The Cambridge dictionary defines justice as “fairness in the way people are dealt with” and whilst this is a satisfactory definition for the purposes of general day-to-day life, we must delve deeper if we wish to examine justice as an academic concept in the field of law.
Justice refers to the fair and equitable treatment of individuals within our judicial system. This means ensuring all are given a fair trial with access to adequate legal representation and advice, even if they would not otherwise be able to afford it. It also means ensuring an unbiased judiciary with either balanced and independent juries, balanced and independent magistrates, or balanced and independent judges. The culmination of these factors, if implemented correctly, would most certainly contribute to a fair state of ‘justice’ within the English judicial system.
However, whilst this may be one approach to justice, if we wish to appreciate a wider understanding of the theory of justice, we must take a look at other significant approaches to justice as a concept.
One professor, Perelman, also defined justice in his book, De La Justice, and placed great emphasis on the fact that justice has different meanings depending on its context. He expounded several meanings of justice, including justice to each according to their needs, merits, works, ranks, legal entitlement, and equality. One of the earliest definitions of justice arose from the Greek philosopher Plato, who viewed justice as being the harmony between different sectors and classes of society. Plato’s theory of justice is still relevant today, and his theory believed that a law would be a just law if it enabled people to fulfil themselves to the fullest extent in society.
Plato also distinguished between the concepts of corrective and distributive justice. Distributive justice is primarily concerned with the allocation and distribution of assets, with the ideal of this concept being to achieve an allocation of assets in proportion to each person’s individual claim. Adversely, corrective justice is concerned with situations where the system of distributive justice has been disturbed by external circumstances, for example, through some form of wrongdoing or ill fortune. The ideal of corrective justice would be to redistribute assets and restore distributive justice.
One such approach is the utilitarian approach. Utalitarianism is concerned with the issue of greater good and can essentially be reduced down to the question of whether the good is greater than the bad. This approach believes that a law is just if it is in the interests of and benefits the majority of people, even if it disadvantages or is harmful to a minority. Proponents of this perspective include that of John Stuart Mill and Jeremy Bentham. Utalitarians will take a look at a given law and its benefits as well as its consequences to see whether it is indeed categorised as just. If a law benefits more than it harms, then it would be considered a just law, even if it creates a significant degree of inequality. Naturally, this approach comes with its own inherent criticisms as it focuses on justice for the masses at the expense of individuals. Inevitably, there is a conflict between the interests and needs of society as a whole and the interests and needs of individuals.
There is also the theory of natural law, which assumes the presence of “higher” natural law. Proponents include Aristotle, who believed that higher law was derived from God, as did St. Thomas Aquinas. According to Aquinas, a law that is contrary to human good or goes against God’s will is not a true law.
Natural law theorists will argue that if any law does not conform to the basic principles of natural law, that it follows some “higher natural” law, or if it is not in the interests of human good, then it is not a true law and need not be adhered to. Contrastingly, natural law theorists also believe that, even if a law defies these principles, it should be obeyed as long as it avoids social injustice.
There is also the new-rights approach to justice, theorised by Rawls, based on a set of principles designed to make a society a just society in favour of the greater good. To achieve this, people are asked to consider the principles without regard to their position in society, be it rich or poor, young or old. They will also not know the sociopolitical and economic climates in their society to ensure that they are free from any personal bias and can consider the needs of society without being constrained by their position within it. Rawls essentially argues that there are two basic principles of justice, the first being a set of universal basic freedoms available to all. These are freedom of thought, conscience, speech, and assembly. The second is the principle of equality in terms of equality of ownership, whereby Rawls imagines total equality in the distribution of wealth and where inequality is only permitted if it is in the interest of helping the most disadvantaged.
Nozick is a proponent of the theory of minimal state interference. He believes that a just society can only be achieved when state interference is restricted to only providing an individual’s basic needs: protecting an individual from force, preventing theft and fraud, and enforcing contractual obligations.
Karl Marx had a contrasting view on state interference, instead believing that the state should positively intervene in society to redistribute wealth. He believed that wealth and property ought to be distributed “from each according to his ability, to each according to his needs.” Marx rejected the ideals of capitalism, believing it was unjust, and he did not agree that individuals should be able to own property, and that it should instead be owned communally. Famously, he is quoted saying “property is theft”, demonstrating his belief in achieving equality and justice for all.
Whilst justice as a concept may be widely debated, as well as the best way to achieve it, it can undoubtedly be stated that objectively, justice is an integral pillar of any modern-day, twenty-first-century society and that justice is a necessary artefact to ensure equality and fair treatment for all.