Justice

According to the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, the most plausible candidate for a core definition comes from the Institutes of Justinian, a codification of Roman Law from the sixth century AD, where justice is defined as "the constant and perpetual will to render to each his due".

The interpretation of what "deserve" means draws on a variety of fields and philosophical branches including ethics, rationality, law, religion, and fairness.

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.

Jean-Jacques Rosseau was one of the advocates for social contract theory which states that justice derives from the mutual agreement of members of society to be governed in a political order.

In the 19th century, utilitarian philosophers such as John Stuart Mill proposed that justice is served by what creates the best outcomes for the greatest number of people.

[citation needed] Continuing on these themes, Plato theorizes that those who love wisdom, or philosophers, are the most ideal to govern because only they truly comprehend the nature of the good.

Just like one would seek a doctor's expertise in matters of health rather than a farmer's, so should the city entrust its governance to someone knowledgeable about the good, rather than to politicians who might prioritize power over people's genuine needs.

[citation needed] The Hebrew Bible describes God as saying about the Judeo-Christian-Islamic patriarch Abraham: "No, for I have chosen him, that he may charge his children and his household after him to keep the way of the Lord by doing righteousness and justice;...." (Genesis 18:19, NRSV).

In Republic by Plato, the character Thrasymachus argues that justice is the interest of the strong – merely a name for what the powerful or cunning ruler has imposed on the people.

[citation needed] Advocates of the social contract say that justice is derived from the mutual agreement of everyone; or, in many versions, from what they would agree to under hypothetical conditions including equality and absence of bias.

[citation needed] Mill tries to explain our mistaken belief that justice is overwhelmingly important by arguing that it derives from two natural human tendencies: our desire to retaliate against those who hurt us, or the feeling of self-defense and our ability to put ourselves imaginatively in another's place, sympathy.

[9] Justice can be thought of as distinct from benevolence, charity, prudence, mercy, generosity, or compassion, although these dimensions are regularly understood to also be interlinked.

[10] Metaphysical justice has often been associated with concepts of fate, reincarnation or Divine Providence, i.e., with a life in accordance with a cosmic plan.

Utilitarianism, in general, says that the standard of justification for actions, institutions, or the whole world, is impartial welfare consequentialism, and only indirectly, if at all, to do with rights, property, need, or any other non-utilitarian criterion.

For example, Andrew von Hirsch, in his 1976 book Doing Justice, suggested that we have a moral obligation to punish greater crimes more than lesser ones.

[citation needed] Rawls asks us to imagine ourselves behind a veil of ignorance that denies us all knowledge of our personalities, social statuses, moral characters, wealth, talents and life plans, and then asks what theory of justice we would choose to govern our society when the veil is lifted, if we wanted to do the best that we could for ourselves.

[citation needed] Rawls said that each of us would reject the utilitarian theory of justice that we should maximize welfare (see below) because of the risk that we might turn out to be someone whose own good is sacrificed for greater benefits for others.

[26] Research conducted in 2003 at Emory University involving capuchin monkeys demonstrated that other cooperative animals also possess such a sense and that "inequity aversion may not be uniquely human".

[citation needed] On the basis of this theory of distributive justice, Nozick said that all attempts to redistribute goods according to an ideal pattern, without the consent of their owners, are theft.

[citation needed] According to meritocratic theories, goods, especially wealth and social status, should be distributed to match individual merit, which is usually understood as some combination of talent and hard work.

In criticism of this belief, the author Anatole France said in 1894, "In its majestic equality, the law forbids rich and poor alike to sleep under bridges, beg in the streets, and steal loaves of bread.

"[30] With this saying, France illustrated the fundamental shortcoming of a theory of legal equality that remains blind to social inequality; the same law applied to all may have disproportionately harmful effects on the least powerful.

[32] Social justice is distinct from cosmopolitanism, which is the idea that all people belong to a single global community with a shared morality.

[34] For example, sociologist George C. Homans suggested that the root of the concept of justice is that each person should receive rewards that are proportional to their contributions.

[43] Relational justice examines individual connections and societal relationships, focusing on normative and political aspects.

Politically, he maintains that the proper context for justice is a form of liberalism with the traditional elements of liberty and equality, together with the concepts of diversity and tolerance.

Under some legal systems an award of damages involves some scope for retribution, denunciation and deterrence, by means of additional categories of damages beyond simple compensation, covering a punitive effect, social disapprobation, and potentially, deterrence, and occasionally disgorgement (forfeit of any gain, even if no loss was caused to the other party).

Victims find respectful treatment, information and having a voice important for a sense of justice as well as the perception of a fair procedure.

The question of institutive justice raises issues of legitimacy, procedure, codification and interpretation, which are considered by legal theorists and by philosophers of law.

[56] The United Nations Sustainable Development Goal 16 emphasizes the need for strong institutions in order to uphold justice.