Journal of Social Philosophy最新文献

The paper analyzes Rawls's moral psychology and the claim that a just society must foster a sufficiently strong sense of justice. When Rawls investigates the development of the sense of justice under a just basic structure, he tacitly narrows down the focus: he only demonstrates the development of a sense of justice on the premise that all members of society are already in possession of a full-fledged sense of justice, save the one individual under investigation. This begs the question, largely presupposing what needs to be explained, namely, how citizens at large develop a sense of justice. Rawls's narrowing of perspective leads to distortions in the analysis of stability, particularly with regard to a property-owning democracy. However, in lesser known parts of his work, Rawls offers clues for a more plausible account. Here, the idea is that institutions must be structured such that they enable all of us to nurture the sense of justice of each of us. With this idea of collective self-transformation in place, it becomes clear that economic institutions must be broadly democratized because of their profound educational role. Thus, the choice between a property-owning democracy and liberal socialism falls more strongly upon the latter.

Unredressed injustices in national and global history raise important normative questions. These questions are highlighted by the growing chorus of voices in public and academic discourse calling for agents, especially those in the Global North, to recognize and redress the major injustices of their past, most notably colonialism, chattel slavery, and segregation.¹ One is the justification question: do (some) present-day agents have moral obligations to redress historical injustice, and if so, on what moral grounds? Another is the content question: assuming that reparative obligations are justified, what exactly do they obligate (some) present-day agents to do?

One prominent view in the philosophical literature responding to these questions is centered on the Beneficiary Pays Principle (BPP).² Proponents of the BPP have argued that some present-day agents have a moral obligation to redress historical injustices that they themselves did not commit because they enjoy material benefits—wealth, property, and other such resources—as a result of these injustices. Since these benefits were originally acquired unjustly, their contemporary inheritors ought to relinquish them, not just because they lack any legitimate claim to these resources, but also because by retaining these resources they are perpetuating the effects of injustice. This answers the justification question. The BPP also suggests an answer to the content question. While some present-day agents enjoy material benefits from historical injustices, others correspondingly suffer material harms.³ It is thus morally legitimate to redistribute the relinquished resources of present-day beneficiaries of a historical injustice toward its present-day victims—even if that redistribution can only partially approximate the holdings that present-day victims would have enjoyed had the historical injustice never occurred.⁴ Altogether, the BPP offers an account of one familiar approach to past wrongdoing, namely the provision of material compensation or reparations. Indeed, proponents of the BPP contend that the principle is appealing because it avoids many of the thorny moral and epistemic challenges against reparations for major historical injustices.⁵

But reparations, so understood, is notably removed from a more radical approach to historical injustice proposed by some recent social movements for racial equality and postcolonial global justice. These proposals demand the egalitarian transformation of present-day social structures in order to undo the unjust social, political, and economic legacies of colonialism, slavery, segregation, and so forth.⁶ In alignment with this vision, some philosophical accounts have argued for a structural approach to historical injustice: because many present-day injustices are products of major historical injustices like colonialism and slavery, a full and proper r