Justice

Lore & Background

Early Western theories of justice were developed in part by Ancient Greek philosophers such as Plato in his work The Republic, and Aristotle, in his Nicomachean Ethics and Politics. Saint Augustine emphasized the importance of justice, expressing the opinion that, without justice, 'kingdoms are nothing but gangs of criminals on a large scale.' The classical Confucian theory of justice developed around the same time, and had little in common with Western theories of justice. Instead, it posited that justice was a personal and public virtue, but did not include freedom or equality, and was not part of the law. The law itself was seen as promoting order rather than justice.

Reader's Guide

Justice, according to Plato, is about balance and harmony. It represents the right relationship between conflicting aspects within an individual or a community. He defines justice as everyone having and doing what they are responsible for or what belongs to them. Aristotle saw the word justice as somewhat synonymous to virtue, while at the same time also referring to a particular form of virtue: giving people what they are deserving of. Modern-day Western notions of justice have roots in Christian theology, which largely follows the divine command theory, according to which God dictates morality and determines whether or not an action is seen as morally 'good.' Western thinkers later advanced different theories about where the foundations of justice lie. In the 17th century, philosophers such as John Locke held that justice derives from natural law. Jean-Jacques Rousseau became a prominent advocate of social contract theory, which holds that justice arises from a mutual agreement among members of society to be governed within a political system. Modern frameworks include concepts such as distributive justice, utilitarianism, retributive justice and restorative justice. In broad terms, distributive justice considers what is fair based on what goods are to be distributed, between whom they are to be distributed, and what the proper distribution is; utilitarian theories look forward to the future consequences of punishment; retributive theories look back to particular acts of wrongdoing and attempt to match them with appropriate punishment; and restorative theories look at the needs of victims and society and seek to repair the harms from wrongdoing.

Did You Know?

• The most plausible core definition of justice comes from the Institutes of Justinian, a 6th-century codification of Roman law.
• Saint Augustine said that without justice, 'kingdoms are nothing but gangs of criminals on a large scale.'
• In Buddhist ethics, justice is defined by the transformation of suffering for all sentient beings, not by individuals receiving their due.
• The Euthyphro dilemma asks whether what is morally good is commanded by the gods because it is morally good, or is morally good because it is commanded by the gods.