Regarding footnote 4, I too hate it when people flaunt the rules of English usage. However, I admit that I don't know if the preceding sentence can be accurately described as employing irony.
What then of the modern use of social-justice (as used by those who would describe themselves as pursuing it)?
Does it have any validity as a form of CJ in your mind? They would claim that there are obvious wrongs in society that require government coercion backed by activists to make right, is this justice?
Is there DJ on display? Again a claim would be made that recognising and favouring certain groups, being environmentally aware, wearing your mask and taking your vaccine, are all virtuous acts worthy of eliciting praise for making a more just society. Many would agree with them.
That's a good question, and probably needs its own 10 part essay series :) (One of the reasons this took so long is I kept dipping my toes into that, then realizing it was longer than the rest of the essay, deleting it, then starting again...)
I think, at root, most "social justice" claims boil down to DJ at best, and are closer to straight injustice.
Redistribution of wealth within a society is at some level a DJ question, how do we (the society) make us of our stuff. The problem with that, of course, is that society owns damned little, and really what people are discussing is how much to take from people who own stuff and give it to people who do not. However, using a public choice theory lens, it is quite possible to imagine a unanimous, or close to it, voting system that would also approve taking some percentage of everyone's income to give to the poor, for example, because everyone would agree (consent) that it was a good use.
Most other use of justice along the lines of social-justice has nothing to do with justice, but rather wanting to use the term to imply that using force and coercion to achieve the ends is acceptable.
The tricky bit with that, at least in my view (some others are more hardline) is that for some people that might be justice, in that they, and their compatriots, are quite willing to follow rules whereby violence is visited upon those who don't see things their way. Taking CJ to grammatical implies that it is consistent and known only, not that it is a good idea. I can imagine a society that thinks it completely just to give 90% of their income to government for redistribution; history also teaches that it wouldn't last very long.
So yea, in sum, most modern use is at best DJ pretending to be CJ to justify violence and government coercion to enforce it, and in reality starts to look a lot like rationalization of injustice.
Sometimes what is wanted is not justice, but retribution. 'It's payback time!'. The problem with retribution is that it so easily becomes vengeance. I need 'justice' for the things that you did to me, which you did because of things my grandfather did to yours, which he did because of things your great-grandfather did to mine and so on -- at some point you need to get off this treadmill, and decide that 1. yes, you were wronged and 2. no, we don't care about that any more. This is what 'getting over it' entails and is why some people refuse to 'get over' things.
Some people mailed me about this. Retribution is not always a negative thing. You damaged something of mine, I want you to pay for the repairs. And I want the state to compel you to pay if you refuse. This is fine when what you want repaired is the car I crashed into. It's less fine when you add on 'and I want this much money for the mental suffering this caused me'. And if you send two criminals over to my house, with orders to break my leg so that I will suffer as you have we are completely over my line. Even if I live in a crime district where these *are* the expected local rules for what happens when you offend the Boss, and everybody goes around saying that what I got 'was just'.
Yea, that's the trick, punishment is not bad, but it must be justly applied with good judgement. It should fit the crime, as they say. Smith uses "resentment" as the sentiment that demands punishment for injustice. It takes good judgement (another topic I intend to write on soon) to find that correct level that both is efficient and people will go along with.
Recognizing what is actual harm, and what incentivizes people to claim actual harm where there was none is a big part of that. For those interested in the topic, besides TMS, I recommend David Friedman's "Law's Order" which really does a great job summarizing and explaining the field of law and economics, and how law (whether social or legislative) tends towards efficient outcomes and how/why. Good stuff.
Clearly, however, we find ourselves struggling in modern discourse to rediscover concepts and distinctions that had previously been solved long ago.
I would argue that this is intentional. If people don't understand where they came from, they are easily manipulated. The powers that be have a lot to gain from casting us adrift upon the open sea.
Vatican II is perhaps the most striking modern example of what happens when a culture decides to turn its back on its own intellectual and artistic heritage.
I think that is a big part of it, along with some version of "We don't like the implications of this knowledge, so let's make up something else that will work to our benefit if people buy into it." This is one of those times where I think looking at the people making the arguments is worthwhile. Rousseau's life was a train wreck, personal or public, Marx as well. Were there any of the foundational socialist, communist or post-modernist thinkers who weren't kind of a mess?
