Rawls and Marxism

Author(s): Richard Miller

Source: Philosophy & Public Affairs , Winter, 1974, Vol. 3, No. 2 (Winter, 1974), pp.
167-191
Published by: Wiley

Stable URL: [Link]

JSTOR is a not-for-profit service that helps scholars, researchers, and students discover, use, and build upon a wide
range of content in a trusted digital archive. We use information technology and tools to increase productivity and
facilitate new forms of scholarship. For more information about JSTOR, please contact support@[Link].
Your use of the JSTOR archive indicates your acceptance of the Terms & Conditions of Use, available at
[Link]

Wiley is collaborating with JSTOR to digitize, preserve and extend access to Philosophy &
Public Affairs

This content downloaded from

[Link] on Fri, 14 Apr 2023 13:09:03 UTC
All use subject to [Link]
 RICHARD MILLER Rawls and Marxism

In A Theory of Justice, John Rawls claims that all of the most fun-
damental questions about justice, including questions about an indi-
vidual's duty to help achieve justice, can be settled from the stand-
point of the original position.' He proposes, as a criterion of social
justice, the so-called "difference principle," the principle that basic
institutions ought to maximize the life prospects of the worst-off.2 And
he presents this standard as a morally realistic one, in that people in
societies that do not yet fulfill it ought to accept advances toward it
(at least if these advances do not conflict with the maximization of
equal basic liberties or with fair equality of opportunity), and ought,
to some extent, to help achieve such advances.8
I shall try to show that these claims, taken together, presuppose a
relatively low estimate of the extent and consequences of social con-
flict. In particular, if a Marxist analysis of social conflict is right in
certain respects, a commitment to accept advances toward the differ-
ence principle in societies that do not embody it would not emerge
from the original position. Thus, if these Marxist ideas are correct,

A version of this article will appear in a collection of essays on Rawls' book,

edited by Norman Daniels. I am indebted to Richard Boyd, Gerald Dworkin,
David Lyons, and Hilary Putnam for their helpful suggestions and criticisms.
i. John Rawls, A Theory of Justice (Cambridge, Mass., 1971), pp. II, 17, "I5,
333f. Otherwise unidentified page references in the notes that follow are to this
volume.
2. Pp. 6of., 75ff.
3. Pp. II5, 246, 288f., 334. On the priority of the principles of equal liberties
and of equal opportunity, see note 7, below.

This content downloaded from

[Link] on Fri, 14 Apr 2023 13:09:03 UTC
All use subject to [Link]
 i68 Philosophy & Public Affairs

either the difference principle is unrealistic, in that people do not have

a duty to accept and to further its realization, or there are fundamen-
tal issues concerning justice (for example, this issue of moral real-
ism), that cannot be resolved from the standpoint of the original
position.
In Rawls' "ideal contractualism," principles concerning justice are
seen as agreements that would be made by rational deliberants seek-
ing to pursue their interests behind a veil of ignorance which excludes
knowledge of what one's place in society and one's special interests
are. This is, of course, a very rough statement, but most refinements
on it go beyond the needs of this essay. There are, however, a few
details of Rawls' theory that need further elaboration, for the sake of
my subsequent arguments.
In the original position, one does not know what one's social posi-
tion or one's special needs and interests are. And in deciding the most
general questions abou,t justice, one does not know what particular
form of society (e.g., slave-holding, feudal, capitalist) one lives in.4
But one does know "the general facts about human society."5 Thus, if
Marxist social theory is correct, the general facts contained in this
theory would be known in the original position, and could affect its
outcome.
In defining the agreements Rawls believes would emerge from the
original position, it will be helpful to distinguish the outcomes Rawls
thinks he has established in his book, from the outcomes he thinks
can be established by ideal contractualism. In particular, Rawls
claims to have actually derived a commitment to support the differ-
ence principle in circumstances of "strict compliance," i.e., in any
society the basic institutions of which conform to the difference prin-
ciple and the members of which regard the latter as a principle of
justice and willingly do what it requires.6 But he surely regards it as

4. P. 137.
5. Ibid. Rawls goes on to say, "They understand political affairs and the prin-
ciples of economic theory.... Indeed the parties are presumed to know what-
ever general facts affect the choice of the principles of justice."
6. The derivation is contained in sections 26, 29, and 51. For the restriction to
circumstances of strict compliance, see pp. 8, 288f., 334. This restriction was
also imposed in unpublished comments of Rawls' in response to David Lyons's
paper at the I972 A.P.A. symposium on A Theory of Justice. I should add that a

This content downloaded from

[Link] on Fri, 14 Apr 2023 13:09:03 UTC
All use subject to [Link]
 i69 Rawls and Marxism

possible to derive a commitment to accept and, to some extent, to

further advances toward the difference principle in any society within
the "circumstances of justice," i.e., in any society with respect to
which questions of justice can appropriately be raised. For he says the
difference principle applies throughout the circumstances of justice.7
As noted before, he regards it as a duty to help realize principles of
justice. And he sees all fundamental questions concerning justice as
being decidable by determining what commitments would emerge
from the original position. Thus some commitment to uphold the dif-
ference principle, even when strict compliance has not been achieved,
ought to emerge from the original position.
Of course, that the text of Rawls' book implies a commitment to
there being an ideal contractualist account of the duty to uphold
Rawlsian justice does not show that this commitment is central to
Rawls' theory. But in fact this claim of Rawls' cannot be rejected with-
out casting doubt on the whole ideal contractualist approach. To begin
with, the view that people in less than just societies have no duty to
help achieve justice, or even to accept advances in this direction, is
monstrous, and more than a bit absurd. After all, a slave owner who
refuses to let his slaves go free, when this would require only moder-
ate financial losses, would not be a just man because he believed slav-
ery to be an unjust institution. Indeed, we would regard this belief as
playing a trivial role in his sense of justice. But if the assertion of prin-
ciples of justice for institutions must be accompanied by the require-
ment that these principles be upheld, a moral outlook appealed to in
support of the former claim should provide support for the latter.
Certainly, if ideal contractualism is supposed to tell us how basic

reader who favors a less restrictive interpretation of Rawls' claims will find the
conflict I sketch between Rawls and Marx all the more acute.
7. Pp. 125, 126. Strictly speaking, the difference principle is always to be ful-
filled in so far as this does not conflict with the principle of greatest equal liberty
or the principle of fair equality of opportunity (pp. 6i, 302f.). Also, an expanded
version of the difference principle, in which liberty, opportunity, and self-respect
are counted among the relevant goods, holds universally (pp. 62f.). In this
essay, all discussions of the difference principle are to be understood as bearing
on these two restricted claims. There is little danger of resulting oversimplffica-
tion, for we shall not be concerned with conflicts between the (narrower) dif-
ference principle and principles that override it.

