Analysis of Justice as Fairness and Utilitarianism
Analysis of Justice as Fairness and Utilitarianism
1 There is a fine line between law and ethics, which mainly boils down to choice. There aren’t written instructions for what is ethical because ethics can be interpreted in various ways and is often different from person to person; taking into account things like religion or upbringing or some other factor. Laws on the other hand, while they are not always cut and dry, they are set standards implemented by a government entity. Definitively, law is the application of rules and regulations within a given jurisdiction, while ethics is a moral principle that governs a person’s behavior.1 The ethical component is much more challenging than legal decision because it is voluntary in nature. Due to the fact that ethics is such a vague concept, philosophers and scholars have pondered the best approach to make ethical decision and have come up with various ethical foundations that they believe to be the best approach to making ethical choices.
This paper is a comparative analysis of Aristotle’s utilitarianism ethical foundation and Rawls’s theory of justice as fairness.
Rawls’s theory of justice as fairness suggests that all individuals live behind a veil of ignorance in an attempt to be rational, free and morally equal beings.2 Rawls’s divides these concepts into two main principles, one of liberty and the other of equality. The first principle states that every individual has an equal right to basic liberties and that the government cannot amend or take these rights away. The second
1 There is a fine line between law and ethics, which mainly boils down to choice. There aren’t written instructions for what is ethical because ethics can be interpreted in various ways and is often different from person to person; taking into account things like religion or upbringing or some other factor. Laws on the other hand, while they are not always cut and dry, they are set standards implemented by a government entity. Definitively, law is the application of rules and regulations within a given jurisdiction, while ethics is a moral principle that governs a person’s behavior.1 The ethical component is much more challenging than legal decision because it is voluntary in nature. Due to the fact that ethics is such a vague concept, philosophers and scholars have pondered the best approach to make ethical decision and have come up with various ethical foundations that they believe to be the best approach to making ethical choices.
This paper is a comparative analysis of Aristotle’s utilitarianism ethical foundation and Rawls’s theory of justice as fairness.
Rawls’s theory of justice as fairness suggests that all individuals live behind a veil of ignorance in an attempt to be rational, free and morally equal beings.2 Rawls’s divides these concepts into two main principles, one of liberty and the other of equality. The first principle states that every individual has an equal right to basic liberties and that the government cannot amend or take these rights away. The second