Today we will be discussing Rawl's Theory of
Social Justice
John Broadly Rawl, who is basically an
American Political Philosopher
So lets hava a look into his Theory of Social Justice
in detail
I have added a detailed note on Rawl's
Theory of Social Justice for your reference
at the end of this video
John Rawl
introduced his Theory of Social Justice in his famous book
'A Theory of Justice'
published in the year 1971
Rawl has introduced, in his book, certain
egalitarian criterion of social justice
which every economy should take into consider
while they are formulating certain social choices
What makes Rawl's Theory of Social Justice
distinct from other social welfare functions is that
it is concerned with the distribution of real income
rather than subjective utility
Another important feature of Rawl's Theory of Social Justice
is that the society should always try to
maximise the welfare of the poorest section. This
poorest section will be the persons with minimum
level of utility
This is the reason why Rawl wanted to shift
the focus of welfare activities to the poorest section
As I mentioned earlier
Rawl's social welfare criterion are
egalitarian criterion, where he wanted to reduce the
level of inequality to the minimum in the society
That's why he suggested the welfare of the society is the
welfare of the poorest section
he also states that while calculating the utilities of
society as a whole, highest weight should be
given to the utility of persons with the
lowest level of utility
So according to Rawl, maximum social
welfare can be attained by
equal distribution of goods in the economy
Rawl's Theory of Social Justice can be easily understood with the help of the
following diagram
Suppose there are two individual in the economy
 
individual A and Individual B
in the diagram individual A's income is measured in the X axis
and individual B's income is measured in the Y axis
The curve PRES is the social opportunity frontier
which shows the various possibilities of
obtaining income by the two individuals
According to Rawl inequality of incomes in a society
is justified only to the extent
it increases income or welfare of the least well-off person
The 45 degree line in the diagram OZ
shows equal distribution of income between two individuals
At point E, incomes of two individuals A and B are equal
in the social opportunity set PRES
the optimum point is E
which lies on the opportunity frontier
from which the 45 degree equality line OZ passes
If economy moves from poin E to point R
due to some economic re-organisation
or change in public policy
which shows that individual B has gained
more than the individual A.
but what make the point R superior to point E is that
even the less advantaged individual A
has also benefited from the change
So this how the Rawl's Theory of Social Justice works
up to some extent Rawl support inequality in the economy
but if and only
it benefits to the least advantaged person
So as per this theory
if government introduces some new policy
or makes some changes in the existing policy
it might be resulting to increase in the inequality in the economy
that increase in the inequaity is
even justifiable if it makes some
betterment to the conditions of the poorest section in the economy
that means, if that policy change
increase welfare or improve the condition of
poorest section in the economy
that inequality is justifiable
So here in the diagram
the inequality point R is better than the equality point E
as R lies on the higher social indefference, SW1
as you know the properties of indifference curves
highest indifference curves will be always giving higher level of satisfaction
So as per Rawl's Theory of Social Justice
the inequality in income
is better than equality income
if it brings some benefits to the
least advantaged persons in the society
So thats all about Rawl's Theory of Social Justice
Thank you for watcing. Have a nice day