This content downloaded from

[Link] on Fri, 14 Apr 2023 13:09:03 UTC
All use subject to [Link]
 170 Philosophy & Public Affairs

institutions should operate, but must be abandoned when we ask how

people should behave in less than ideal circumstances, it cannot be
the satisfactory end result of moral reflection that Rawls wants it to
be. Thus, the importance of the idea of an ideal contractualist account
of the duty to help achieve justice is much greater than might be
thought from the few paragraphs Rawls devotes directly to this claim.
I shall be arguing that certain aspects of Marxism (and not very
hard-line ones) would preclude the requisite agreement to uphold the
difference principle throughout the circumstances of justice. In par-
ticular, I shall argue that this commitment would not be made if
some societies in the circumstances of justice display the following
three features: no social arrangement that is acceptable to the best-
off class is acceptable to the worst-off class; the best-off class is a rul-
ing class, i.e., one whose interests are served by the major political
and ideological institutions; the need for wealth and power typical of
the best-off class is much more acute than that typical of the rest of
society. This piece of Marxism is, of course, less controversial than
Marx's whole theory, in which these features are said to hold true of
all nonprimitive societies. But certain of the claims I have sketched
can be so understood that it is implausible that they should hold true
of any society. And, of course, the question of whether there is an
obligation to uphold the difference principle in a society like our own
will be an implicit concern in my arguments, even though I do not
explicitly address myself to it. For these reasons, I would like to spell
out in more detail the ways in which the above three properties might
obtain in various societies.
To begin with, Marx claims that in any society, from the dissolu-
tion of primitive communism to the overthrow of capitalism, there is
no social contract that the best-off class and the worst-off one will
acquiesce in, except as a result of defeat in class struggle or a tactical
retreat to preserve long-term advantages. For example, Marx would
say that no aristocracy has reduced feudal obligations, no bourgeoisie
has reduced the length or pace of the working day, except in response
to the actual or potential militancy of peasants or of workers, usually
in alliance with other classes. And no peasantry or proletariat has
accepted an economic arrangement for long without fighting against
it, whether in peasant uprisings, militant strikes, or revolutions. For

This content downloaded from

[Link] on Fri, 14 Apr 2023 13:09:03 UTC
All use subject to [Link]
 171 Rawls and Marxism

Marx, this determination of social affairs by what Rawls would call

"threat advantage" reflects people's rational pursuit of their self-
interests. Moreover, improvements in the relative position of the
worst-off class cannot, in Marx's view, be brought about by appeals
to any universal sense of justice. Even when such a sense exists, no
appropriate consensus can be achieved as to whether the demands of
justice have in fact been fulfilled. For instance, capitalists, as a class,
have always insisted that a proposed reduction of the working day, e.g.,
from twelve or more hours to ten, would do immeasurable harm to
workers by destroying the capitalist economy on whose existence
workers' welfare depends.8
The second Marxist idea I shall emphasize is the notion that the
best-off class is a ruling class, one whose interests are served by all
major institutions. Marx and Engels emphasize two aspects of this
rule, the repressive and the ideological. In their view, the official i
struments of coercion are employed, in almost all crucial instances
of class conflict, in favor of the best-off class. Thus, to take some dra-
matic examples, the police, the army, and the courts were used in the
United States and Great Britain to break up meetings in support of
the ten-hour day, not meetings against it. In the fight for industrial
unionism in this country in the twenties and thirties, they were used
to protect strikebreakers and threaten sit-down strikers, not the other
way around. In addition to institutions of repression, ideological insti-
tutions, in the Marxist view, help to maintain the special status of
the best-off class. For example, in the Middle Ages, the Church tended
to teach that submission to the dominant social order was an expres-
sion of piety. In nineteenth-century England, according to Marx, as
class struggle became more intense, academic economists mostly
became "hired prizefighters" of the bourgeoisie,9 arguing, e.g., that
abolishing tariffs on grain would immensely enrich workers and that
a ten-hour workday would reduce profits to zero.10 To take a present-
day American example, many Marxists would now argue that the
media and the schools foster anti-Black racism because it serves to

8. See Karl Marx, Capital (Moscow, n.d.), I, chap. 9, sec. 3, "Senior's 'Last
Hour.'"
9. Ibid., I, 'Preface to the Second German Edition," p. 25.
io. Ibid., I, p. 25 and chap. 9, sec. 3.

This content downloaded from

[Link] on Fri, 14 Apr 2023 13:09:03 UTC
All use subject to [Link]
 172 Philosophy & Public Affairs

divide those having common interests against American big business.

The third Marxist idea to which I shall refer is, strictly speaking,
an extrapolation from Marx's writings, and not taken directly from
them. Marx seems to regard a typical member of the best-off class in
an exploitive society as having an especially acute need for wealth
and power. He would, I think, have accepted the following estimate
of how acute these needs usually are: the need for wealth and power
of a typical member of the best-off class is sufficiently great that such
a person would be miserable if his society were transformed to accord
with the egalitarian demands of the difference principle. Indeed, this
misery would be so great that the possibility of such unhappiness
would dissuade someone in the original position from committing
himself to help realize the difference principle, when the veil of igno-
rance is lifted. (I shall spell out this claim in more detail later on.)
While this specific estimate of ruling-class needs cannot, of course,
be found in Marx, it is, I think, a reasonable extrapolation from
Marx's writings. Some such radical estimate of how much greater a
lord's needs are than a serf's, or how much greater a capitalist's are
than a worker's, is suggested by Marx's comments on the immense
differences between what workers in different societies regard as
"necessities of life."" It also seems implicit in his historical writings.
For example, in Marx's account, the factions of the French bour-
geoisie who overthrew Louis Philippe risked large-scale social disorder
to escape a subordination to other factions that allowed the worst-off
factions wealth and power beyond the dreams of most of the French

iI. See, for example, ibid., I, chap. 6, "The Buying and Selling of Labor-
Power," p. i68: "On the other hand, the number and extent of his [the wage-
laborer's] so-called necessary wants, as also the modes of satisfying them, are
themselves the product of historical development, and depend therefore to a
great extent on the degree of civilization of a country, more particularly on the
conditions under which, and consequently on the habits and degree of comfort
in which, the class of free laborers has been formed."
There is a discussion to the same effect in Wages, Price and Profit, in which
Marx speaks of "a traditional standard of life" as "the satisfaction of certain
wants springing from the social conditions in which people are placed and
reared up," and contrasts "the English standard of life" with "the Irish stand-
ard"; "the standard of life of a German peasant" with that "of a Livonian peas-
ant" (Selected Works in One Volume [New York, 1970], p. 225). See also Wage-
Labor and Capital, ibid., pp. 84f.

