Social justice concepts and applications

Social Justice

By saying that social justice is a "mirage," Friedrich Hayek has raised the question whether the concept of social justice has meaningful content. This provocative statement implies that social justice is not real, but stands closer to an illusion. As such, it questions those who would assert that social justice is, or can be, a social reality. It compels an answer from anyone who would assert a concept of social justice grounded in real possibilities. Using a number of scholarly articles, Hayek's assumptions will be evaluated. This essay will argue that social justice has historically seemed like a mirage, but that some contemporary theoretical approaches might profitably be used to correct this impression. Further, it will show that historical studies prove the moral implication of the free market in oppressive structures that cannot be vindicated of blame by reference to the market's impersonality and inequality. There are ways forward toward a real and substantial concept and practice of social justice in the world.

Hayek's view is encapsulated when he says, "In a free society in which the position of the different individuals and groups is not the result of anyone's design -- or could within such a society not be altered in accordance with a principle of general applicability -- the differences in rewards cannot meaningfully be described as just or unjust" (Hayek 1976, p. 83). The whole of Hayek's view rests upon the idea that the market is impersonal and spontaneous. Since it is impersonal, it is amoral. If the market allows unequal distribution, this is a matter of chance and skill but not of ethics. There is no intention or design in an impersonal process, and therefore no blame for injustice. In capitalism there are only procedural rules for undesigned information dispersal. He calls it the "game of catallaxy." This means that "With the acceptance of this procedure the recompense of different groups and individuals becomes exempt from deliberate control" (p. 70). The results are determined by skill and luck in circumstances with unpredictable outcomes. He is deeply suspicious of any government interference with the market, while not applying that same suspicion to the market's free operation. Hayek seems not to recognize the market as a social construct between people. It is taken for granted as a natural process.

As a result, Hayek believes "social justice" is a mirage. It is a product of naive thinking that mistakenly gives meaning to the term "social" and mistakenly sees market outcomes as the result of willful and conscious individual or collective choice. If it were "determined by deliberate acts of will," then it could be "guided by moral rules" (p. 62). However, it is not. To presume the market can be judged from a moral standpoint is to personify it inaccurately. Further, it is to make into a substance something called the "social." In Hayek's conception, the social and its surrounding concepts cannot be given clear meaning. He sees no agent attached to the concept, which means the concept is too empty. Obviously Hayek has tremendous faith in impersonal forces, if this is in fact what the market it, and exonerates them. One cannot demand justice from an impersonal mechanism. To his mind, the appeal to social justice has become a kind of bewitchment based on the false notion that "the near-universal acceptance of a belief" proves its validity (p. 66). Social justice presupposes that "people are guided by specific directions and not by rules of just individual conduct" (p. 69). But these conditions, in his view, do not hold for the impersonal market.

He assumes, in addition, that any notion of a moral market or of social justice implies a directed government in which individual freedom is taken away. It requires that the government tells people what to do and demands obedience. This leads inevitably to totalitarianism and its idea is intolerable to him. It would involve treating people unequally. He says, "It would have to do so because under such a system it would have to undertake to tell people what to do" (p. 82). The government would have to impose a discriminatory practice, since it would restrict the freedom of some (the wealthy) for the benefit of others (the poor). This meddles with human freedom and an impersonal process.

The assumption of impersonality and lack of conscious design leads Hayek to reject any notion of actual equality. He writes, "The postulate of material equality would be a natural starting point only if it were a necessary circumstance that the shares of the different individuals or groups were in such a manner determined by deliberate human decision" (p. 81). Demand for equality or material redistribution can be based only on the belief that someone's decision has created the inequality so. Obviously, by assuming that the social does not exist and that the market is impersonal, there is no decision to blame for inequality. Further, he operates from the assumption that any starting point of equality is impossible to achieve due to the practical nightmare it would entail to redistribute wealth and resources. Another assumption he makes is that impersonality "brings about a greater satisfaction of human desires than any deliberate human organization could achieve" (p. 63). It is not clear on what history he bases this claim on the market's unintentional benevolence. Yet it clearly assumes that "nature" is a better means to achieve well-being than institutionalized human morality or social programs. Another assumption he makes is that we have discovered this market procedure and discerned that merit is not part of its assumptions: "these values which their services will have to their fellows will often have no relations to their individual merits or needs" (p. 72). This connection between deserving and rewards is alleged, not real. In his view, value is determined by worth to the receiver alone. The assumption is that real value cannot be known "except in so far as the market tells him" (p. 77). You cannot construct value -- i.e., know what just remuneration is -- without knowing the market. The important thing for Hayek is that remuneration is based on accident (luck), but that "the individual is to be allowed to decide what to do" (p. 81).

In the end, Hayek proposes a view that excludes social justice from discussions of capitalism. Since the free market is the most desirable form of social order, it should be left alone to work itself out without social (or socialist) interference. The spontaneous ordering of haphazard outcomes among free individuals should remain free of meddling. If inequality results, it is neither good nor bad, only neutral. The only way an economic system could be judged morally is if its process is intentional and designed to affect the well-being of others. That would mean governmental control, which he opposes to a preferable free system. Redistribution cannot be done with predictable outcomes.