Read pages of these excerpts, beginning with the subheading on page 7, "Two Principles of Justice. Firstly, everyone should have an equal right to basic freedoms. Secondly, resources and institutions should be arranged to benefit the least well-off to create equality of opportunity. These principles are a far cry from the minimal government intervention libertarians advocate. This video explains the different roles of society that have existed since the industrial revolution, and considers whether or not concepts like intelligence or social opportunities matter more in distribution of wealth and status in society.
The income gap between the highest earning and the lowest earning Americans has increased. Read this article and respond to the following questions: To which era of modern American history is the current level of income inequality frequently compared?
What events tend to precipitate the widening of income inequality? This video addresses the specific changes in affirmative action that have occured in Northern Ireland, and the shift from forced inclusion to institutional change.
This is an interesting example because the affirmative action legislation in Northern Ireland involved Catholics and Protestants imbalanced in the workplace, rather than race imbalances in the workplace. Then, skip ahead and read part VI on pages This US Court of Appeals decision involved a group of white students who sued the University of Texas School of Law on the grounds that the school selected several minority students instead of them despite the fact that they had superior academic qualifications.
Thus, the plaintiffs argued that they had been discriminated against based on their race. The court decided in their favor, and although the decision was later overturned, the court's statement provides a reasoned argument for the idea that affirmative action constitutes racial discrimination. Read the syllabus of Grutter v. Bollinger, in which the U. Supreme Court overturned the decision handed down in Hopwood.
What did Grutter argue in the case? Did the Court uphold her argument or reject it? Who must analyze government racial qualifications? Is student body diversity a compelling state interest? What is a narrowly tailored plan? What is the impact of blackness and whiteness on reputation and in the legal system?
Read Professor Chappell's remarks on the ethical difficulties with racial profiling. What is the difference in considering an individual versus a group? Post and respond to the following topics on the course discussion board, and respond to other students' posts. Skip to main content. Side panel. Log in or Sign up. Getting Started. Discussion Forums. Course Introduction.
Unit 2: Rights, the State, and the Free Market. Unit 3: Morality, Markets, and Immanuel Kant. Unit 4: John Rawls' Theory of Justice.
Unit 5: Ethics and Politics of Virtue. Study Guide. Course Feedback Survey. Certificate Final Exam. Saylor Direct Credit. About Saylor Academy.
Credit University Partners. Log in or Sign up to track your course progress, gain access to final exams, and get a free certificate of completion! Unit 4: John Rawls' Theory of Justice In the s, John Rawls put forward what is widely considered to be the most important contemporary theory of justice. Thomas Hobbes' Leviathan : Chapters Book. Mark as completed. Locke versus Hobbes Page.
Hobbes' Dilemma Page. John Rawls on Just War Page. What is Justice? Restorative Justice Book. Read this article, which describes the key differences between retributive and restorative justice. In social and political philosophy, there are traditionally two major types of justice: distributive justice describes how the status, wealth, and goods in society will be portioned out from the beginning, and retributive justice describes punishments, penalties, and restitution for situations where someone wrongs someone else and breaks a social contract.
In recent years, retributive justice theory has been contrasted with restorative justice: retributive justice focuses on punishment and penalty, while restorative justice focuses on restitution and restoring community relationships. Read this article which describes restorative justice. What are the benefits of this approach over retributive justice? What are some of the pitfalls or risks? Journalist's Resource: "U.
Rawls, in contrast, uses the contract to argue that one must first establish reasonable conditions for reflection on what is rational and only then decide what one can rationally pursue. For Rawls, obedience is justified because what is obeyed is just, whereas for Hobbes, what is obeyed is just because this is what it is most prudent to obey. So for Rawls, what is reasonable both structures the contracting position and shapes the analysis of what would be chosen within it.
The role of the contract is to model the reasonable constraints of publicity and reciprocity: any principles of justice chosen must be mutually acknowledged by citizens, even though in the "original position" all are ignorant of their actual identities and so would reason the same way. Rawls insists on this ignorance because, like Kant in his moral theory, he wants to exclude special pleading and unfair existing advantages from the contracting or "original" position. Whereas for Hobbes, people have the same overriding interest in preserving their lives and can be shown that in a "state of nature" without government they will best do so by acting reasonably, for Rawls people should recognize the fairness of starting with the reasonable prior to any particular rational interest they might have.
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