I am not making an argument along the lines of "the rich and powerful are right, by evidence of their riches and power", but rather that when one advocates a wild change in our understanding of humans deviating highly from thousands of years of work, I want to see them have lives that function, at least in the parts they can control. I don't take life advice from the alcoholics at the bar who will be sleeping in a dumpster later, unless it is about how bad their choices were, for the same reasons.
So, when I was a young'in, my best friend was in a family with four boys, all within about 4 years of each other. As a result, their under clothing was labeled: socks and underwear color coded with dots of paint (my friend's were coded red, which periodically made me worried he had suffered a foot injury). I was also aware that some kids had their name written inside their underwear for similar purposes.
A popular underwear brand, was "Fruit of the Loom".
For about a month, I was convinced that was the fruit you would know someone by. If someone lied about who they were, you could just check the label on their underpants.
I am indeed! In fact, every time I slip into the linguistic norm of calling legislation "law" I half expect Don Boudreaux to slap me in the back of the head. Not that he ever did, or ever would (he is super nice), but I feel kind of like he should :D It is such an important distinction.
Now that I hit post, I am suddenly not sure if the essay on Social or Distributive Justice is in "Law, Legislation and Liberty" or not... damn, that's going to bug me till I find my copies.
Hah! Every once in a while my brain can toss up the right card when I try to remember some obscure bit of knowledge. Names of people I just started talking to give it hell, however. :)
But yea, Hayek writing about "social justice" so long ago was pretty shocking to me too. I had no idea the term was even that old till then, and man, they haven't refined the concept at all in the intervening decades. Still as bad now as it was then.
I'll be damned, I hadn't heard of him. Thanks for the link! I wonder how much Rauschenbusch was sort of the early grandad of the early 20th century Progressive movement, which was characterized as being largely the children of preachers but turned to non-religious action. Reading through a quick bio of R-busch there, it seems like he was fairly in line with their thinking, early in line.
Regarding footnote 4, I too hate it when people flaunt the rules of English usage. However, I admit that I don't know if the preceding sentence can be accurately described as employing irony.
Don't make me get out my red pen and draw on my monitor.
What then of the modern use of social-justice (as used by those who would describe themselves as pursuing it)?
Does it have any validity as a form of CJ in your mind? They would claim that there are obvious wrongs in society that require government coercion backed by activists to make right, is this justice?
Is there DJ on display? Again a claim would be made that recognising and favouring certain groups, being environmentally aware, wearing your mask and taking your vaccine, are all virtuous acts worthy of eliciting praise for making a more just society. Many would agree with them.
That's a good question, and probably needs its own 10 part essay series :) (One of the reasons this took so long is I kept dipping my toes into that, then realizing it was longer than the rest of the essay, deleting it, then starting again...)
I think, at root, most "social justice" claims boil down to DJ at best, and are closer to straight injustice.
Redistribution of wealth within a society is at some level a DJ question, how do we (the society) make us of our stuff. The problem with that, of course, is that society owns damned little, and really what people are discussing is how much to take from people who own stuff and give it to people who do not. However, using a public choice theory lens, it is quite possible to imagine a unanimous, or close to it, voting system that would also approve taking some percentage of everyone's income to give to the poor, for example, because everyone would agree (consent) that it was a good use.
Most other use of justice along the lines of social-justice has nothing to do with justice, but rather wanting to use the term to imply that using force and coercion to achieve the ends is acceptable.
The tricky bit with that, at least in my view (some others are more hardline) is that for some people that might be justice, in that they, and their compatriots, are quite willing to follow rules whereby violence is visited upon those who don't see things their way. Taking CJ to grammatical implies that it is consistent and known only, not that it is a good idea. I can imagine a society that thinks it completely just to give 90% of their income to government for redistribution; history also teaches that it wouldn't last very long.
So yea, in sum, most modern use is at best DJ pretending to be CJ to justify violence and government coercion to enforce it, and in reality starts to look a lot like rationalization of injustice.
Sometimes what is wanted is not justice, but retribution. 'It's payback time!'. The problem with retribution is that it so easily becomes vengeance. I need 'justice' for the things that you did to me, which you did because of things my grandfather did to yours, which he did because of things your great-grandfather did to mine and so on -- at some point you need to get off this treadmill, and decide that 1. yes, you were wronged and 2. no, we don't care about that any more. This is what 'getting over it' entails and is why some people refuse to 'get over' things.
