Paste your essay in here…Social Meanings and Complex Equality
Given the presence of diversity and multiculturalism that is present in nation-states, modern liberal democracies are faced with the question of what political model rooted in the European Enlightenment they should adopt for ensuring the rights of minorities to have freedom and equality. The political definition of minorities is a group of individuals who do not share the majority of mainstream ideas, culture, and lifestyle. Therefore, pluralist democracies must ask how a society where all people are allowed to be free and equal despite everyone being unique and different can be achieved? Professor Michael Walzer who is a moderate communitarian proposes a solution to this dilemma in his work The Spheres of Justice. He proposes the idea of creating egalitarian societies through the use of implementing distributive guidelines respective to every individual commodity, how a society chooses to interpret their meaning, and the level of need an individual requires. Because this system is both circumstantial and pluralistic, whether or not it would ultimately lead to egalitarian societies would end up being entirely subjective since the definition of whether or not a particular good should be distributed as a public good is entirely up to the definition of the leaders of that particular society. Equality through the implementation and practice of social meanings is Pickwickian and doomed to contradict itself.
The focal point of Walzer’s theory is on the social meaning of goods, which are, according to him culturally dependent and confined to their own domain circles. The social meaning of goods is responsible for determining what should be relevant to distributive rules. Just like Marx, Walzer promotes the idea of distributing goods according to their social meaning (Walzer 9). If universal healthcare is interpreted to not be a public need by the leaders of the United States but it is in North Korea, then it is unlawful to require the United States government to provide its citizens with it through the use of public taxation in the same way that Communist North Korea does. Likewise, if the collective ideas North Koreans have of universal K-12 education differs from their collective understanding of Rolex watches, then to request that they are distributed in the same manner infringes upon their respective meanings. The same object is valued for more than one reason, or it is valued in one place and disvalued in another place. Most individuals would be hard pressed to be able to choose the value of a single object or understand the reasons why an object may be considered to be likable or dislikable.
The problem with distributing social goods is that these things cannot be idiosyncratically valued (Walzer 7). Some privatized items are valued for personal and nostalgic reasons, but only in societies where nostalgia is attached to particular objects (7). A beautiful rainbow, the smell of a newborn baby, the joy of a nature hike: these could all be categorized as being valued social goods, though they are also, and more strictly, the articles of personal appraisal. Even inventors do not have the right to label a price on their own creations; they must allow the market to decide the price of their goods through supply and demand (7). Walzer uses the example of God’s creation being the exception to this rule and this is evident from the first chapter of Genesis: “and God saw everything that He had made, and, behold, it was very good” (1:31) (7). That statement does not ask God’s creation, namely Adam and Eve, if they share the same sentiment or if the universe could use any improvements or if nature is just (7).
Members of a society are equal when different kinds of goods are distributed independently, depending on their own internal social meanings, and only when no distribution of any sort of good is affected by the distribution of another (6). Infringements on equality are not dependant on whether one individual is wealthier or has more than someone else, but rather when money has the means to purchase more goods: when it buys political positions, or when it is the sole supplier of social goods whose shared meanings include various regulations for distribution (6). Walzer distinguishes in this respect the simple equality of complex equality (18). All spheres must distribute their property constituting the sphere. For example, money in the sphere of the market, or knowledge in that of education. If it were possible to distribute commodities to those who could pay for it, then the threat of income inequality would diminish. If more money equals better health, greater freedoms, and more power then equality vanishes.