This content downloaded from

[Link] on Fri, 14 Apr 2023 13:09:03 UTC
All use subject to [Link]
 173 Rawls and Marxism

working class, or, indeed, most workers in the Paris Commune, twenty
years later. The general idea that classes differ in their needs, and not
just in the degree to which their needs are satisfied, is almost explic-
itly stated in one of Marx's last writings, his notes on Wagner's Lehr-
buch der politischen Oekonomie, when he criticizes some remarks of
Wagner's on the "natural" needs of Man: "[If 'Man'] means Man, as a
category, he has . . . no . . . needs at all. If it means man confronting
nature by himself, one has in mind a non-social animal. If it means
a man who is already to be found in some form of society . . . one
must begin by presenting the particular character of this social man,
i.e., the particular character of the community in which he lives, since
here production, and thus the means by which he maintains his exist-
ence already have a social character."'`2 This idea is, in turn, a special
case of Marx's general thesis that "the social being [of men] deter-
mines their consciousness."'13
If some societies in the circumstances of justice have the three fea-
tures I have sketched, then, I shall try to show, no commitment to
uphold the difference principle throughout the circumstances of jus-
tice would emerge from the original position.'4 To organize my argu-
ment, I shall take advantage of a certain feature of Rawls' exposition.
His arguments for the difference principle often look like arguments
for a commitment to participate in the immediate realization of the
difference principle, once the veil of ignorance is lifted.'5 As I have
mentioned, I do not think Rawls actually means to put forward such
an argument within the confines of his book. He means only to argue

12. Marx's emphasis. See Marx and Engels, Werke (Berlin, I958), I9, p. 362.
The idea that needs differ significantly among different classes or socio-economic
groups is not, of course, by any means confined to Marxist or left-wing writers.
See, for example, Emile Durkheim, "Anomic Suicide," in Suicide (New York,
1951 ), pp. 249ff.
13. Preface to the Critique of Political Economy, in Marx and Engels, Selected
Works, p. I82.
14. One clear and immediate corollary will be that if present-day society has
these features, no commitment to uphold the difference principle in the present
day would emerge.
I5. These arguments, in sections 26 and 29, are actually presented as argu-
ments for Rawls' two principles of justice, in serial order. But they are fairly
characterized as "Rawls' arguments for the difference principle," since no other
derivation of that principle is given in Rawls' book.

This content downloaded from

[Link] on Fri, 14 Apr 2023 13:09:03 UTC
All use subject to [Link]
 174 Philosophy & Public Affairs

for a commitment to uphold the difference principle in a society in

which the principle has already been stably realized and everyone has
a psychology supporting compliance with it. Nevertheless, the con-
siderations Rawls brings forward in these arguments, considerations
concerning the strains of commitment, rationality, self-respect, and
stability, seem the ones that would be appealed to in support of a
commitment to uphold the difference principle in less than ideal
circumstances. In fact, it will be helpful to examine Rawls' argu-
ments in turn, first taking each as if it were an argument for a com-
mitment to realize the difference principle as soon as possible, then
seeing if such an argument could be modified so as to generate a
commitment to gradual realization. It might seem that working in this
way I will tie my arguments too closely to special features of Rawls'
text. But I think the reader will find that if the putative arguments I
construct conflict with Marxist social theory, it seems quite unlikely
that any argument for a commitment to uphold the difference princi-
ple throughout the circumstances of justice could accord with rele-
vant aspects of Marxism.
One final comment may be necessary, before setting out my main
arguments, in order for their import not to be misunderstood. I shall
be maintaining that Rawls is tacitly committed to a social hypothesis
that can reasonably be argued either way, i.e., that the Marxist analy-
sis I have just sketched is wrong throughout the circumstances of
justice. I should note that I do not at all intend to criticize Rawls for
developing a moral theory based on controversial factual assumptions.
Indeed, it seems unlikely he could have written a book of such merit
and importance if he had not been willing to commit himself to
empirical claims. My intention in this essay is, rather, to show what
some of Rawls' implicit assumptions are. By that token, I shall be
arguing that some of his claims must be rejected if these assumptions
are held to be false.
I shall now consider Rawls' main attempts to derive the difference
principle from the original position. In the chapter entitled "Some
Main Grounds for the Two Principles of Justice" Rawls begins with
the argument that his standard of social justice uniquely satisfies the
following constraint: ". . . they [the bargainers in the original posi-
tion] consider the strains of commitment. They cannot enter into

This content downloaded from

[Link] on Fri, 14 Apr 2023 13:09:03 UTC
All use subject to [Link]
 175 Rawls and Marxism

agreements that may have consequences they cannot accept. They

will avoid those that they can adhere to only with great difficulty."'16
Rawls argues along these lines against the principle of utility, noting
that it will probably be a standard one cannot adhere to if it turns out
to demand that one make great sacrifices simply to create more happi-
ness for mankind as a whole.
Taken as an argument for a commitment to realize the difference
principle as soon as possible, such reasoning from the strains of com-
mitment seems subject to the charge Rawls makes against utilitarian-
ism. It might be said that the best-off people will generally find it
intolerable to give up great advantages in order to maximize the situ-
ation of the worst-off. This is, of course, a claim that Marxists would
make. They would claim that the best-off people in any exploitive
society cannot be made to give up their privileges except by force. In
support of this claim, they would argue, for example, that no domi-
nant exploitive class has voluntarily given up its rule, no matter how
unjust. If Marxist social theory is right, at least when applied to some
societies, someone in the original position would foresee that the dif-
ference principle may be intolerable for him, if he turns out to be a
typical member of a dominant exploitive class. Thus, he could not
accept, as grounds for a commitment to help realize the difference
principle, an argument that this commitment, unlike its rivals, will
be one he can live up to, no matter what social position he turns out
to occupy.
In his book Rawls advances certain considerations that might be
taken to show that in the original position one can foresee oneself as
fulfilling a commitment to the difference principle, even if one turns
out to be among the best-off. Most notably, in the chapter "On the
Tendency to Equality," Rawls argues, in the following terms, that the
difference principle is a "principle of mutual benefit":

. .. to begin with, it is clear that the well-being of each [i.e., both

the best-off and the worst-off] depends on a scheme of social coop-
eration without which no one could have a satisfactory life. Sec-
ondly, we can ask for the willing cooperation of everyone only if
the terms of the scheme are reasonable. The difference principle,

i6. P. I76.

