Justice

Early Western theories of justice were developed in part by Ancient Greek philosophers such as Plato in his work The Republic, and Aristotle, in his Nicomachean Ethics and Politics. Modern-day Western notions of justice also have their roots in Christian theology, which largely follows the divine command theory, according to which God dictates morality and determines whether or not an action is seen as morally "good". This, in turn, determines justice. Western thinkers later advanced different theories about where the foundations of justice lie. In the 17th century, philosophers such as John Locke said justice derives from natural law. Jean-Jacques Rousseau was a prominent advocate of…

]]It has been said that 'systematic' or 'programmatic' political and moral philosophy in the West begins, in Plato's Republic, with the question, 'What is Justice?' According to most contemporary theories of justice, justice is overwhelmingly important: John Rawls claimed that "Justice is the first virtue of social institutions, as truth is of systems of thought." In classical approaches, evident from Plato through to Rawls, the concept of 'justice' is always construed in logical or 'etymological' opposition to the concept of injustice. Such approaches cite various examples of injustice, as problems which a theory of justice must overcome. A number of post-World War II approaches do,…