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Social justice is justice exercised within a society, particularly as it is applied to and among the various social classes of a society.
A socially just society is one based upon the principles of equality and solidarity; which pedagogy also maintains that a socially just society both understands and values human rights, as well as recognizing the dignity of every human being. The Constitution of the International Labour Organization affirms that "universal and lasting peace can be established only if it is based upon social justice." Furthermore, the Vienna Declaration and Programme of Action treats social justice as a purpose of the human rights education.
The term and modern concept of "social justice" was coined by Jesuit priest Luigi Taparelli in 1840 based on the teachings of St. Thomas Aquinas and given further exposure in 1848 by Antonio Rosmini-Serbati. The phrase has taken on a very controverted and variable meaning, depending on who is using it. The idea was elaborated by the moral theologian John A. Ryan, who initiated the concept of a living wage. Father Coughlin also used the term in his publications in the 1930s and the 1940s. It is a part of Catholic social teaching, the Protestants' Social Gospel, and is one of the Four Pillars of the Green Party upheld by green parties worldwide. Social justice as a secular concept, distinct from religious teachings, emerged mainly in the late twentieth century, influenced primarily by philosopher John Rawls.
In To Heal a Fractured World: The Ethics of Responsibility, Rabbi Jonathan Sacks states that social justice has a central place in Judaism. One of Judaism’s most distinctive and challenging ideas is its ethics of responsibility reflected in the concepts of simcha ("gladness" or "joy"), tzedakah ("the religious obligation to perform charity and philanthropic acts"), chesed ("deeds of kindness"), and tikkun olam ("repairing the world").
Catholic social teaching consists of those aspects of Roman Catholic doctrine which relate to matters dealing with the collective aspect of humanity. A distinctive feature of the Catholic social doctrine is their concern for the poorest members of society. Two of the seven key areas of "Catholic social teaching" are pertinent to social justice:
Even before it was propounded in the Catholic social doctrine, social justice appeared regularly in the history of the Catholic Church:
From its founding, Methodism was a Christian social justice movement.
Under John Wesley's direction, Methodists became leaders in many social justice issues of the day, including the prison reform and abolitionism movements. Wesley himself was among the first to preach for slaves rights attracting significant opposition.
Today, social justice plays a major role in the United Methodist Church. The Book of Discipline of the United Methodist Church says, "it is a governmental responsibility to provide all citizens with health care." The United Methodist Church also teaches Population control as part of its doctrine.
Ancient Hindu society was based on equality of all beings. However, to divide labor society divided itself into hundreds of tribes[Jati]. India was governed by people of non-Hindu faiths from the 8th century which caused ruptures in societal fabric. Caste is a word from the Portuguese word "casta" and caste came to define the jatis only 500 years ago. Considerable social engineering occurred during the British rule which impacted the society's self governance. There was some social injustice in which some jatis considered themselves superior to others (just as in the western societies). The present day jati hierarchy is undergoing changes for variety of reasons including 'social justice',which is a politically popular stance in democratic India. Institutionalized affirmative action has swung the pendulum. The disparity and wide inequalities in social behaviour to some of the jatis led to various reform movements in hinduism for centuries. While legally outlawed, the caste system remains strong in practice, with social and employment opportunities strongly governed by one's caste of birth.
Vivekananda's calls to promote social justice have been largely heeded. Of course there is room for improvement as in the rest of the world.
The Quran contains numerous references to elements of social justice. For example, one of Islam's Five Pillars is Zakāt, or alms-giving. Charity and assistance to the poor – concepts central to social justice – are and have historically been important parts of the Islamic faith.
In Muslim history, Islamic governance has often been associated with social justice. Establishment of social justice was one of the motivating factors of the Abbasid revolt against the Umayyads. The Shi'ite believe that the return of the Mahdi will herald in "the messianic age of justice" and the Mahdi along with the Messiah (Jesus) will end plunder, torture, oppression and discrimination.
For the Muslim Brotherhood the implementation of social justice would require the rejection of consumerism and communism. The Brotherhood strongly affirmed the right to private property as well as differences in personal wealth due to factors such as hard work. However, the Brotherhood held Muslims had an obligation to assist those Muslims in need. It held that zakat (alms-giving) was not voluntary charity, but rather the poor had the right to assistance from the more fortunate.
Though monetary donations are the most practiced way of zakat, Islam is deeply rooted in the tenets of volunteerism and social activism. Areas of one's communities which require assistance and beneficiaries must be a Muslim's foci if need be, rather than strictly her or his personal or superficial wants. For example, the ecological well-being of the planet (i.e.: animal rights, global warming, natural resources degradation); locally, nationally, globally, is a campaign to which every Muslim must adhere. Many Muslims practice this today by ensuring that they produce minimal waste, give to charity what they no longer need, and spend time in prayer and meditation upon the bounties of nature so as to more mindfully approach all that is provided by nature,and ultimately, Allah. Other areas of society in need may be the safety and security of minority populations, i.e.: women or persons of color, children, the elderly, the developmentally or physically disabled, animals, et al. Social Justice in Islam is a tenet to which every Muslim must corroborate in his or her daily life, and without which would create a void in all their efforts towards attaining true spirituality and a connection with God.