This content downloaded from

[Link] on Fri, 14 Apr 2023 13:09:03 UTC
All use subject to [Link]
 176 Philosophy & Public Affairs

then, seems to be a fair basis on which those better endowed, or

more fortunate in their social circumstances, could expect others
to collaborate with them when some workable arrangement is a
necessary condition of the good of all.'7

Such a line of reasoning is inadequate to establish the tolerability

of commitment to the difference principle, if the best-off are a ruling
class in an exploitive society. In a system which is in fact thoroughly
exploitive, a ruling class can, for centuries, maintain as much will-
ing cooperation as it needs, because ideological institutions serve its
interests, while restraining most who do not cooperate and dissuading
most who are tempted not to, by employing the coercive apparatus of
the state. In such a situation, the rewards of exploitation for the rul-
ing class far outweigh the costs to it of maintaining cooperation in an
exploitive society. (Note that most of these costs are not supplied by
the ruling class at all, but by workers who supply taxes and, in times
of war, their lives.) Thus, if the best-off are sometimes a ruling class,
of the sort just described, someone in the original position would fore-
see that if he turns out to be one of the best-off, his interests may not
lie in the realization of Rawls' standard of social justice.
Of course, there is nothing in Marxist social theory to indicate one
is likely to find it impossible to live up to a commitment to help realize
the difference principle. To the contrary, the sort of exploitive ruling
class I have described is supposed to be a small minority in any
society. But an argument that one is quite unlikely to find commit-
ment to the difference principle intolerable could not be successfully
advanced behind the veil of ignorance. For, as Rawls indicates on sev-
eral occasions, if reasoning from the respective likelihoods of one's
occupying various social positions were admitted in the original posi-
tion, the social ideal chosen would be some version of the principle of
average utility.'8 Thus, if probabilistic reasoning were admitted (and
Rawls thinks it should not be), the resultant commitment would be
to help maximize the welfare of the average person, or something of
the sort.
Let us suppose that if the sort of exploitive ruling class Marx

'7. P. 103.
i8. Pp. 154, 164f., I68f.

This content downloaded from

[Link] on Fri, 14 Apr 2023 13:09:03 UTC
All use subject to [Link]
 177 Rawls and Marxism

describes has, at times, existed, the reasoning about the strains of

commitment that Rawls uses against utilitarianism would also count
against a commitment to help realize the difference principle immedi-
ately, or, in any case, as soon as possible after the veil of ignorance is
lifted. It might still seem possible that the argument from the strains
of commitment might persuade one to help maintain some gradual
course of development toward full realization. Ideal contractualism
might thus lead to a view according to which one sometimes has a
duty to accept (and, perhaps, to promote) a certain incremental
advance toward the realization of the difference principle, without
having a duty to accept any advance beyond this increment. An exam-
ple of such a gradualist moral claim, though admittedly an extreme
one, is the view that slave holders are obliged to accept emancipation
with compensation, but not to accept uncompensated emancipation
involving considerable financial sacrifice.
One thing to be said about the gradualist position is that it is repug-
nant to many people's considered moral judgments. Many would say
that if the difference principle defines the requirements of perfect
social justice, everyone should willingly accept its immediate realiza-
tion. Indeed, many would say that everyone who can be helpful in
realizing perfect social justice should take an active part in this proc-
ess, if no great effort is involved.
In any case, an argument from the strains of commitment would
not in fact support a gradualist commitment to the difference princi-
ple, if exploitive classes such as Marx describes have existed. For on
the latter assumption every course of development leading to the dif-
ference principle will be more than some social class can willingly
accept. Roughly speaking, there will be at least some circumstances
in which any rate of change is either too fast for the best-off or too
slow for the worst-off. The gradual realization of Rawls' principle will
require a narrowing of the gap between best-off and worst-off, until
Rawls' standard is satisfied. In the process, the wealth, power, and
status of the best-off will be progressively reduced. There are, pre-
sumably, definite limits to the size of the reduction an upper class can
be expected to accept willingly in a given generation. They may accept
a greater advance toward equality as a concession to force or the pros-
pect of it. (Thus, the prospect of further social turmoil is sometimes

This content downloaded from

[Link] on Fri, 14 Apr 2023 13:09:03 UTC
All use subject to [Link]
 178 Philosophy & Public Affairs

said to be the cause of ultimate corporate acceptance of New Deal

legislation.) But in a society for which a Marxist analysis holds true,
the best-off will not accept an advance toward equality beyond a cer-
tain limit as a voluntary expression of their sense of justice. On the
other hand, there are definite lower limits to the rate of advance typi-
cal members of the worst-off class find acceptable. They may settle
for less out of fear, or a misguided perception of social reality, but not
out of a feeling that in the actual social setting justice requires no
quicker rate of progress. According to the view of class conflict char-
acteristic of, though by no means special to, Marxist social theory,
these two ranges of tolerability do not, as a rule, intersect. An advance
that is not too much for the best-off class is, characteristically, too
little for the worst-off class. Thus, Marx (e.g., in the beginning of
Part i of the Manifesto) characterizes the whole course of social
development as a more or less veiled civil war. And a great many peo-
ple who do not discern such conflict in the most advanced societies
would still claim that in some less advanced societies (where the
circumstances of justice obtain) there is no course of action that is
relevantly tolerable to all classes. Given such assumptions as these,
the reasoning from the strains of commitment that Rawls directs
against utilitarianism could also be directed against a commitment to
accept any course of development leading to the difference principle.
It should be noted that there is a second sort of objection that might
be raised against a gradualist version of Rawls' tolerability argument.
Assuming that upper class needs do not change as the gap between
best-off and worst-off narrows, the question of tolerability is simply
postponed, since the cumulative results of change will eventually
become intolerable from the standpoint of the best-off. Marxists and
many others would reject the possibility of an appropriate gradual
reduction of upper-class needs. They would, for example, point to
many upper classes of the past that have responded more and more
vigorously as their status has been eroded, even entering when neces-
sary into civil wars. They would also claim that no substantial long-
run decline in upper-class needs is to be discerned over the course of
history. It might be replied that for the purposes of a strict-compliance
theory, it is enough that upper-class needs might be gradually reduced
by modifying educational institutions, in the broadest sense of the

