Spheres of Justice #3

“[W]e should focus on the reduction of dominance – not, or not primarily, on the break-up or the constraint of monopoly” (17).

“We search for principles internal to each distributive sphere … the disregard of these principles is tyranny. To convert one good into another, when there is no intrinsic connection between the two, is to invade the sphere where another company of men and women properly rules. Monopoly is not inappropriate within the spheres. There is nothing wrong, for example, with the grip that persuasive and helpful men and women (politicians) establish on political power. But the use of political power to gain access to other goods is tyrannical.

“In formal terms, complex equality means that no citizen’s standing in one sphere or with regard to some social good can be undercut by his standing in some other sphere, with regard to some other good” (19).

Walzer’s three distributive principles are free exchange, desert, and need. Free exchange is open-ended; it guarantees no distributive outcome. Desert seems to require an especially close connection between particular goods and particular persons. He doesn’t say much about what are needs, but basic things like security, food and water, adequate medical care and education are good examples. Obviously children are more needful. Need does not work for many other goods. Some people want but nobody needs political power, honor and fame, sailboats, rare and expensive books or works or art, etc. A search for a hospital director focusing on the needs of the candidates rather than the staff and patients of the hospital would be improper. Other distributive criteria will always be operating alongside need, and it will always be necessary to worry about the boundaries that mark them off from one another. Every distributive criteria that is forceful meets the general rule within its own sphere, and not elsewhere (21-26).

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