hoofdstuk 4 | terug

Vrije keuze, vrije ruil, vrije markt en rechtvaardigheid

Rechtvaardigheid komt in Dekkers overwegingen niet voor. Voor een minister is dat een fatale tekortkoming.

 

 THEORIE    | practijk

Een vrije markteconomie resulteert in economisch efficiënte consumentenwensvervulling.
Is het resultaat ook rechtvaardig?
Ja, volgens de theorie. Dit heet procedurele rechtvaardigheid: de procedure is rechtvaardig, dus de uitkomst van de procedure is rechtvaardig.
Is de procedure van vrij spel van vraag en aanbod dan rechtvaardig?
Ja, volgens de theorie. Mensen zijn in die procedure redelijk, vrij en gelijk. Een vrije markteconomie is in theorie een egalitair systeem, met allerlei gelijkheden: gelijke vrijheid, kansen, macht.

Adam Smith, The wealth of nations:

"The difference of natural talents in different men is, in reality, much less than we are aware of; and the very different genius which appears to distinguish men of different professions, when grown up to maturity, is not upon many occasions so much the cause, as the effect of the division of labour. The difference between the most dissimilar characters, between a philosopher and a common street porter, for example, seems to arise not so much from nature, as from habit, custom, and education" (1).

Een vrije markteconomie hoeft daarom niet te resulteren in grote verschillen tussen arm en rijk.

E. F. Schumacher, Small is beautiful:

"High profits are either fortuitous, or they are the achievement not of the owner but of the whole organizati­on" (2).

Zo te zien is er wel wat te zeggen voor deze vorm van economische rechtvaardigheid.

Maar het model is een ideaal. In werkelijkheid is er immense economische, sociale en misschien toch ook "natuurlijke" ongelijkheid tussen mensen, en rechtvaardigheid vergt allicht dat die rechtgezet wordt.

John Rawls, A theory of justice:

"... to mitigate the influence of social contingencies and natural fortune on distributive shares. To accomplish this end it is necessary to impose further basic structural conditions on the social system. Free market arrangements must be set within a framework of political and legal institutions which regulates the overall trends of economic events and preserves the social conditions necessary for fair equality of opportunity. The elements of this framework are familiar enough, though it may be worthwhile to recall the importance of preventing excessive accumulations of property and wealth and of maintaining equal opportunities of education for all. Chances to acquire cultural knowledge and skills should not depend upon one's class position, and so the school system, whether public or private, should be designed to even out class barriers.

While the liberal conception seems clearly preferable to the system of natural liberty, intuitively it still appears defective. For one thing, even if it works to perfection in eliminating the influence of social contingencies, it still permits the distribution of wealth and income to be determined by the natural distribution of abilities and talents. Within the limits allowed by the background arrangements, distributive shares are decided by the outcome of the natural lottery; and this outcome is arbitrary from a moral perspective. There is no more reason to permit the distribution of income and wealth to be settled by the distribution of natural assets than by historical and social fortune. Furthermore, the principle of fair opportunity can be only imperfectly carried out, at least as long as the institution of the family exists. The extent to which natural capacities develop and reach fruition is affected by all kinds of social conditions and  class attitudes. Even the willingness to make an effort, to try, and so to be deserving in the ordinary sense is itself dependent upon happy family and social circumstances. It is impossible in practice to secure equal chances of achievement and culture for those similarly endowed, and therefore we may want to adopt a principle which recognizes this fact and also mitigates the arbitrary effects of the natural lottery itself. That the liberal conception fails to do this encourages one to look for another interpretation of the two principles of justice" (3).

Ook libertarisme erkent dit thema. Libertarisme is ultraliberalisme dat een minimale staat wil. De versie die ik hier aan de orde stel volgt het rechtvaardigheidsmodel van vrije keuze, vrije ruil, vrije markt.

