ETHICS

FRAMEWORK AND PRINCIPLES BEHIND MORAL DISPOSITION

POLITICAL DOCTRINES
Overview

In this chapter, we will discuss about the relationship of the state/government/authority to the
individual/community/society in terms of the viewpoints of equality. About the law of state nations in relation
to the rights of state citizen.

Main topic: Political Doctrines

Subtopic: Egalitarianism, Socialism or Socialist justice, and Communism.

Introduction

Political philosophy is the study fundamental questions about the state, government, politics, liberty, justice and

the enforcement of a legal code by authority. It is Ethics applied to a group of people, and discusses how
a society should be set up and how one should act within a society.

“Equal justice under law” means “equal access to the justice” which in turn is taken to mean access to the law
as procedural process. However, those received their day in court do not always feel that “justice has been done
and with reason”. Marc Galanter stated at his classic article on "Why the haves come out ahead” - that money
often matters more than merits. Substantive rights and procedural obstacles can be skewed, and even those who
win in the court can lose in life, given post-judgement relations. It seems there is a problem in what we called
justice and fairness or maybe in the people.

Egalitarian Justice
Egalitarian – in modern democratic societies, is the term often used to refer to a position that favors, for any of
a wide array of reasons, a greater degree of equality of income and wealth across persons that currently exists.
The term derived from the French word “égal”, meaning “equal”, even” or “level.
Egalitarianism is a trend of thought in political philosophy. An egalitarian favors equality of some sort:
“People should get the same, or be treated the same, or be treated as equals in some respect.”
People “should be” treated as equal.
Egalitarian doctrines tend to rest on a background idea that all human persons are equal in fundamental worth of
moral status. In western European and Anglo-American philosophical tradition is concerned, one significant
source of this thought is the Christian notion that God loves all human souls equally.
”.Distributive justice is another form of egalitarianism that addresses life outcomes and the allocation of
valuable things such as income, wealth, and other goods.

Types of Egalitarianism
 1. Economic Egalitarianism (or Material Egalitarianism) is where the participants of a society are of
equal standing and have equal access to all the economic resources in terms of economic power, wealth
and contribution. It is a founding principle of various forms of socialism.

2. Moral Egalitarianism is the position that equality is central to justice, that all individuals are entitled to
equal respect, and that all human persons are equal in fundamental worth or moral status.

3. Legal Egalitarianism is the principle under which each individual is subject to the same laws, with no
individual or group or class having special legal privileges, and where the testimony of all persons is
counted with the same weight.

4. Political Egalitarianism is where the member of a society are of equal standing in terms of political
power or influence. It is a founding principle of most forms of democracy.

5. Luck Egalitarianism is a view about distributive justice (what is just or right with respect to the
allocation of goods in a society) espoused by a variety of left-wing political philosophers, which seeks
to distinguish between outcomes that are the result of brute luck (e.g. misfortunes on generic makeup, or
being struck by a bolt of lightning) and those that are the consequence of conscious options (e.g. career
choices, or fair gambles).

6. Gender Egalitarianism (or Zygarchy) is a form of society in which power is equally shared between
men and women, or a family structure where power is shared equally by both parents.

7. Racial Egalitarianism (or Racial Equality) is the absence of racial segregation (the separation of
different racial groups in daily life, whether mandated by law or through social norms.)

8. Opportunity Egalitarianism (or Asset-based Egalitarianism) is the idea that equality is possible by a
redistribution of resources, usually in the form of a capital grant provided at the age of majority, an idea
which has been around since Thomas Paine (1737-1809).

9. Christian Egalitarianism holds that all are equal before God and in Christ, and specifically teaches
gender equality in Christian church leadership and in marriage.

