Would a good society be an equal society?
Will Cook
Almost every political philosopher attempts in some way to find a vision of society that would bring the greatest benefit to all people. But in terms of equality, they are faces with two fundamental questions. First, whether or not equality is a good thing in itself, and second, whether equality can be achieved without compromising other values to an unacceptable degree. the Origin of Inequality, Jean-Jacques Rousseau lays out a theory as to why inequality has come to exist. He feels that in man’s natural, primitive state, he has a non-destructive self-love and also a compassion for others. These two characteristics together help to preserve the human race. However, as soon as men begin to interact with each other, these values are corrupted and replaced with competition, hatred and greed. It is this competition and comparison between men that will always cause inequality whenever they come together. Rousseau regrets inequality but imagines no real society without it. He feels that inequality is inevitable if men interact and therefore inevitable in any kind of civil society. We can infer from this that he feels inequality is a necessary evil if we are to have any kind of society at all. Therefore, though inequality is an evil, if we are to have any kind of civil society, it must exist. Any ‘good’ society must by its nature be unequal. There are those however who feel that there are ways in society through which we can get rid of inequality. In the Communist Manifesto of 1848, Marx and Engels lay out that inequality through class divisions comes about In his work Discourse on
through exploitation of the proletariat. The capitalist system and the existence of private property allows the workers to be suppressed by the bourgeois. Marx clearly feels that equality is important. But he also lays out his vision of a society whereby we can achieve it. Here it is necessary to abolish all private property and disregard much personal liberty. All people simply become arms of the state and work for the government. In this way we can have a fair distribution and an equal society. Perhaps the main problem with this is that it relies on everyone valuing equality as the most important ideal. Once people are more unhappy with their liberty being taken away than the nominal equality which is achieved, it seems impossible for this society to be a ‘good’ one. Surely a society that is good is one people want to live in. We have seen throughout history that many societies which have taken on Marxist ideals have not been happy ones. Therefore it is clear that we cannot disregard liberty. In terms of happiness it is foolish to assume that equality is the only thing that matters. This becomes more important when taking a ‘good’ society to be one that functions properly. Many communist governments have collapsed because people were no longer willing to give up such freedoms. Robert Nozick takes the view that equality is not necessarily a good thing in itself. He questions why a fair distribution is one that must be exactly equal. Instead he feels that fairness comes about through how people choose to distribute money and resources. There may be rich people like basketball
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