them as a group make a decisions. I then voluntarily gave up the right. Then the group has the property and it become a group decision. There are many such options but one which is not an option is that the Government comes in and tells me. The Government has no property right! Now let us go back to Thomas Paine. I will look at the work on distributive justice by Fleischacker. First a quote to let you know what Fleischacker is coming from 130 : "Karl Marx is by far the most influential figure ever to decry the distinction between rich and poor." Perhaps he never heard of the New Testament and the Sermon on the Mount, the loaves and fishes, and a few other things. Even Mohammed was quite direct on giving to the poor and the giving to the poor is a significant part of the Muslim religion. That accounts for 2.5 billion people that somehow may or may not like Marx. But that should set one to understand Fleischacker, Now Fleischacker states the following about Paine: "I think we can assume that is Paine, one of the most radical of eighteenth century writers, had thought that his readers would accept the claim that all humans beings deserve to be raised out of poverty "not as a matter of grace, but of right" he would have 130 Fleischacker, Distributive Justice, p 96. Page 121
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progressivism, individualism, and the public ... - Telmarc Group

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