Values and Justice A New Perspective

Author(s): Hemant Shah
Publisher: Z_Philosophical_Writings_001802.pdf

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Philosophical Writings
two qualifications: (i) none less than enough for the purpose, and (2) none more than is compatible with everyone having enough.
“The domain of Justice is divided into two main sphere of interest. One is concerned with the justice of the individual in relation to other human beings and to the organized community itself - the state. The other is concerned with the justice of the state - its form of government and its laws, its political institutions and economic arrangements - in relation to the human beings that constitute its population."14
"The man made laws of the state derives its authority from Justice in three ways: (i) by the enactment of measures that protect natural rights, ii) by legislation that prescribes or safeguards fairness in transactions among individuais, and iii) by regulating matters affected with the public interest for the general welfare of the community. Not any one at all can make a law that has authority. Power to make laws is in the hands of the rulers or government. In democracy, it is absolutely in the hands of thce group which holds majority of the people's elected representatives.
To conclude all these aspects related to Western thinking about justice which began with the Greek Philosophers Plato and Aristotle, one can observe that the fundamental issues about law and justice have been discussed. Lack of self interest is an essential requirement for dispensing Socratic justice. Thrasymachus, opposite to Socrates, considers justice as serving one's own interest. Justice for Socrates, is another's good, while injustice is one's own good. In this way, justice is disposed from a disinterested perspective, which, guards against the judgement being affected by goals and values which would serve the judge's aims and pursuits.
Justice, to Aristotle, is the chief virtue comprehending all the other virtues; to Prof. Mortimer | Adler, it is one of the Six great ideas we act one. But in East, to Indians, Justice is a value. In the Constitution of India, in its very preamble there is a declaration as follows: