Justice: Rights and Wrongs PDF
Preview Justice: Rights and Wrongs
Justice Justice RIGHTS AND WRONGS Nicholas Wolterstorff PRINCETON UNIVERSITY PRESS PRINCETON AND OXFORD Copyright©2008byPrincetonUniversityPress Requestsforpermissiontoreproducematerialfromthisworkshould besenttoPermissions,PrincetonUniversityPress PublishedbyPrincetonUniversityPress,41WilliamStreet,Princeton,NewJersey08540 IntheUnitedKingdom:PrincetonUniversityPress,3MarketPlace, Woodstock,OxfordshireOX201SY AllRightsReserved LibraryofCongressCataloging-in-PublicationData Wolterstorff,Nicholas. Justice:rightsandwrongs/NicholasWolterstorff. p. cm. Includesbibliographicalreferencesandindex. ISBN978-0-691-12967-9(hardcover:alk.paper) 1.Christianityandjustice.2.Humanrights—Religious aspects—Christianity.I.Title. BR115.J8W652008 241’.622—dc22 2007019574 BritishLibraryCataloging-in-PublicationDataisavailable ThisbookhasbeencomposedinBaskerville Printedonacid-freepaper.∞ press.princeton.edu PrintedintheUnitedStatesofAmerica 1 3 5 7 9 10 8 6 4 2 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1 CONTENTS Preface vii Introduction 1 ART P I The Archeology of Rights 19 CHAPTERONE TwoConceptionsofJustice 21 CHAPTERTWO AContestofNarratives 44 CHAPTERTHREE JusticeintheOldTestament/HebrewBible 65 CHAPTERFOUR OnDe-justicizingtheNewTestament 96 CHAPTERFIVE JusticeintheNewTestamentGospels 109 ART P II Fusion of Narrative with Theory: The Goods to Which We Have Rights 133 CHAPTERSIX LocatingThattoWhichWeHaveRights 135 CHAPTERSEVEN WhyEudaimonismCannotServeasFrameworkfor aTheoryofRights 149 CHAPTEREIGHT Augustine’sBreakwithEudaimonism 180 CHAPTERNINE TheIncursionoftheMoralVisionofScriptureinto LateAntiquity 207 CHAPTERTEN CharacterizingLife-andHistory-Goods 227 vi CONTENTS ART P III Theory: Having a Right to a Good 239 CHAPTERELEVEN AccountingforRights 241 CHAPTERTWELVE RightsNotGroundedinDuties 264 CHAPTERTHIRTEEN RightsGroundedinRespectforWorth 285 CHAPTERFOURTEEN TheNatureandGroundingofNaturalHumanRights 311 CHAPTERFIFTEEN IsaSecularGroundingofHumanRightsPossible? 323 CHAPTERSIXTEEN ATheisticGroundingofHumanRights 342 CHAPTERSEVENTEEN ApplicationsandImplications 362 EPILOGUE ConcludingReflections 385 Index 395 PREFACE WHYCAREABOUTATHEORYOFJUSTICE I came late to thinking about justice, late and fortuitously, or perhaps providentially. It was injustice that impelled me to think about justice, not the imperatives of some theoretical scheme or the duties of some academic position. Injustice in the form of the wronged, which is the forminjusticealwaystakes.Thevictimsconfrontedme;Iwasnotlooking forthem.Ishouldhavenoticedthemmuchearlier.Thewrongedareall aboutus. In September of 1976 I attended a conference at the University of Potchefstroom in South Africa. The University of Potchefstroom was thenverymuchawhiteuniversity,foundedandmaintainedbyabranch of the Afrikaners known familiarly as “Doppers.” There were Afrikaner scholars present at the conference, and “black” and “colored” scholars from South Africa. There were Dutch scholars who were extremely knowledgeableaboutwhatwasgoingoninSouthAfricaandfuriouswith the Afrikaners over the South African policy of apartheid. And there wereNorthAmericanslikemyselfwhohadheardofapartheidbutwere nowherenearaswell-informedastheDutch. Atfirst theAfrikaners andthe Dutchvented theirfury ateach other. Butastheconferenceproceeded,the“blacks”and“coloreds”beganto speak up, not with the rage of the Dutch but with faces and voices of suffering. Theytold in slowquiet tonesof the manyways in whichthey werewronged.TheAfrikanersrespondedbysayingthatitwasallforthe sake of the future good. Some told of the charity that they and their familieshad extendedto blacksandcoloreds: cast-offclothing givento familiesliving inhutsin thebackyards, Christmastrinketsgiven tothe children,andsoforth.Theychargedthatthestrategiesofresistanceand thewordsofcriticismemployedbysomeblacksandcoloredswerehurt- fulandnotloving.Andtheyassuredtheirblackandcolored“brothers,” as they called them, that if they just behaved, they would see what a generouspeopletheAfrikanerswereatheart.Isaw,asneverbefore,the good overwhelming the just, and benevolence and the appeal to love beingusedasinstrumentsofoppression. I left South Africa more changed than I knew. Gradually, I realized that I had been confronted with a call to speak up for these wronged and suffering people. At the conference I had come to know some of viii PREFACE them, and over the years some, along with a good many others, have becomedearfriendsofmine. InMayof1978IattendedaconferenceonthewestsideofChicagoon Palestinianrights,organizedbythePalestineHumanRightsCampaign.I had never heard of the organization, I never learned why I had been invitedtotheconference,andnoteveninretrospecthaveIunderstood whatitwasinmethatledmetoattend. TheconferencewasevenmoredisruptiveformethanPotchefstroom