This content downloaded from

[Link] on Fri, 14 Apr 2023 13:09:03 UTC
All use subject to [Link]
 179 Rawls and Marxism

phrase, to make a representative member of each new upper-class gen-

eration less demanding in his needs than his forebears. But it is hard
to see how this educational process could effectively obtain without
the constant threat to the upper class of intolerable reductions in self-
respect. After all, seeing that one's children are successfully and inten-
tionally taught what one takes to be falsehoods, and that their basic
needs and desires are systematically changed from one's own is never
a small burden (cf. Rawls' discussion of self-respect and liberty of
conscience in chapter 33). Thus, gradualism would be seen as at best
a postponement of problems of intolerability.
I have tried to show that if Marxist social theory precludes a certain
argument for a commitment to the immediate realization of the dif-
ference principle, it precludes the use of this argument in support of
a gradualist commitment, as well. While this discussion of gradualism
as a putative "way out" has been tied to reasoning from the strains of
commitment, analogous considerations can readily be developed in
connection with arguments we shall subsequently examine, which
concern rationality, self-respect, and stability. In considering these
arguments, rather than repeating my discussion of gradualism, I
shall, on the whole, assume that gradualism does not remove con-
flicts between Rawls and Marxist social theory.
One further objection to my arguments about tolerability concerns
supposed strains of pursuing something less than justice. I have
assumed that members of an exploitive ruling class would oppose the
changes that the difference principle requires, even if they had a sense
of justice defined by Rawls' principles. It might be felt that this would
produce a considerable burden of either self-hatred or self-deception,
a burden so great that it would not, in fact, be in one's interests to
resist the consequences of the difference principle, if on leaving the
original position one turns out to be a member of an exploitive ruling
class. The answer to this, I think, is that while the ruling class does,
in a sense, practice considerable self-deception, this self-deception is
of a peculiarly unburdensome kind.
In the following sense, the capacity for self-deception of an exploi-
tive ruling class would be said by Marx to be practically infinite: The
long-term nonmoral interests of a typical member of such a class often
sharply conflict with the moral principles which he puts forward with-

This content downloaded from

[Link] on Fri, 14 Apr 2023 13:09:03 UTC
All use subject to [Link]
 I8o Philosophy & Public Affairs

out conscious hypocrisy; and when this conflict obtains, no reasoning

from those moral principles can, in a typical case, dissuade an
exploiter from doing what his nonmoral interests demand. Thus, sup-
pose a decision to speed up the pace of work without installing safety
equipment will keep profits up at the cost of hundreds of workers'
lives. According to Marx, a typical capitalist will make the decision
that serves the needs of profit, in spite of an appeal to common prin-
ciples of justice, even if that appeal is backed by the best arguments
in the world. It should also be noted that the emotional strain associ-
ated with the instances of self-deception most of us have encountered
will typically be lacking in such cases. In Marx's view, the unrespon-
siveness of members of an exploitive ruling class to arguments con-
flicting with their class interests is supported by falsehoods, e.g.,
"What's good for Business (or-what preserves feudal bonds) is good
for everyone," which the immense variety of ideological institutions
operating in the interests of the ruling class promote, and which every-
one in the social circle of a typical member of that class acknowledges.
Indeed, even if a revolution were to destroy the basic institutions that
contribute to these falsehoods, the survival of bourgeois ideologues,
and of bourgeois ideas among many people, including working people,
together with the survival of exclusive networks of social acquaint-
ance would continue to insulate a member of the bourgeoisie from
the truths on which the correct application of principles of justice
depends. Thus, if one wants to speak of self-deception in situations
like the one described (where the self gets so much help in its decep-
tion) it is not the sort of self-deception that imposes such strains as
to make it preferable for a member of the exploitive ruling class to
accept the objective fulfillment of his sense of justice.
I have sketched some reasons for rejecting the claim that the
realization of Rawls' standard of social justice would be tolerable to
a typical member of every income group. In particular I tried to show
how a Rawlsian argument from a common interest in social coopera-
tion conflicts with the conception of the best-off group in isociety as a
ruling class. There are, however, a number of derivations of the dif-
ference principle that Rawls presents which do not directly rely on
the idea that this standard is tolerable from the standpoint of every
social position. I shall now consider these arguments in turn, and try

This content downloaded from

[Link] on Fri, 14 Apr 2023 13:09:03 UTC
All use subject to [Link]
 i8i Rawls and Marxism

to establish that they would not support a commitment to uphold the

difference principle in less than just circumstances, if Marxist social
theory is true.
In what is probably the most celebrated derivation of the difference
principle, Rawls argues for it on the basis of an assessment of the
standard of rational choice appropriate to the original position.
According to this argument, an agreement to maximize the life pros-
pects of the worst-off is the outcome of a conservative attitude toward
risk-taking that the circumstances of the original position demand. It
represents a rational effort to hedge one's bet in a situation which
displays the following three features:

(i) The factual basis for an estimate of one's probable prospects

under a given social contract is extremely slender.

(2) ". . . the person choosing has a conception of the good such
that he cares very little, if anything, for what he might gain above
the minimum stipend that he can, in fact, be sure of by following
the maximin rule. It is not worthwhile for him to take a chance
for the sake of a further advantage, especially when it may turn
out that he loses much that is important to him."19

(3) The most unlucky choices of a social contract would have out-
comes "one can hardly accept."20

Rawls' discussion of rational choice in the original position is often

criticized on the grounds that it arbitrarily takes a single, conservative
attitude toward risk to be rational, when, in fact, more daring atti-
tudes would be equally rational. I shall suppose, to the contrary, that
it is not at all arbitrary of Rawls to favor a conservative attitude
toward risk, given the three motivational assumptions he makes. I
shall indicate why the second assumption, if applied to typical occu-
pants of social positions in societies violating the difference principle,
might be rejected as underestimating the importance, for some of
these representative individuals, of wealth and power such as the dif-
ference principle excludes. At the same time, I shall try to show that
the failure of Rawls' assumption could preclude accepting a commit-

'9. P. I54- 20. Ibid.

