Series on Justice: What does justice mean today?
It seems as though justice has won the contest over which good should count as the supreme social good. We encounter justice in the most diverse domains as an ideal to which different, and often conflicting, social actors appeal. For example, all participants in the discussion over the reform of the welfare state without exception justify their conflicting positions – whether in support of reform, retrenchment or expansion – by appeal to precepts of justice. Most of our judgements about what is just are intuitive, for example when we say that in society – whether in the education system or the labour market – equality of opportunity should prevail or that performance should be rewarded. At the same time, the theory of justice shows us how diverse the corresponding justifications and orientations can be.
A systematic treatment of what is meant by political and social justice can serve as a benchmark and orientation for many current debates. It is also important to balance repeatedly the competing claims in different fields against each other – from educational and occupational justice to environmental justice, from international justice to intergenerational justice. The series ‘What does justice mean today?’ will combine basic considerations with practical approaches and local references in these fields. Issues of justice are among the central research topics of the co-organiser of this series, the Cluster of Excellence ‘The Formation of Normative Orders’. A major focus is current conflicts over the formation of a new global order, which are fuelled to a large extent by the demands of human beings for justice. Here, too, a decisive role is played by the diverse and often conflicting convictions of the parties to the conflict concerning a just social order and how it is justified.