Robert Nozick, Anarchy, state and utopia:

"The minimal state is the most extensive state that can be justified. Any state more extensive violates people's rights. Yet many persons have put forth reasons purporting to justify a more extensive state. (...) In this chapter we consider the claim that a more extensive state is justified, because necessary (or the best instrument) to achieve distributive justice; (...).
The subject of justice in holdings consists of three major topics.
The first is the original acquisition of holdings, the appropriation of unheld things. (...) We shall refer to the complicated truth about this topic, which we shall not formulate here, as the principle of justice in acquisition.
The second topic concerns the transfer of holdings from one person to another. (...) The complicated truth about this subject (...) we shall call the principle of justice in transfer. (...)
If the world were wholly just, the following inductive definition would exhaustively cover the subject of justice in holdings.

1. A person who acquires a holding in accordance with the principle of justice in acquisition is entitled to that holding.
2. A person who acquires a holding in accordance with the principle of justice in transfer, from someone else entitled to the holding, is entitled to the holding.
3. No one is entitled to a holding except by (repeated) applications of 1 and 2.

The complete principle of distributive justice would say simply that a distribution is just if everyone is entitled to the holdings they posses under the distribution.
A distribution is just if it arises from another just distribution by legitimate means. The legitimate means of moving from one distribution to another are specified by the principle of justice in transfer. The legitimate first "moves" are specified by the principle of justice in acquisition. Whatever arises from a just situation by just steps is itself just. (...)

Not all actual situations are generated in accordance with the two principles of justice in holdings: the principles of justice in acquisition and transfer. Some people steal from others, or defraud them, or enslave them, seizing their product and preventing them from living as they choose, or forcibly exclude others from competing in exchanges. None of these are permissible modes of transition from one situation to another. (...)

The existence of past injustice (previous violations of the first two principles of justice in holdings) raises the third major topic under justice in holdings: the rectification of injustice in holdings. If past injustice has shaped present holdings in various ways, some identifiable and some not, what now, if anything, ought to be done to rectify these injustices? What obligations do the performers of injustice have toward those whose position is worse than it would have been had the injustice not been done? Or, than it would have been had compensation been paid promptly? How, if at all, do things change if the beneficiaries and those made worse off are not the direct parties in the act of injustice, but, for example, their descendants? Is an injustice done to someone whose holding was itself based upon an unrectified injustice? What may victims of injustice permissibly do in order to rectify the injustices being done to them, including the many injustices done by persons acting through their government? I do not know of a thorough or theoretically sophisticated treatment of such issues. (See, however, the useful book by Boris Bittker, The case for black reparations).
Idealizing greatly, let us suppose theoretical investigations will produce a principle of rectification. This principle uses historical information about previous situations and injustices done in them (as defined by the first two principles of justice and rights against interference), and information about the actual course of events that flowed from these injustices, until the present, and it yields a description (or descriptions) of holdings in the society. The principle of rectification presumably will make use of its best estimate of subjunctive information about what would have occured (or a probability distributions over what might have occurred, using the expected value) if the injustice had not taken place. If the actual description of holdings turns out not to be one of the descriptions yielded by the principle, then one of the descriptions yielded must be realized. (...)

We began this chapter's investigation of distributive justice in order to consider the claim that a state more extensive than the minimal state could be justified on the grounds that it was necessary, or the most appropriate instrument, to achieve distributive justice. According to the entitlement conception of justice in holdings that we have presented, there is no argument based upon the first two principles of distributive justice, the principles of acquisition and of transfer, for such a more extensive state. If the set of holdings is properly generated, there is no argument for a more extensive state based upon distributive justice. (...)

If, however, these principles are violated, the principle of rectification comes into play. Perhaps it is best to view some patterned principles of distributive justice as rough rules of thumb meant to approximate the general results of applying the principle of rectification of injustice. For example, lacking much historical information, and assuming (1) that victims of injustice generally do worse than they otherwise would, and (2) that those from the least well-off group in the society have the highest probabilities of being the (descendants of) victims of the most serious injustice who are owed compensation by those who benefited from the injustices (...), then a rough rule of thumb for rectifying injustices might seem to be the following: organize society so as to maximize the position of whatever group ends up least well-off in the society.
This particular example may well be implausible, but an important question for each society will be the following: given its particular history, what operable rule of thumb best approximates the results of a detailed application in that society of the principle of rectification?