This content downloaded from

[Link] on Fri, 14 Apr 2023 13:09:03 UTC
All use subject to [Link]
 i82 Philosophy & Public Affairs

ment to help achieve the difference principle as a uniquely rational

commitment, in the original position.
Rawls' second assumption amounts to the claim that in the original
position one does not care enough about the difference between stand-
ing at the top of the heap in a relatively nonegalitarian society, and
enjoying the minimum standard of living in a society satisfying the
difference principle, to choose a less egalitarian principle, with the
added risks of suffering that choice entails. On the face of it, some
such assumption concerning what people regard as important seems
crucial to a commitment to accept the less risky, more egalitarian
social rule. After all, because of the importance success would have
for him, most of us feel Orville Wright was rational in making the
risky choice and taking off at Kitty Hawk, even though the basis for
estimating the prospects of success (or survival) was extremely slen-
der, and the maximal loss was death.
On a Marxist view it would not be uniquely rational in the original
position to commit oneself to help realize the difference principle. For
one has real concern over the elimination of social positions of great
wealth and power. Knowing what the needs and desires associated
with various social positions are, but not knowing what society or what
social position is his own, someone in the original position cannot, it
would be claimed, "care very little . . . for what he might gain above
the . . . stipend he can ... be sure of by following the maximin rule."
For he must take into account the possibility that he is in fact a mem-
ber of the best-off group in a highly nonegalitarian society. And in
terms of the needs and desires characteristic of such groups it mat-
ters a great deal whether one has great wealth, power, and status, or,
on the other hand, one enjoys the comfortable but moderate standard
of living that, at least on a Marnxist view, would be found at all levels
of a society satisfying the difference principle. Given the existence of
typical upper class needs for wealth, power, and status, it might be
reasonable to choose a less egalitarian contract than one embodying
the difference principle, even in light of the risks involved. To put it
roughly, someone in the original position might argue: "Perhaps I have
a Rockefeller's needs or a feudal baron's. In that case, life will be hell
for me at any position in a difference-principle society, or as a worker
or a serf in a non-difference-principle society. Given the possibility

This content downloaded from

[Link] on Fri, 14 Apr 2023 13:09:03 UTC
All use subject to [Link]
 i83 Rawls and Marxism

that I have luxurious needs, I should not exclude the latter sort of
society, where, if my needs turn out to be luxurious, I at least have a
chance of enjoying the only sort of success I will find it worthwhile
to have."
Of course, a need for great wealth, power, and status of the sort I
have described is not to be found throughout any society. And it might
be suggested that this consideration is all Rawls requires. Given the
possibility that one would not find the best-off situations in a society
violating the difference principle much more rewarding than the
worst-off situations in a society satisfying that standard, it might be
claimed that one should choose Rawls' principle in light of the risks
involved in other arrangements. But in fact, it does not seem that this
extremely conservative choice would be the only reasonable one.
There are a number of other reasonable choices which give at least
a certain amount of weight to the possibility that success excluded by
the difference principle would be especially rewarding. (Note that
rational gamblers like Orville Wright act as if their success will cer-
tainly matter even when they are not certain it will. When he took
off, Orville may have been aware that other experimenters might have
achieved self-sustained flight several hours before.) In particular, if
one is worried about admitting social systems in which one may turn
out to be absolutely miserable, one can deal with this possibility by
measures much less extreme than adopting the situation of the worst-
off as one's basic standard for judging societies. For example, one
might hedge one's bets by defining a certain social minimum, say one
in which anybody who will work forty hours a week can lead a life
free from acute hunger, sheltered from the elements, and safe from
acute and constant dangers to his life. One might specify that any
society must meet this minimum, or approach as close as possible to
it, but that once that minimum is realized, the social arrangement is
to be favored in which the happiness of the average person is greatest.
Or one might hedge the principle of average utility not just with a
social minimum, but with the requirement that the situation of the
average person be no better than the situation of the median person.
Supposing that one's attitude toward risks represents a reasonable
mixture of the conservative and the daring, it would seem that either
of these standards might be preferable to the difference principle. Yet

This content downloaded from

[Link] on Fri, 14 Apr 2023 13:09:03 UTC
All use subject to [Link]
 184 Philosophy & Public Affairs

each of them allows for extremely exploitive societies by the standard

of the difference principle.21
So far, I have left out one assumption Rawls makes in response to
the claim that relatively daring attitudes toward risk might exist in the
original position, attitudes which favor admitting increased life pros-
pects for the best-off, even at the expense of the worst-off. Rawls seeks
to justify a conservative attitude toward risk-taking by supposing that
people in the original position care about their immediate descend-
ants, and want to be able to justify their choices to them. He points
out that it is especially hard to defend a choice of principles of justice
to one's children if it has a disastrous outcome for them.
It seems to me that Rawls' additional assumption does not in fact
justify his giving unique weight to conservative attitudes toward risks.
No doubt, if a person chooses, in the original position, a principle of
justice that admits slave societies, and turns out himself to be a slave,
his children will be bitter about his choice (especially if they are
inclined to conservative gambles). But suppose he chooses a principle
that excludes extremes of wealth and power, and turns out himself to
have been at the top of an extreme and inequitable hierarchy. Again,
his children may be bitter at his choice, since they have been deprived
of the advantages they would have enjoyed, and cut off from the
opportunity to pursue such advantages. In particular, the choice will
appear indefensible to them if they are inclined to accept great risks
for possible great rewards. In sum, since a person does not know
whether his choice will deprive his children of great advantages, what
needs his children have, or what their attitudes toward risk are, the
desire to make choices he can defend to them does not entail a more
conservative attitude toward risk on his own part. "I wanted to give

21. Or, in any case, their admitting such societies is a relevant possibility
if Rawls is right in supposing that utilitarian principles are less egalitarian than
his own, in ways that are relevant to the original position (cf. David Lyons,
"Rawls versus Utilitarianism," Journal of Philosophy, LXIX, I8 [1972]). As far
as the conflict between Rawls and utilitarianism is concerned, the outcome of
my arguments will be that on the basis of certain social hypotheses the differ-
ence principle is not superior to a hedged utilitarianism such as the above, from
the standpoint of the original position, even if the latter outcome does, in rele-
vant ways, impose weaker constraints on inequality. I shall return to this topic
at the end of this paper.

This content downloaded from

[Link] on Fri, 14 Apr 2023 13:09:03 UTC
All use subject to [Link]
 i85 Rawls and Marxism

you a chance to enjoy the way of life you might require, on account
of your needs," appears, in the original position, to be a reasonable
argument by which to justify a choice to one's descendants. Certainly,
the need to justify a choice to one's descendants does not increase the
weight of extremely conservative choices sufficiently to exclude the
sort of alternatives to the difference principle described above, e.g.,
utilitarianism hedged with a low, but livable social minimum.
Since hedged utilitarianism is not one of the conceptions of social
justice Rawls considers, it is worth noting that this alternative is not
at all artificial. A great many people feel that where justice is con-
cerned the interests of the worst-off should be given special weight
only insofar as a certain low social minimum ought to be guaranteed;
thereafter, everyone's interest should be given equal weight, with no
special weight attached to the welfare of the worst-off. A hedged utili-
tarianism is a plausible expression of this viewpoint. If a commitment
to uphold such a principle is as attractive, in the original position, as
a commitment to uphold the difference principle, then, given Rawls'
assumption of a special obligation to uphold the latter standard, there
is a live issue of social morality that ideal contractualism cannot
resolve.
If a commitment to help in the immediate realization of the differ-
ence principle would be no more rational than certain alternatives in
the original position, might a commitment to the gradual realization
of the difference principle be uniquely favored? In light of our previ-
ous arguments and given our assumption about the needs of the best-
off, a gradualist commitment does not seem to be uniquely rational.
A proposed commitment to improve the life prospects of the worst-off
until they are maximized would be competing with a proposed com-
mitment to improve their life prospects until some social minimum is
reached, and then, let us say, to help maximize average utility. Given
that one may turn out to have luxurious needs, and, hence, to care a
great deal about nonegalitarian success, the choice of the latter social
commitment, in the original position, would be no less rational than
the choice of the former.
As we have seen, a general commitment to uphold the difference
principle would emerge only if no "representative individual" has suf-
ficient need for advantages beyond what the difference principle guar-

