Question

        Explain how Rawls tries to justify his solution in his own

        "unique" version of contractarianism.

        Explain what the following terms refer to:

               (1) Original Position

               (2) Veil of Ignorance

               (3) Maximin Rule

Answer 1

• Rawls wanted to find the principles for a just system for distributing wealth in a fair way. The problem is: people would choose principles out of their own self-interest. A rich person wouldn’t agree to a redistribution of wealth, because he doesn’t want to lose his wealth.
• Original position is a state of authentic ambiguity and uncertainty tied with common sense.It is a state in which a person wouldn’t have fair idea concerning the rewards but would have a vague idea.
• So Rawls came up with a thought experiment called the original position. You’d need to image that your consciousness is placed back in time before you are born. In this state you are behind the veil of ignorance.
• In this state, a person is beneath “Veil of Ignorance”, completely unaware about the self, his/her talents, advantages, disadvantages, structure of society, etc.
• In such a situation, a person would strive for those principles of Justice which would be fair to everyone in the society.
• He means that at that time you have no idea whether you’ll be born in wealth or poverty, if you’re going to be Chinese or American, black or white, intelligent or not, talented or not, etc.
• In this original position you should choose the fundamentals on which we can build a just system. According to Rawls, this would mean that you’d want a system that maximizes the means of those who have the least.
• This ‘Veil of ignorance’ ensures that the least privileged members of the community will get some protection, because everyone will want to insure themselves against a possible future life of poverty.
• It is a hypothetical state, in which decisions about social justice and the allocation of resources would be made fairly, as if by a person who must decide on society’s rules and economic structures without knowing what position he or she will occupy in that society.
  
• Rawls claims that people use the maximin rule to choose principles of justice in his original position. According to the maximin rule we should compare alternatives by the worst possible outcome under each alternative, and we should choose one which maximize the utility of the worst outcome.
• The basic structure is just throughout when the advantages of the more fortunate promote the well-being of the least fortunte, that is, when a decrease in their advantages would make the least fortunate even worse off than they are. The basic structure is perfectly just when the prospects of the least fortunate are as great as they can be.
• This rule is rational under certain conditions. First, we do not know the probability of each circumstance under each decision. This make it impossible to calculate expectation of gain.
• Second, the worst off position chosen by maximin rule is good enough that we are not eager to get more than that.
• Third, the worst positions under other alternatives are unacceptably bad. Under the second and third assumptions we are inclined to secure the minimal acceptable result above all. Thus we use the maximin rule. Rawls thinks that original position satisfies these conditions.
• Due to time limit,remaining questions can be asked as another question ,they will be answered,thankyou for your cooperation