Some people mailed me about this. Retribution is not always a negative thing. You damaged something of mine, I want you to pay for the repairs. And I want the state to compel you to pay if you refuse. This is fine when what you want repaired is the car I crashed into. It's less fine when you add on 'and I want this much money for the mental suffering this caused me'. And if you send two criminals over to my house, with orders to break my leg so that I will suffer as you have we are completely over my line. Even if I live in a crime district where these *are* the expected local rules for what happens when you offend the Boss, and everybody goes around saying that what I got 'was just'.
Yea, that's the trick, punishment is not bad, but it must be justly applied with good judgement. It should fit the crime, as they say. Smith uses "resentment" as the sentiment that demands punishment for injustice. It takes good judgement (another topic I intend to write on soon) to find that correct level that both is efficient and people will go along with.
Recognizing what is actual harm, and what incentivizes people to claim actual harm where there was none is a big part of that. For those interested in the topic, besides TMS, I recommend David Friedman's "Law's Order" which really does a great job summarizing and explaining the field of law and economics, and how law (whether social or legislative) tends towards efficient outcomes and how/why. Good stuff.
Clearly, however, we find ourselves struggling in modern discourse to rediscover concepts and distinctions that had previously been solved long ago.
I would argue that this is intentional. If people don't understand where they came from, they are easily manipulated. The powers that be have a lot to gain from casting us adrift upon the open sea.
Vatican II is perhaps the most striking modern example of what happens when a culture decides to turn its back on its own intellectual and artistic heritage.
I think that is a big part of it, along with some version of "We don't like the implications of this knowledge, so let's make up something else that will work to our benefit if people buy into it." This is one of those times where I think looking at the people making the arguments is worthwhile. Rousseau's life was a train wreck, personal or public, Marx as well. Were there any of the foundational socialist, communist or post-modernist thinkers who weren't kind of a mess?
I am not making an argument along the lines of "the rich and powerful are right, by evidence of their riches and power", but rather that when one advocates a wild change in our understanding of humans deviating highly from thousands of years of work, I want to see them have lives that function, at least in the parts they can control. I don't take life advice from the alcoholics at the bar who will be sleeping in a dumpster later, unless it is about how bad their choices were, for the same reasons.
"You will know them by their fruits." That guy knew what he was talking about sometimes!
So, when I was a young'in, my best friend was in a family with four boys, all within about 4 years of each other. As a result, their under clothing was labeled: socks and underwear color coded with dots of paint (my friend's were coded red, which periodically made me worried he had suffered a foot injury). I was also aware that some kids had their name written inside their underwear for similar purposes.
A popular underwear brand, was "Fruit of the Loom".
For about a month, I was convinced that was the fruit you would know someone by. If someone lied about who they were, you could just check the label on their underpants.
A fellow lost-causer regarding ‘begging the question’ and a connoisseur of Firefly? Excellent.
I take it you are familiar with Hayek’s ‘Social’ or Distributive Justice?
https://www.semanticscholar.org/paper/‘Social’-or-Distributive-Justice-Hayek/59253559420f0d80a6255d8178906a88b6556271
I am indeed! In fact, every time I slip into the linguistic norm of calling legislation "law" I half expect Don Boudreaux to slap me in the back of the head. Not that he ever did, or ever would (he is super nice), but I feel kind of like he should :D It is such an important distinction.
Now that I hit post, I am suddenly not sure if the essay on Social or Distributive Justice is in "Law, Legislation and Liberty" or not... damn, that's going to bug me till I find my copies.
It is! Volume 2, Part 9.
Reading this 30 odd years ago was quite something. The term ‘social justice’ (Soziale Gerechtigkeit) may as well be the 11th commandment in Germany.
Hah! Every once in a while my brain can toss up the right card when I try to remember some obscure bit of knowledge. Names of people I just started talking to give it hell, however. :)
But yea, Hayek writing about "social justice" so long ago was pretty shocking to me too. I had no idea the term was even that old till then, and man, they haven't refined the concept at all in the intervening decades. Still as bad now as it was then.
Oh, it was old even then. In the US you can trace it back to Rauschenbusch and the social gospel movement.
I'll be damned, I hadn't heard of him. Thanks for the link! I wonder how much Rauschenbusch was sort of the early grandad of the early 20th century Progressive movement, which was characterized as being largely the children of preachers but turned to non-religious action. Reading through a quick bio of R-busch there, it seems like he was fairly in line with their thinking, early in line.