This content downloaded from

[Link] on Fri, 14 Apr 2023 13:09:03 UTC
All use subject to [Link]
 I86 Philosophy & Public Affairs

antees to justify one in committing oneself to a less egalitarian

arrangement, behind the veil of ignorance. I would like to conclude
this section by indicating what is right and what is wrong about this
Rawlsian assumption of moderate needs, from the Marxist standpoint
we are examining. There is, to begin with, much truth to the requisite
assumption, from a Marxist point of view, in that most people have
the attitudes Rawls requires. If they knew their own needs, but were
otherwise operating behind the veil of ignorance, then, seeing the
existence guaranteed in a society governed by the difference principle,
they would not take great risks to leave open the highest possibilities
of success in a highly nonegalitarian society. This choice would result
in part from a relatively small need for great wealth, power, and
status, in part from a disinclination toward the sorts of existence
characteristically associated with the highest positions in a society
violating the difference principle. Thus, most people, on a Marxist
view, would not care enough about the luxuries of a large slave holder
to make the riskier choice, both because they do not care that much
about luxuries, and because they would not want to be surrounded by
those who hate them, or who would if they knew their role. Similarly,
someone with the needs and desires typical of mankind would not
care enough about the material standards of a top corporate execu-
tive, at least after perceiving their association with such corporate
phenomena as speeding workers up and laying them off, making
goods seem worth more than they are, and trying to defeat other exec-
utives in corporate politics.
If the psychological assumption Rawls requires is, in fact, true of
most people, only the following premise is needed to apply it to the
original position: Morally relevant facts of psychology that are true
of most people are true of typical representatives of all major income
groups.22 In other words, the requisite assumption about attitudes
toward highly nonegalitarian success in the original position depends,
in effect, on the idea that morally important aspects of human nature
are not too sharply differentiated along class lines. I have argued that
on a Marxist view such a split in human nature does obtain, in at least

22. In the original position, one chooses between the difference principle and
alternative standards under the assumption that one will turn out to have the
life prospects of one of these "representative men." See p. 96.

This content downloaded from

[Link] on Fri, 14 Apr 2023 13:09:03 UTC
All use subject to [Link]
 i87 Rawls and Marxism

the following respect: The existence of a special need for wealth,

power, and status typical of an upper class, or, more precisely, a domi-
nant exploitive class, might lead one to commit oneself to a weaker
constraint on inequality than Rawls' in a situation like that of the
original position, in which one does not know one's actual place in
society. Thus, the outcome of the original position (indeed, the very
existence of some outcome) would be crucially affected by a split
between what most people are like and what people in a certain
income group are like.
I should now like to consider, very briefly, two other arguments
suggested by remarks of Rawls', for commitment to the difference
principle. For one thing, Rawls claims that his standard of social jus-
tice is especially stable in that when a system is known to realize it,
people will come to commit themselves to upholding this system.23
Since the best-off obviously would prefer stability, this looks like a
reason for a commitment to further Rawls' principles, even though it
may require one to give up certain advantages.
In response to this argument, a Marxist might note that no special
risk of instability is involved in a commitment to uphold a principle
less egalitarian than the difference principle. Of course, a Marxist
would agree that the worst-off will eventually be dissatisfied if the
difference principle is not realized, and that instability will result. But
given the hypothesis sketched above about the need for wealth and
power of certain ruling classes, one would expect deposed members
of such a class to be extremely disruptive of societies transformed to
accord with the difference principle and more disruptive of such socie-
ties than of societies transformed in a less egalitarian direction.
Indeed, in the early stages of the realization of the difference principle
one would expect these disruptions to create acute and general insta-
bility, on account of the central social roles members of the old ruling
class played, the especially far-flung networks of personal contacts
they retain, and the residues of the old ruling-class ideology they can
appeal to.
Of course, Marxists do suppose that a permanently stable society
would have to be one which, at least roughly speaking, realizes the

23. P. I77.

This content downloaded from

[Link] on Fri, 14 Apr 2023 13:09:03 UTC
All use subject to [Link]
 i88 Philosophy & Public Affairs

difference principle. But this does not mean that someone in the
original position, not knowing to which generation he belongs, should
commit himself to uphold the difference principle in order to avoid
instability. For, at least if highly probabilistic reasoning is excluded, as
Rawls requires, one has no reason to suppose one can avoid instability
in this way, for oneself or one's children. Similarly, even if, as Marx-
ists suppose, the worst-off will eventually win and realize the differ-
ence principle, someone in the original position has no reason to sup-
pose they are bound to win in his own lifetime or his children's.
Indeed, if a person's sense of justice were determined by principles
which would emerge from the original position, and a commitment
to realize a principle less egalitarian than Rawls' would emerge, it
seems unlikely that the life prospects of the worst-off would ever be
maximized. For the worst-off would have an ideology inappropriate
to their struggle to maximize their life prospects. They could give no
honest answer to the best-off, when the latter claim, "You are asking
for more than society is morally required to give you, at this time."
In sum, a Marxist would claim that the desire for stability would
not make a commitment to help realize the difference principle more
rational than a commitment, say, to utilitarianism hedged by a social
minimum. If the two commitments are equally rational before insta-
bility is considered, the desire to avoid instability will not tip the
scales.
There is one more argument that Rawls presents for the difference
principle that does not explicitly appeal to the idea that the burdens
of upholding this principle are uniquely tolerable. Rawls argues that
by committing themselves to exclude inequalities that are not to every-
one's advantage, the bargainers in the original position agree to a
social arrangement in which everyone can have self-respect.24 If this
argument were used to support a commitment to uphold the differ-
ence principle throughout the circumstances of justice, I would pro-
pose that the bases of self-respect may be relevantly different from
class to class. In particular, on the view of class conflict we are exam-
ining, most members of some exploitive classes have a need for great
wealth and power, and for much more of them than most other peo-
ple, a need which typical members of exploited classes do not have to

