Fairness and Justice: Moving Targets
“At his best, man is the noblest of all animals; separated from law and justice he is the worst.”
Another logical pairing of Maslowe’s preconditions to the pursuit of our human needs is that of fairness and justice. As with the other preconditions, if these are lacking in your world, it’s hard to focus on being your best self, so we’ll think through them a bit this week. They're similar concepts that I think are often differentiated by the question of degree; many people think of fairness as a nice idea that is rarely realized; you’ve probably heard someone tell a child at some point, “Life isn’t fair, so stop whining and walk it off,” or something similar. This imperative acknowledges the difficulties of achieving fairness, as well as, arguably, an insensitivity on the part of the speaker to the child’s feelings and an unwillingness to explain the matter further!
In the ideal, fairness would be an expression of equality in which two human beings are treated identically no matter what their various qualities and differences might be. In reality, it’s easy to see how it would be nearly impossible to treat every person in exactly the same manner, and not even appropriate to do so. For instance, should we allow a five-year-old to drive a car because older people are allowed to? Well, no—that’s an obviously terrible idea, but then the question becomes, which qualities create equality between human beings such that they should be treated identically, and that’s a complex question. The response to this difficulty is met with a variety of approaches across cultures, as the determination of who can be considered similar to whom will be based on local values. Fairness is a word that we often use around subjects that are not fraught with the kind of danger and importance to which we apply the word justice. The word brings to mind two people attempting to decide on what kind of fence to build between their properties, or the way a middle school teacher grades papers, rather than decisions that affect the course of history. We seem to apply it to situations that are not gross violations, but debatable conundrums. It’s a concept that any given group probably decides and polices in a less structured way because of its lower stakes, and the more a group shares similar values, the easier it will be for its members to negotiate solutions that seem fair across the board in any given instance.
Justice, on the other hand, is a term generally used for the formal rule system communicated through a region’s laws and judicial system. Those rules apply across all people who live within the borders of that region, no matter what their cultural influences. Laws are common agreements that sum up the group’s best thinking about how its members should behave. There will always be rules that individual members disagree with, but they govern anyway so that there can be certainty about expectations. There are many wonderful novels that explore visions of utopian living, and the more interesting ones show us the impossibility of creating conditions that will be perfect for everyone. The most we can expect is that our region’s rules will leave us mostly free to act as we prefer. Justice can also refer to the perceived “rightness” of an action or outcome. A region’s laws will take ideals of rightness into account, but they are, again, subjective. Today’s justice is tomorrow’s injustice. In today’s world, where so much information is easily shared, the best practices of many regions of the world are out there to be utilized and to inform local choices. A wider range of options can be considered for the best fit in a local system. New ideas spur more rapid change and more detailed refinements.
The justice meted out by a region’s judicial system, guided by clear written rules of law, lets us know that the culture will not stand for lack of equity on a grander scale, and makes it worthwhile for all to pay attention. Unlike fairness, this should make justice, at least in theory, harder than fairness to ignore or interpret. Of course, enormous amounts of time and money are still spent each year in the arguing of cases and how the written laws apply to each one! The proliferation of legal dramas on television attests to the spellbinding variety of ways in which many laws can be understood and argued. While a societal group holds sway over the rules of justice in that in can contribute to the process of changing laws over time, there are times when it does not seem that justice (as in the right result from a moral perspective) has been served in the moment because an antiquated law is still on the books, or a situation arises with new factors that haven’t been considered before. Not to mention a loophole having been exploited or a judge or jury proving to have an obvious bias. And yet, despite inevitable ambiguities, developed nations still make strong efforts to define legal rules so that clear lines of consequence can be obvious to citizens. When everyone knows what’s allowable and what isn’t, each can make his own choice about his actions, and understand the likely outcomes. Each can also understand her agreement or disharmony with the larger group, which can help her to understand her place in this region and whether she is willing to stay there. The alternative to having set rules would be chaos, which is not conducive to the health and happiness of most people; if chaos reigns, safety concerns draw us away from anything more rewarding that could be achieved in an environment of general stability.
