Seminar
on
‘Is There An Adequate Theory Of Justice?’
At
Indian Institute of Advanced Study, Shimla
(20-21 March 2015)
There exist several contesting theories of justice in the field of socio-political philosophy, though some have a more dominant presence in our theoretical and political imagination than others. The main theoretical contention, as it has evolved in our times, is between conceptions of justice that are universal in scope and those that are contextually historical and hence defined by historical particularity. At the operative level, both have shown limitations in ensuring justice and also involve certain overlaps.
The liberal and more particularly, the Rawlsian theory of justice, arguably suggests that justice can be universally applicable, specifically in its de-ontological thrust. On the other hand, we have the public conceptions of social justice that reduce the universality of the concept to its historical specificity. In fact, historical specificity decides, or provides an epistemic ground for the universal conception of social justice. But the public imagination, particularly in the Indian context, distorts this necessary ontological relation between the concept and its epistemic ground. The concept of justice is implicated into sociological concreteness that is evident, for example, in Sachar Committee recommendations. Such socio-cultural particulates in societies like India pose challenges to the dominant theory of justice that is singularly associated with Rawls. Further, the continuous process of marginalization and deprivation of some communities has exposed the limits of universal conceptions of justice. The pressure of existential conditions, for example, ever worsening quality of life, is forcing these groups to bring alternate political conceptions of justice to the fore.
On the other side of the spectrum, the liberal conception of justice also offers an opportunity to evaluate the mode of the distribution of social welfarism. The need to evaluate the distributive stamina of the government makes it necessary to provide for the conditions of its successful articulation. Thus, democracy, pluralism and institutional mechanism become the constitutive condition within which justice as a principle becomes operative. Paradoxically, justice as a universal principle of distribution, however, on its way to its concretization, particularly in the form of policy package, generates its own adversary-injustice. The condition of injustice, thus, becomes internal to the very principle of justice. The discourse on justice lands up into the un-resolvable tension between the universal and the particular on the one hand, and justice and injustice on the other.
It is in this general problematic, that the seminar seeks to address the following issues: First, what is an adequate conception of justice? Can there be one? Can we imagine an expansive conception of justice? Second, did we ever have such conception of justice in the field of political philosophy particularly in modern times? Third, what are the conditions for its minimum articulation? Do we have these conditions present in the Indian context?
Link:
Leave a comment