VI Meetings on Ethics and Political Philosophy

University of Minho (Braga), June 8, 2015

DISTRIBUTION OR RECOGNITION?
A CRITICAL EXAMINATION OF A FALSE DILEMMA1
Pablo Aguayo W.
Lecturer in Moral Philosophy at University of Chile
paguayo@derecho.uchile.cl

HAND-OUT

The   aim   of   this  paper  is   to   show   that   Rawls's conception of distributive justice goes beyond allocative
justice and has sound arguments to deal with claims for recognition. I suggest that some critics of the
distributive paradigm confuse “allocative justice” with “distributive justice”. In doing so, they not only
reduce Rawls's conception of primary goods to economic factors, but they also fail to grasp the moral
and political perspective of the Rawlsian project, thus cutting out essential dimensions of justice. At
the end of this paper, I discuss the Rawlsian concepts of reciprocal recognition and self-respect in
order to present a conception of distributive justice to meet these questions.

Introduction

o Most contemporary “Friends of recognition” confront a conception of justice centred on

recognition with one focused on distribution

o Conceptions centred on distribution are presented as insufficient

o I defend that some scholar misunderstand the Rawlsian conception of distributive justice

1. The recognition–theoretical turn

o For Nancy Fraser, the distributive dimension of justice “corresponds to the economic structure of
society” which would be responsible for “the allocation of economic resources and wealth”
(Redistribution or Recognition? 2003 50).

o For Rawls, by contrast, the central question of distributive justice was not to allocate resources or
goods, nor how to distribute them, but rather how to organise the basic structure of society. The
problem of Rawlsian distributive justice was: “how are the institutions of the basic structure to be
regulated as one unified scheme of institutions so that a fair, efficient, and productive system of
social cooperation can be maintained over time, from one generation to the next?” (Justice as
Fairness. A Restatement, 2001 50). This contrasts with the very different problem of: “how a
given bundle of commodities is to be allocated among various individuals whose particular needs,
desires, and preferences are known to us” (2001 50). Only this second problem is that of allocative
justice.

o The aim of Rawls’s conception of distributive justice is the moral justification of the principles that
regulate the basic structure of society and the practices that result from it.

o What is at play in the Rawlsian conception of distributive justice is how we conceive the
justice of social practices rather than the justice of one particular case of allocation.
                                                                                                               
1 I am very grateful to M. E. Orellana Benado, Chris Lyon, Claudio Santander and Kay Holder for carefully reading a previous

version of this paper and providing me with valuable comments.

 2. The importance of reciprocal recognition for justice as fairness

o The two-fold basis of justice: (a) The Conventional basis; (b) The Natural basis

o According to Rawls the Natural Basis “simply invokes the thought that morality, and in particular
justice, is imbedded in the act of recognizing persons as persons: justice is the reciprocal
recognition of persons as persons” (The two-fold Basis of Justice 1).2

3. Taking persons seriously

o Rawls considers that each person has a conception about what is good for her, a conception that is
inevitably interwoven with our own expectations. Those expectations would arise from our
effective participation in the different associations to which we belong.

o The recognition of two moral powers –the sense of justice and the capacity for a conception of the
good – lies at the basis of Rawlsian thought on how we should arrange the social institutions in a
manner that takes persons seriously. To take persons seriously would be to consider them to be
free and equal moral persons.

4. A Rawlsian approach to reciprocal recognition

o Following Rawls, self-respect could be damaged not only when individuals fail to have appropriate
thoughts and emotions with regard to themselves, but also when they lack appropriate conditions
to support the construction of a basal framework that allows and fosters in them a positive self-
worth. These conditions are strongly related to social recognition.

5. Social bases of self-respect

o One central issue underlying the claims for recognition is the need to treat persons with equal
respect and consideration. Only under these conditions of mutual recognition respect will it be
possible to achieve sufficient self-respect to enable us to pursue a preferred plan of life (See TJ
108).

o Self-respect has two aspects. First, a person’s sense of her own value, that is to say, her sure
conviction that her conception of good, her plan of life, is worth carrying out. Second, self-respect
implies the necessary confidence that my abilities are sufficient to advance the plan of life I have
chosen. It is fundamental to both aspects that our efforts are recognised and appreciated by those
around us.

o Given the relevance that recognition by our associates has –as much of our person [self-respect] as
of our actions [self-esteem]– it is difficult to think that Rawls wanted to defend an individualist
conception of society as some scholars have tried to suggest.

o For Rawls Self-respect is one of the essential requisites in the determination of the identity of
persons, an identity which is determined not by standards she has created, but by norms and
criteria accepted by her associates.
o According to Rawls “Self-respect is reciprocally self-supporting” (TJ 179).
                                                                                                               
2  See Papers of John Rawls. Box 9, Folder 1. “The Two-fold Basis of Justice” was probably written between 1954 and 1956

according to Priscilla MacKenzie’s paper “Personhood and the Nature of Morality in the Early Rawls”
http://www.yale.edu/macmillan/globaljustice/rawlsPapers/BOK_EarlyRawlsPersonhood.pdf