Political philosopher John Rawls draws on the utilitarian insights of Bentham and Mill, the social contract ideas of John Locke, and the categorical imperative ideas of Kant. His first statement of principle was made in A Theory of Justice where he proposed that, "Each person possesses an inviolability founded on justice that even the welfare of society as a whole cannot override. For this reason justice denies that the loss of freedom for some is made right by a greater good shared by others.". A deontological proposition that echoes Kant in framing the moral good of justice in absolutist terms. His views are definitively restated in Political Liberalism where society is seen "as a fair system of co-operation over time, from one generation to the next.".
All societies have a basic structure of social, economic, and political institutions, both formal and informal. In testing how well these elements fit and work together, Rawls based a key test of legitimacy on the theories of social contract. To determine whether any particular system of collectively enforced social arrangements is legitimate, he argued that one must look for agreement by the people who are subject to it, but not necessarily to an objective notion of justice based on coherent ideological grounding. Obviously, not every citizen can be asked to participate in a poll to determine his or her consent to every proposal in which some degree of coercion is involved, so one has to assume that all citizens are reasonable. Rawls constructed an argument for a two-stage process to determine a citizen's hypothetical agreement:
This applies to one person who represents a small group (e.g., the organiser of a social event setting a dress code) as equally as it does to national governments, which are ultimate trustees, holding representative powers for the benefit of all citizens within their territorial boundaries. Governments that fail to provide for welfare of their citizens according to the principles of justice are not legitimate. To emphasise the general principle that justice should rise from the people and not be dictated by the law-making powers of governments, Rawls asserted that, "There is ... a general presumption against imposing legal and other restrictions on conduct without sufficient reason. But this presumption creates no special priority for any particular liberty." This is support for an unranked set of liberties that reasonable citizens in all states should respect and uphold - to some extent, the list proposed by Rawls matches the normative human rights that have international recognition and direct enforcement in some nation states where the citizens need encouragement to act in a way that fixes a greater degree of equality of outcome.
The concept of social justice has come under criticism from a variety of perspectives.
Many authors criticize the idea that there exists an objective standard of social justice. Moral relativists deny that there is any kind of objective standard for justice in general. Non-cognitivists, moral skeptics, moral nihilists, and most logical positivists deny the epistemic possibility of objective notions of justice. Cynics (such as Niccolò Machiavelli) believe that any ideal of social justice is ultimately a mere justification for the status quo.
Many other people accept some of the basic principles of social justice, such as the idea that all human beings have a basic level of value, but disagree with the elaborate conclusions that may or may not follow from this. One example is the statement by H. G. Wells that all people are "equally entitled to the respect of their fellowmen."
On the other hand, some scholars reject the very idea of social justice as meaningless, religious, self-contradictory, and ideological, believing that to realize any degree of social justice is unfeasible, and that the attempt to do so must destroy all liberty. Perhaps the most complete rejection of the concept of social justice comes from Friedrich Hayek of the Austrian School of economics:
There can be no test by which we can discover what is 'socially unjust' because there is no subject by which such an injustice can be committed, and there are no rules of individual conduct the observance of which in the market order would secure to the individuals and groups the position which as such (as distinguished from the procedure by which it is determined) would appear just to us. [Social justice] does not belong to the category of error but to that of nonsense, like the term `a moral stone'.
Ben O'Neill of the University of New South Wales argues that, for proponents of "social justice":
the notion of "rights" is a mere term of entitlement, indicative of a claim for any possible desirable good, no matter how important or trivial, abstract or tangible, recent or ancient. It is merely an assertion of desire, and a declaration of intention to use the language of rights to acquire said desire. In fact, since the program of social justice inevitably involves claims for government provision of goods, paid for through the efforts of others, the term actually refers to an intention to use force to acquire one's desires. Not to earn desirable goods by rational thought and action, production and voluntary exchange, but to go in there and forcibly take goods from those who can supply them!
Janusz Korwin-Mikke argues simply: "Either 'social justice' has the same meaning as 'justice' – or not. If so – why use the additional word 'social?' We lose time, we destroy trees to obtain paper necessary to print this word. If not, if 'social justice' means something different from 'justice' – then 'something different from justice' is by definition 'injustice'"
Sociologist Carl L. Bankston has argued that a secular, leftist view of social justice entails viewing the redistribution of goods and resources as based on the rights of disadvantaged categories of people, rather than on compassion or national interest. Bankston maintains that this secular version of social justice became widely accepted due to the rise of demand-side economics and to the moral influence of the civil rights movement.
Hunter Lewis' work promoting natural healthcare and sustainable economies advocates for conservation as a key premise in social justice. His manifesto on sustainability ties the continued thriving of human life to real conditions, the environment supporting that life, and associates injustice with the detrimental effects of unintended consequences of human actions. Quoting classical Greek thinkers like Epicurus on the good of pursuing happiness, Hunter also cites ornithologist, naturalist, and philosopher Alexander Skutch in his book Moral Foundations:
The common feature which unites the activities most consistently forbidden by the moral codes of civilized peoples is that by their very nature they cannot be both habitual and enduring, because they tend to destroy the conditions which make them possible.
