Tradeoffs between Justice and Self-Interest

  • Leo Montada
Chapter
Part of the Critical Issues in Social Justice book series (CISJ)

Abstract

In his introduction to this volume, Melvin Lerner refers to Russell Hardin’s assertion (cf., Hardin’s chapter in this volume) that in the view of scholars, when confronted with the demands of real world considerations, welfare and self-interest in the form of mutual benefit invariably trump justice. In the light of the contributions to this volume let us now consider the various implications of this observation. Both justice and welfare are multifaceted concepts which include a variety of criteria rendering different perspectives on social problems. When these criteria are conflicting, one of them maybe given priority, even in circumstances where a tradeoff between different ones would offer the chance of a more adequate solution. Refering to the contributions to this volume I will comment on the multifaceted nature of these concepts, on the usefulness of differentiations both within and between the concepts, and various possibilities for reaching integrative solutions.

Keywords

Affirmative Action Procedural Justice Distributive Justice Social Construction Social Contract Theory 
These keywords were added by machine and not by the authors. This process is experimental and the keywords may be updated as the learning algorithm improves.
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Copyright information

© Springer Science+Business Media New York 1996

Authors and Affiliations

  • Leo Montada
    • 1
  1. 1.Professor of Psychology, Fb I — PsychologieUniversitaet TrierTrierGermany

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