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SOCIAL
JUSTICE The term
“social justice” is of relatively recent coinage in Catholic social
doctrine, and its meaning remains in some dispute. The modern emphasis on
society’s responsibilities in justice and charity to promote the common
good appears to have arisen primarily in response to industrialization,
urbanization, changes in agricultural patterns, and the human dislocations
they brought in their wake. Many of the welfare provisions of modern
democracies, such as unemployment insurance and social security, were
created to deal with those problems. Social justice has thus often been
seen as in part a demand for social supports. But such demands have
usually also been accompanied by a call for the reordering of social
priorities, both within societies and in international relations. Nonetheless,
there is some question whether social justice, properly understood, is
something more than the traditional forms of justice applied to modern
problems. The Church, following Aristotle, has long taught that there are
three basic types of justice: legal, distributive, and commutative.
Commutative justice governs the free exchanges between individuals and,
though a model for the other kinds of justice, has little to do with
social questions directly – with a few exceptions. Wages, for example,
though primarily a question of an agreement between individuals, also have
a social dimension. If employers do not pay a just wage, workers and their
dependents will be unable to live, leading to social chaos. Early modern
social encyclicals, such as Pope Leo XIII’s 1891 On the Social Question,
Rerum Novarum, examined the relative duties of capital and labor in
contemporary circumstances. Welfare and
social insurance issues may be viewed as falling into another traditional
category, distributive justice. According to the Catholic notion of
subsidiarity, the social structure closest to the level of a problem that
has the capacity to deal with that problem should take the responsibility
to do so. Thus, in the normal course of affairs, individuals are
responsible for themselves, families for children and other dependents,
private associations for their members, and so on. Subsidiarity not only
aims at preventing concentration of power in the state, a danger that Pius
XI’s 1931 encyclical On the Fortieth Year, Quadragesimo Anno, saw as the
road to Nazism, Fascism, and communism; subsidiarity also seeks to empower
the various sectors of society to play their God-given roles in human
life. Distribution
of Goods in Society • According to distributive justice, society as a
whole has the responsibility to distribute goods in proportion to
individual contributions and needs. Inequality in society is not itself
wrong unless it becomes excessive (Quadragesimo Anno, 58). In fact, it
would be unjust to reward equally those who contribute more and those who
contribute less. But natural inequality in talents and enterprise cannot
justify the exclusion, exploitation, or marginalization of anyone in
society (CCC 1937), since God has destined created goods for all. A
problem thus arises when the subsidiary institutions are unable or
unwilling to perform their duties, and persons fall outside natural modes
of distribution. Beginning
with Quadragesimo Anno, the term “social justice” began to be applied
to the need for modern societies as a whole to respond to such situations.
In modern societies, unemployment compensation, welfare and food programs,
and social security and health care insurance have been established by
governments because the instability of modern labor markets and breakdown
of extended families seemed to put many people in considerable peril.
Furthermore, the disabled and the children born to those who are unmarried
or who will not work are innocents who need protection. One dimension of
social justice has been to promote this welfare function and critique
sinful structures of society, including an international order that shows
wide differences in development (Vatican Council II, Pastoral Constitution
on the Church in the Modern World, Gaudium et Spes, 29; cf. Pope John
XXIII, encyclical Peace on Earth, Pacem in Terris [1963], and Pope Paul
VI, encyclical On the Progress of Peoples, Populorum Progressio [1967]). But social
justice in these wider implications closely resembles another traditional
category, legal justice. The traditional name is unfortunate, because it
implies that the legal system and the laws upon which it is based are
simply just. In fact, legal (or universal) justice is a wider category
that judges whether the legal judgments and institutions of individual
nations and international bodies are themselves just. Respect for the
transcendent dignity of the human person and for the rights that flow from
that dignity is the only true basis for legal authority (CCC 1930). Calls
for the reordering of social priorities to help the poor and unfortunate
are part of traditional legal justice. The 1971 world Synod of Bishops
that considered the theme of justice in the world, while rarely using the
term “social justice,” nevertheless calls for a loving pursuit of
justice in all areas of human life without qualification. Content of
Social Justice • Approached in its most universal form, social justice
promotes the interests of the poor and marginalized, but it also calls for
the creation and maintenance of a well- ordered social mainstream. The
normal functionings of the economic order and the political system are
needed for society even to be capable of helping its weaker members.