Pope Benedict XVI cites Teilhard de Chardin in a vision of the cosmos as a 'living host' embracing an understanding of ecology that includes mankinds's relationship to fellow men, that pollution affects not just the natural world but interpersonal relations also. Cosmic harmony, justice and peace are closely interrelated:
If you want to cultivate peace, protect creation.
Social justice is also a concept that is used to describe the movement towards a socially just world, i.e., the Global Justice Movement. In this context, social justice is based on the concepts of human rights and equality, and can be defined as "the way in which human rights are manifested in the everyday lives of people at every level of society".
A number of movements are working to achieve social justice in society. These movements are working towards the realization of a world where all members of a society, regardless of background or procedural justice, have basic human rights and equal access to the benefits of their society.
The Interfaith Social Justice Reform Coalition (ISARC) is Ontario's largest interfaith organization dedicated to faith-based approaches to public policy reform in the areas of social justice and poverty eradication. ISARC has a shared hope to mobilize, facilitate, and empower diverse faith communities to research, educate and advocate for public policy for the elimination of poverty in Ontario. ISARC's values include human dignity, social equity, mutual responsibility, fiscal fairness, economic equity and environmental sustainability. Since 1986, ISARC has been a leader in mobilizing faith communities to advocate for systemic change in the Province of Ontario, Canada.
Liberation theology is a movement in Christian theology which conveys the teachings of Jesus Christ in terms of a liberation from unjust economic, political, or social conditions. It has been described by proponents as "an interpretation of Christian faith through the poor's suffering, their struggle and hope, and a critique of society and the Catholic faith and Christianity through the eyes of the poor", and by detractors as Christianity perverted by Marxism and Communism.
Although liberation theology has grown into an international and inter-denominational movement, it began as a movement within the Catholic Church in Latin America in the 1950s – 1960s. It arose principally as a moral reaction to the poverty caused by social injustice in that region. It achieved prominence in the 1970s and 1980s. The term was coined by the Peruvian priest, Gustavo Gutiérrez, who wrote one of the movement's most famous books, A Theology of Liberation (1971). According to Sarah Kleeb, "Marx would surely take issue," she writes, "with the appropriation of his works in a religious context...there is no way to reconcile Marx's views of religion with those of Gutierrez, they are simply incompatible. Despite this, in terms of their understanding of the necessity of a just and righteous world, and the nearly inevitable obstructions along such a path, the two have much in common; and, particularly in the first edition of [A Theology of Liberation], the use of Marxian theory is quite evident."[dead link]
Other noted exponents are Leonardo Boff of Brazil, Jon Sobrino of El Salvador, and Juan Luis Segundo of Uruguay.
Social justice has more recently made its way into the field of bioethics. Discussion involves topics such as affordable access to health care, especially for low income households and families. The discussion also raises questions such as whether society should bear healthcare costs for low income families, and whether the global marketplace is a good thing to deal with healthcare. Ruth Faden and Madison Powers of the Johns Hopkins Berman Institute of Bioethics focus their analysis of social justice on which inequalities matter the most. They develop a social justice theory that answers some of these questions in concrete settings. Social injustices occur when there is a preventable difference in health states among a population of people. These social injustices take on the form of health inequities when negative health states such as malnourishment, and infectious diseases are more prevalent among an impoverished nation. These negative health states can often be prevented by providing social and economic structures such as Primary Healthcare which ensure the general population has equal access to health care services regardless of income level, gender, education or any other stratifying factor. Integrating social justice to health inherently reflects the social determinants of health model without discounting the role of the bio-medical model.
The Vienna Declaration and Programme of Action affirm that "Human rights education should include peace, democracy, development and social justice, as set forth in international and regional human rights instruments, in order to achieve common understanding and awareness with a view to strengthening universal commitment to human rights."
Published originally in Italian in 1848, the founder of the Society of Charity Rosmini's seminal work Costituzione secondo la giustizia sociale "The Constitution under Social Justice" was translated into English in 2006 by Alberto Mingardi. This work of political philosophy links representative justice to territorial property rights held in trust by a monarch, and asserts a social justice of no taxation without representation. Historically income tax was not levied on an individuals' industry or labor but rather on profits realized by title holders of real estate. Such an injustice-withholding wages from a worker-would have been inconceivable to 18th century liberal democrats.
Social Justice was also the name of a periodical published by Father Coughlin in the 1930s and early 1940s. Coughlin's organization was known as the National Union for Social Justice and he frequently used the term social justice in his radio broadcasts. In 1935 Coughlin made a series of broadcasts in which he outlined what he termed "the Christian principles of social justice" as an alternative to both capitalism and communism. Some Catholic contemporaries, such as the Catholic Radical Alliance, felt that he misused the term, and was too supportive of capitalism. The president of the Pontifical Council for Justice and Peace Ghanaian Cardinal Peter Turkson acknowledges that terminology used in the Church's social teachings needs glossing for US audiences where the adjective social may have a negative connotation of collective arrogation of responsibility for individual well-being.
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