Socialism (Socialist Justice)

Socialists take equality to be the ultimate political idea.
Socialism is a populist economic and political system based on the public ownership (also known as collective
or common ownership) of the means of production. Those means include the machinery, tools and factories
used to produce goods that aim to directly satisfy human needs.
Socialism’s mantra is “From each according to his ability, to each according to his contribution.” Everyone in
the society receives a share of the production based on how much each has contributed. That motivates them to
work long hours if they want to receive more.
In purely socialist system, all legal production and distribution decisions are made by the government, and
individuals rely on the state for everything from food to health care. The government determines output and
pricing levels of these goods and services.
Origins and Development
Socialism developed in opposition to the excesses and abuses to liberal individualism and capitalism. Under
early capitalist economies during the late 18th and 19th centuries, western European countries experienced
industrial production and compound economic growth at a rapid pace. Some individuals and families rose to
riches quickly, while others sank into poverty, creating income inequality and other social concerns.
Famous Early Socialist Thinkers
1. Robert Owen 3. Karl Marx
2. Henri de Saint-Simon 4. Vladimir Lenin
It was primarily Lenin who expounded on the ideas of earlier socialist and helped bring socialist planning to
the national level after the 1917 Bolshevik Revolution in Russia.
Following the failure of socialist central planning in the Soviet Union and Maoist China during the 20 th century,
many modern socialist adjusted to a highly regulatory and redistributive system, sometimes referred to as
market socialism or democratic socialism.

Advantages
1. Workers are no longer exploited, since they own the means of production. All profits are spread equitably
among all workers, according to his or her contribution. The cooperative system realizes that even those who
can’t work must have their basic needs met, for the good of the whole.
2. The system eliminates poverty.
3. Everyone has equal access to health care and education. No one is discriminated against
4. Everyone works at what one is best at and what one enjoys. If society needs jobs to be done that no one
wants, it offers higher compensation to make it worthwhile.
5. Natural resources are preserved for the good of the whole.

Disadvantage
1. The biggest disadvantage of the socialism is that it relies on the cooperative nature of human to work. It
negates those within society who are competitive, not cooperative. Competitive people tend to seek ways to
overthrow and disrupt society for their own gain.
2. It doesn’t reward people for being entrepreneurial and competitive. As such, it won’t be as innovative as a
capitalistic society.
3. The government set up to represent the masses may abuse its position and claim power for itself.
Communism
Communism is economic and political in its requirement that government be the central owner and decision
maker in all matters.
Communism rejects any religion and in a true Communist state religion is effectively abolished.
Similarities:
 Communism and Socialism both arose in the context of the Industrial Revolution and largely as a response
to a time when business owners were becoming extremely wealthy by exploiting their workers.
 Each is built on the premise that individual will contribute to society based on their own ability.
 Both advocate that institutions are centralized and either controlled by government or by collectives, this
effectively removes private business as a producer of goods and services.
 Government (or some form of it) plays a large role in economic investment and planning, either in a
centralized form or decentralized to local government bodies.

Differences:
Communism
 Under Communism, individuals are provided for
or compensated based on their needs, in effect
meaning that in a true communist system you
wouldn’t have money and you’d simply be given
what the government thinks you need in terms of
food, clothing, accommodations, etc.
Socialism
 Whereas, in Socialism, individuals are
compensated for based on their individual
contributions, so people that work harder or
smarter would receive more than those that don’t
contribute.

 Communism views all property as being public
property and effectively there is no personal
property or items held by individual.
 Communism is economic and political in its
requirement that government be the central
owner and decision maker in all matters.
 Socialism rather sees individuals still having
their personal property but all industrial and
production capacity would be communally
owned and managed by consensus or
government.
 Socialism is at its core an economic philosophy.

 Communism rejects any religion and in a true
Communist state religion is effectively
abolished.
 Communism sees the complete abolishment of
class distinctions as everyone is effectively
treated the same.
 Socialism is economic only in its focus, freedom
of religion is allowed, though some
interpretations see it as promoting secularism in
its nature (even if religion is not effectively
banned.)
 Socialism sees a diminishment here but class for some to achieve more wealth than others.
distinction would still exist as there is capacity