Furthermore, social justice ideally aims at empowering all sectors to
participate in society: “Society ensures social justice when it provides
the conditions that allow associations or individuals to obtain what is
their due, according to their nature and their vocation. Social justice is
linked to the common good and the exercise of authority” (CCC 1928). Private
property and the moral and productive use thereof are important components
of any just social order. When socialism and Marxism were still believed
to be potentially fruitful paths, there was some weakening of appreciation
for private property among many proponents of social justice. Now that it
is clear that coercive state systems provide neither material goods nor
political liberties, social justice is more directed toward seeking
greater equity and compassion within market systems. During the
Cold War, calls for social justice often recommended reductions in
military spending and corresponding increases in social spending. In some
instances, that was and is a just change. But the powerful image from
Isaiah, “they shall beat their swords into ploughshares, and their
spears into pruning hooks” (2:4), led many to believe a simple choice
between two alternatives was to be made. One of the obligations of society
in legal justice, however, is to protect its members from threats, whether
foreign or domestic. Despite the ethical complication of nuclear weapons
and the large nuclear arsenals of the United States and other nations,
legal justice demands security and freedom, as well as support for the
weak and helpless. Social
justice does not, therefore, dictate that resources be redirected from
military uses to social development simply because the first are
destructive and the second, perhaps, constructive. Military expenditures
must correspond to the threat being faced. Similarly, it would be
preferable to spend money on schools rather than prisons. But how many
policemen and how many teachers to hire, given limited funds, can only be
decided on the basis of judgments of the need for crime prevention and
incarceration on the one hand and for education and training on the other.
Public safety and public education are both matters of social justice, and
the poor city-dweller who enjoys neither to any great degree may be the
most wronged member of a society. In a similar
way, many of the social justice questions that currently vex advanced
societies require a clear and broad analysis of all social factors in
light of legal justice. Should a given country reduce welfare to
discourage dependency and illegitimacy – or should it increase spending
for carefully targeted child support and job training? Should a national
budget favor the growth of the economy or taxation for social purposes?
Should modern technological innovations be stimulated to provide jobs and
remain competitive with other countries – or should efforts be made to
transfer industries and jobs to developing nations? Such issues
involve both social justice and the kind of prudence traditionally
associated with legal justice. Social justice, then, seems to be, as one
analyst has said, “a form of legal justice properly understood.”
See:
Civil Law; Common Good; Commutative Justice; Environment; Human Life,
Dignity and Sanctity of; Human Person; Interdependence; Liberation
Theology; Preferential Option for the Poor; Property; Restitution; Social
Doctrine; Socialization; Stealing; Subsidiarity; Universal Destination of
Goods; Usury; Work. Suggested
Readings: CCC 1929-1942. Vatican Council II, Pastoral Constitution on the
Church in the Modern World, Gaudium et Spes, Ch. II. John Paul II, On
Human Work, Laborem Exercens; On Social Concerns, Sollicitudo Rei Socialis;
The Hundredth Year, Centesimus Annus. J. Calvez and J. Perrin, The Church
and Social Justice: The Social Teaching of the Popes from Leo XIII to Pius
XII, 1878-1958. R. Charles, The Social Teaching of Vatican II. J. Hoffner,
Fundamentals of Christian Sociology. J. Pieper, The Four Cardinal Virtues. Robert
Royal Russell
Shaw. Our Sunday Visitor's Encyclopedia of Catholic Doctrine. Copyright ©
1997, Our Sunday Visitor.
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