These issues are very complicated and are best left to a full treatment of the principle of rectification. In the absence of such a treatment applied to a particular society, one cannot use the analysis and the theory presented here to condemn any particular scheme of transfer payments, unless it is clear that no consideration of rectification of injustice could apply to justify it. Although to introduce socialism as the punishment for our sins would be to go to far, past injustices might be so great as to make necessary in the short run a more extensive state to rectify them." (4)

Ik ga niet in op de kwestie hoe de twee beginselen van rechtvaardigheid bij verwerving en overdracht zich verhouden tot het model van vrije keuze, vrije ruil, vrije markt. Dit rechtvaardigheidsmodel is een ideaal, niet werkelijkheid. In werkelijkheid komt onrechtvaardigheid voor. Volgens het beginsel van rectificatie moet deze onrechtvaardigheid rechtgezet worden. Libertarisme vult dit abstracte beginsel vervolgens in met concrete rechtvaardigheidsbeginselen uit andere theorieën. Toepassing daarvan zet onrechtvaardigheid recht in overeenstemming met het beginsel van rectificatie. Libertarisme gaat dus te rade bij andere rechtvaardigheidstheorieën. Nozick zelf stelt als vuistregel voor: maximaliseer de minima. Dit is John Rawls’ beginsel van ongelijkheid: organiseer sociale en economische ongelijkheid zo, dat deze zoveel mogelijk ten goede komt aan degenen die het slechtst af zijn. We kunnen bijvoorbeeld ook utilitaristische rechtvaardigheidsbeginselen toepassen. Pas als het duidelijk is dat toepassing daarvan niet met het beginsel van rectificatie overeen kan stemmen, wijst libertarisme dat af.

 

 PRACTIJK    | theorie

Huurprijsregels kunnen we opvatten als toepassing van het beginsel van rectificatie. Via dat beginsel zijn ze aan het model van vrije keuze, vrije ruil, vrije markt geschakeld. Huurprijsregels zijn dus rechtvaardig. Ze leiden tot een uitkomst die dichterbij het ideaal ligt.

Dekkers huurprijsplannen zijn onrechtvaardig. Een vrije markt van wonen en huizen bestaat immers niet, en keuzes in wonen zijn vaak niet vrij maar uit nood geboren. Net zoals een ongeregelde "markt" van wonen en huizen tot economische inefficiëntie leidt, leidt deze tot onrechtvaardigheid. Wonen gaat niet rechtvaardiger door rechten af te schaffen en prijzen te verhogen. Zonder huurprijsregels is "de markt" van wonen en huizen vrij spel van geld en macht, en geldt het recht van de rijkste. "Liberalisering" is woners vogelvrij verklaren. Dat is geen rechtvaardigheid.

Ik toets de rechtvaardigheid van de huurprijsplannen hier aan de maatstaf van vrije keuze, vrije ruil, vrije markt. Zijn ze ook onrechtvaardig volgens andere rechtvaardigheidsbeginselen, uit andere leren? Jazeker. Van eminent belang is utilitarisme. De vrije markteconomie kun je opvatten als deel van een utilitaristisch sociaal systeem. De werking en uitkomsten van het vrije marktmechanisme dienen te voldoen aan eisen van utilitaristische rechtvaardigheidsbeginselen. Dat geldt a fortiori voor "de markt" van wonen en huizen, die geen vrije markt is.

Dit bespreek ik hier niet verder. Diverse onrechtvaardigheden van Dekkers plannen komen in de volgende hoofdstukken ter sprake (zie bijvoorbeeld hoofdstuk 7). Vrijheid en legitieme verwachtingen zijn twee beginselen die in hoofdstuk 9 aan de orde komen. Utilitarisme komt in hoofdstuk 9 en 10 nader ter sprake.

Socialisten nodig ik uit hun visie op het rechtvaardigheidsgehalte van Dekkers plannen politiek-filosofisch te motiveren.

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