hadbeen.IknewthattherewereArabslivinginPalestine;whatIdidnot knowishowintenselytheyidentifiedthemselvesasPalestiniansandnot justas Arabs.Thosepresent attheconference pouredouttheir gutsin rhetoric of flaming intensity. They spoke of being driven from their homes in the ’48 war, they spoke of their right of return, they spoke of the indignities daily heaped upon them; and they asked why no one heardtheircry.OnceagainIfeltthatIhadbeenconfrontedwithacall tospeakupforthiswrongedandsufferingpeople,yetwithoutforgetting foramomentall thewrongsinflictedontheJewish people.SoonIwas chairmanofthePalestineHumanRightsCampaign. For almost thirty years now I have listened to the Israelis say to the PalestinianswhatIfirstheardtheAfrikanerssaytotheblacksandcolor- eds. We are good people; if you just behave, we will give you most of whatyouareaskingfor.Oppressorsdoalltheycantopreventuseofthe category of justice; theydo all they can to castthe situation in terms of better and worse rather than justice and injustice, in terms of good be- haviorandbadbehavior,intermsofbenevolence. IhadopposedtheVietnamWar,arguingthatitwasnotajustwar.Yet thewardidnotenergizemetothinkaboutjusticeinthewaythesetwo episodesdid.Inretrospect,Iunderstandpartofwhythatwas.Inthecase ofVietnam,Ihadnotdirectlyseenthefacesorheardthevoicesofthose who were wronged; the injustice of the war remained something of an abstractiontome.Nowthefacesandthevoicesofthevictimswerethere beforeme.Thatmadeallthedifference:myempathywasevoked. In the interest of full disclosure I should perhaps explain who is the “I” that discerned injustice in the faces and the voices of the Africans and the Palestinians. I grew up in a tiny village in the farm country of southwestMinnesota,theeldestchildofpoorimmigrantparents.Rather often I saw my parents being treated with the indignity typical of how the well-to-do treat the poor. What I now find remarkable is that my parentsneverforamomentindicatedthattheybelievedtheysomehow deservedsuch treatment;ratherthan internalizingtheattitude oftheir demeaners, they felt bruised, hurt, helplessly angry. They maintained their self-respect, grounded, in their case, in the Calvinist version of Christianity withinwhich they were embeddedand into which Iwas in- PREFACE ix ducted. They were precious in God’s sight. All human beings are pre- ciousin God’ssight. Inow realizethata fertileseed bedhad beenpre- paredinmeforseeingthefacesandhearingthevoicesofvictims. This book is an attempt to speak up for the wronged of the world. I havealreadydonesoalmosttwoandahalfdecadesagoinmybookUntil JusticeandPeaceEmbrace. Inthatbook,however,Itook forgranteda certain account of justice and focused my attention on its application to various situations in our world; in this book, I try to articulate thataccount. Mydescriptionofthisbookasanattempttospeakupforthewronged oftheworldwillseempreposteroustomanyreaders;hemustbetalking about some other book, they will think, than this long abstract tome I have in hand. Let me explain. My discussion, like many philosophical discussions,acquiredlegsofitsown;withablendoffascinationanddis- mayIfollowedwherethoselegsledme.Theydidnotleadmeawayfrom speakingupforthewrongedandtowarddoingsomethingelse,although theydidleadmeintosomehighlyabstractdiscussionsandsomeprobing ofoldhistory.Therearemanyexplanationsoffailingtoseethefacesand hearthevoicesofthosewhoarewronged,evenofthoserightbeforeone. Sometimesweloathethevictims.Sometimesweareoverwhelmedbythe fear of what we would have to do if we genuinely saw and heard; so we blockoutthesightandmufflethesound.Andsometimesourframeworks ofconvictionleadustodiscountthesignificanceofwhatweseeandhear. We regardtheone beforeus as acandidate forcharity,shouldwebeso inclined;orweinsistthathisconditionishisownfault.Weresistacknowl- edging that the presence of the other before us places a claim on us, issues to us a call to do justice. My speaking up for the wronged of the world takes the form, in this book, of doing what I can to undermine thoseframeworksofconvictionthatpreventusfromacknowledgingthat theothercomesbeforeusbearingaclaimonus,andofofferinganalter- nativeframework,onethatopensusuptosuchacknowledgment. APPROACHTOTHETOPIC Formanycenturiesnow,philosophersandotherwritersonthesematters have distinguished between,on the one hand, whatis called distributive and commutative justice and, on the other hand, rectifying, or corrective, justice. Rectifying justice consists of the justice that becomes relevant whentherehavebeenbreakdownsindistributiveandcommutativejus- tice.Mydiscussionfocusesentirelyondistributiveandcommutativejus- tice,orasIshallcallthem,primaryjustice.Nodoubttheidealaccountof justicewouldtreatbothkindsatonce,bothprimaryjusticeandrectifying
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