24. Pp. 178f.

This content downloaded from

[Link] on Fri, 14 Apr 2023 13:09:03 UTC
All use subject to [Link]
 i89 Rawls and Marxism

anything like the same degree. This need must typically be satisfied,
if a member of the exploitive class is to respect himself. Indeed, it
seems plausible that many a feudal lord, a late nineteenth-century
tycoon, or even a member of some contemporary ruling classes would
rather kill himself than accept the loss of his special position in
society. Thus, in a society conforming to the difference principle, in
which, no doubt, the self-esteem of the majority would be increased,
the self-esteem of former exploiters might be destroyed. More gen-
erally, on the Marxist view under consideration, the needs for self-
respect of the typical members of the different classes conflict in a
way that Rawls' principle cannot resolve.
If the above arguments are correct, it seems highly unlikely that a
commitment to accept advances toward the realization of the differ-
ence principle would emerge from an original position in which the
following propositions are known to hold true in some societies:

( i ) The reduction of inequalities requires class struggle. Any over-

all social arrangement that the best-off class can accept has unac-
ceptable consequences for most people affected by it. This hypothe-
sis was seen to be incompatible with arguments concerning the
strains of commitment, in support of a commitment to uphold the
difference principle.

(2) The best-off class in society is a ruling class. Political and ideo-
logical institutions work exclusively or almost exclusively in its
interests. The argument that social cooperation requires realizing
the difference principle depended on the rejection of the ruling
class hypothesis.

(3) Typical members of the ruling class have an especially great

need for wealth, power, and status. This hypothesis was seen to
conflict with arguments for commitment to Rawls' principle as
uniquely rational in the original position. A further derivation of
that commitment was in conflict with the corresponding hypothesis
about class differences in the bases of self-respect.

Very roughly, then, the derivation of a commitment to accept and

further the difference principle throughout the circumstances of jus-
tice would depend, for its validity, on the following view of what
societies in those circumstances are like: class conflict is mo;derate;

This content downloaded from

[Link] on Fri, 14 Apr 2023 13:09:03 UTC
All use subject to [Link]
 Igo Philosophy & Public Affairs

there is no ruling class; the basic desires characteristic of one class

are not drastically different from those characteristic of another.
Our discussion of Rawls' arguments from the point of view of Marx-
ist social theory naturally gives rise to the following question: "Given
that a commitment to uphold the difference principle does not emerge
from the original position if the Marxist hypotheses we have consid-
ered are correct, does any agreement concerning the reduction of eco-
nomic inequality emerge?" The answer, I think, is "no." The specific
form of this negative result depends on whether one accepts or rejects
Rawls' exclusion of statistical arguments from the deliberations in the
original position. If estimates of probabilities are excluded, then no
honest commitment concerning the promotion of social justice is pos-
sible. If probabilistic reasoning is admitted, then too many agreements
are equally acceptable, and the outcome of the original position is
indeterminate.
First of all, if we follow Rawls in excluding probabilistic reasoning,
no one in the original position will be able to make the required honest
commitment to a social contract, since one cannot be sufficiently cer-
tain of being able to accept the social changes the contract requires.
If, when the veil of ignorance is lifted, one turns out to be a typical
member of an exploitive ruling class, one may be unable to accept the
consequences of the difference principle or of any constraint on in-
equality of similar strength. But, as Marx and Rawls would agree, any
weaker constraint on inequality would be intolerable to the working
class. Thus it would seem that no commitment concerning the reduc-
tion of economic inequality can emerge from the original position.
The situation may be somewhat different if probabilistic reasoning
is admitted. Perhaps in that case one could honestly agree to support
the difference principle, on the grounds that one is very unlikely to be
a member of an exploitive ruling class, unable to accept its conse-
quences. I say "perhaps," because even here the possibility of honest
commitment is not obvious. After all, one has reason to believe one
may actually be a person who is incapable of accepting what the dif-
ference principle requires. It is as if one knows that LSD has been
dropped in someone's drink at a party, and one is asked to run an
errand within the next hour. In such a case, it is by no means obvious
one can honestly make the relevant promise.

This content downloaded from

[Link] on Fri, 14 Apr 2023 13:09:03 UTC
All use subject to [Link]
 I9I Rawls and Marxism

Still, suppose we grant for the sake of argument that an honest

commitment to the difference principle might be based on its probable
tolerability. At this point, the following dilemma arises: commitment
to the difference principle is but one of several possible outcomes of
the search for a commitment to social justice in the original position,
and probabilistic considerations (such as must, in all consistency,
now be admitted) do not decisively favor one outcome over the others.
In addition to the difference principle, it can be foreseen that utilitar-
ian standards are very likely to be found tolerable, as are utilitarian
standards with some requirement of a low social minimum added on.
But, especially as between the latter, mixed standards and the differ-
ence principle, there seem to be no decisive arguments either way.
One might adopt Rawls' principle, as we saw, on the grounds that it
makes the most sense in terms of the needs and desires one is likely
to have. On the other hand, one might adopt a hedged utilitarian
principle on the grounds that not knowing what one's actual desires
are, one wants to maximize the extent to which they will probably be
fulfilled, whatever they turn out to be, while excluding outcomes that
are disastrous from all points of view, and uniquely disastrous from
most. Similarly, each conception has its drawbacks. In the Rawlsian
solution, one completely dismisses needs one may actually have. In
the hedged utilitarian solution, one assumes a greater risk of non-
egalitarian outcomes that represent irrational bets from the stand-
point of the needs and desires one probably has.25 In sum, even if one
accepts the need to hedge one's bets in the original position, it becomes
quite indeterminate what hedging one's bets requires, once one sees
that the availability of highly nonegalitarian success has a different
importance with respect to sets of needs and desires typical of differ-
ent income groups.

25. In any case, Rawls would characterize the more utilitarian contract in this
way. This characterization seems reasonable at least on the following basis:
more or stronger factual assumptions would be required to preclude the highly
nonegalitarian outcomes in question as consequences of the hedged utilitarian
contract, than would be required for Rawls' principles of justice. The partici-
pants in the original position are plausibly assumed to be reluctant to bet on the
truth of social facts (which they do, in fact, know) where this is avoidable. Thus,
they regard the risk of a highly nonegalitarian outcome as relevantly greater for
the more utilitarian contract (cf. p. I6o).

This content downloaded from

[Link] on Fri, 14 Apr 2023 13:09:03 UTC
All use subject to [Link]