Having a well-defined and well-communicated set of rules also accomplishes a few other things, including helping to map out ways to address what has happened in a given incident (and its aftermath), and how best to move forward following that incident for the safety of all:
· It helps people to decide whether those rules are effectively creating what they think of as justice from a moral perspective. It’s normal for values to shift over time. As they do, those people governed by a particular set of laws can decide separately or as a group that the rules should change to reflect new values, and band together in order to create the change they see as necessary
· Those who run afoul of the rules are punished in some way, which may deter others from risking taking the same kinds of actions. Without consequences, more individuals might dare to flout the rules and cause havoc in a previously orderly system
· The feelings of outrage of victims or other observers at the lawbreaker’s behavior may be satisfied by recompense of some sort being required. This may restore a sense of fairness being upheld in the group; this is an emotional and moral consideration regarding balancing out the scales regarding a former incident
· The public may be kept safer from those who are imprisoned or lose privileges because of unlawful behavior. This is a functional, purely mechanical consideration about doing the best thing going forward from a problematic incident
As for the interplay between the two concepts, if fairness is not a common concept or value in a particular region, it’s also less likely that this region’s judicial system will treat all citizens equitably. For instance, if racial or religious biases are rampant, there may be an unwritten agreement by the majority that all people deserve equal treatment except those in one of the groups that is out of favor, which implies that fairness is not a strong principle here; if women are considered to be less valuable than men, say, there may be entirely different laws in place covering their actions and rights. Even in the United States right now, which likes to pride itself on being a free and modern nation, we still see vestiges of old ideas about women’s place in society played out in the fact that on average, women still earn about 21% less than men who do the same exact job. There’s currently a lot of work being done in the corporate world on changing this stubborn fact, but old ways of thinking and behaving die hard, and for centuries it was completely in vogue to think of women as separate and unequal to men—a completely different commodity with much different value in dollars and cents. “Fairness” that applied among men didn’t apply to women, and that was considered to be obvious and only right. The idea of fairness that many cultures are striving toward now includes similar rules applying to both men and women, though some may vary based on obvious differences. But, of course, there will always be room for confusion as our understanding of differences changes; for example, women are now allowed to serve in the U.S. military, but their progress in having opportunities for career advancement has been slow, and in the event of a draft, women are not included because they are still considered to be fundamentally less suited to combat, and positions that support it, than men. I imagine that, to some modern men in the military, that might be seen as unfair! So even if fairness is a common value, the complexities of life and the progress of ideas mean that it still may not be applied equitably.
Both fairness and justice are imprecise, complicated concepts that will always be imperfectly expressed, but an attempt at them supports societal agreement, conflict resolution, and safety. They help to create a framework in which we can expect to operate as we go about our pursuit of happiness, hopefully with something of a sense of clarity. They support order in the group, another precondition that we looked at last week, and lay out a code of conduct to which we must adhere if we want to remain at liberty. They also give us recourse if someone else is violating our stated rights, which can also contribute to our feelings of safety and stability. Anyone who has been on the wrong side of unfairness knows that it’s not an enjoyable experience. It’s confusing and frustrating, and it can be hard to understand how to avoid it in the future, which can be a real blow to confidence. Anyone who has experienced injustice knows that it can be heartbreaking and incredibly disruptive to one’s life. Structures and customs that help us to avoid these results help to create an environment in which people can thrive. Feeling that you have choices regarding how you relate to issues of fairness and justice is empowering. Consider, then:
· Do you make an effort to treat others fairly?
· Do you include what you know to be local understandings of fairness or moral justice in your consideration of possible actions, or only your own preferences?
· Do you respond thoughtfully to feedback you receive from others about their perceptions of your fairness?
· Do you explain why you make choices to others who will be affected by those decisions, or better yet, involve them in the decision-making process?
· If there are laws where you live that you don’t agree with, do you comply with them? Do you make an effort to change them?
· How do you regard those in a position of trying to uphold your region’s laws?
· Do you ever advocate for fewer or no rules? If so, have you thought through how it would feel to have no recourse against others in those areas?
Are there issues in how you relate to these concepts that you could benefit from thinking through further? Feel free to comment below about anything you realized as you read this post.