Walzer is concerned with grasping and overseeing public resources in a manner that both acknowledges the similarities between individuals while honoring their differences. He defines complex equality as follows: “In formal terms, complex equality means that no citizen's standing in one sphere or with regard to one social good can be undercut by his standing in some other sphere, with regard to some other good. Thus, citizen X may be chosen over citizen Y for political office, and then the two of them will be unequal in the sphere of politics. But they will not be unequal generally so long as X's office gives him no advantage over Y in any other sphere – superior medical care, access to better schools for his children, entrepreneurial opportunities, and so on” (Walzer 19). Complex equality, however, is only compatible with the belief that dissemination of assets to both the top and bottom of the distributional sphere would be ample and generous in scope. It would be a win-lose solution in each independent distribution, and additionally, the same individuals in every new distribution would be the winners and losers in each and every sphere. Equality is a nebulous liaison between the various spheres of goods were controlled by the collective understanding of all representatives in a society. Basic equality is the doctrine that directs those goods that a society views as necessities such as schooling, employment, political rights, security, and welfare. Complex equality, however, is in charge of regulating those spheres that are dependent in free exchange and commodities. To achieve a position of complex equality, Walzer comes up with a policy of obstructing commerce: goods that are purchased in one sphere should not be allowed to be bartered for goods in another sphere (20). For example, the money that person X has amassed in the economic sphere should not be utilized to purchase power and influence in the political sphere (20). Walzer argues that complex equality will lead to having a more egalitarian distribution of public resources (28). Sooner or later every person will amass goods in every sphere in society, given the plurality of spheres.
Social meanings are classical by their very nature and so distributions both equal and unequal will adapt over time. There are certain goods that could be described as being normative structures, redefined with more than one definition in more than one sphere. The belief that political power should be given to qualified applicants-is an idea supported and practiced in many societies where partisanship and nepotism is frowned upon and prosecuted. (However, many other parts of the world have different definitions of what qualifies as political power). Additionally, retribution has been greatly understood to be deserving of those who go outside the bounds of law and order, not those who have simply been condemned by a political establishment. This begs the question however of what exactly constitutes a verdict? Who should be given the task to decide it? How should it be carried out? There seems to be no clear consensus. These questions beg for an empirical analysis. However, there simply is no innate or theoretical strategy for being able to do so.
Walzer’s theory of complex equality is derived from an analysis of understanding what exactly social goods and services constitute and is used as a way to spotlight his ideas on civil society in general. His assertion is that multicultural society perceives and determines what they seize as social goods in different ways. At different points in history, different communities have had to ask whether and how things like education, healthcare, political participation, and property are social goods. How these societies may evenly distribute these goods may evenly vary because of the guidelines for distribution attached to different goods may also differ depending on the value of the good itself. If a particular community comes to the conclusion that health care is a necessity because maintaining the health is in the greater interest of society as a whole, then according to Walzer, these social goods should be distributed to every individual who wishes it according to their level of need. In contrast, if Rolex watches and other luxury commodities are interpreted and categorized as assets, that they can be evenly distributed according to guidelines regulating assets-that is to say how much one would be willing to pay.
Complex equality is problematic and contradictory on an ethical level. According to this model, societies have to accept an existing common view of a good as a valid compelling means of distribution even if it is ridden by an enmity towards a certain group of people. For example what if there where a society in which most people believed that women should not be allowed to attain higher education, because they think that a woman’s role is just childrearing and taking care of the household. This seems to be a case of oppression by the majority which Walzer in the one hand Walzer labels as unjust, yet at the very same time, according to his own theory, this is a valid enough to justify the distribution of higher education exclusively to men. It might be possible to brush this off by saying that men’s dominance over women can be bypassed to such an extent as the separation of spheres is preserved and other spheres are protected from the sexist unequal distribution of education, but this solution easily falls apart as we the probable likelihood of other goods being unjustly distributed within this same community. It could very well be that this very same society may decide that women do not need as many job opportunities as men because their primary responsibility should be child-rearing. It seems that the complex equality is far too limiting in scope.
Complex equality is not compatible with libertarianism. There is no opposition to state intervention on behalf of championing individual rights. Alternatively, Walzer opposes this idea based on a communitarian assumption. Walzer argues that there is no such thing as a universal theory of justice and the precondition that justice should only be pinpointed in the collective realization of the representatives of a specific community. According to Walzer, for a state’s interventions to be justified, the intervening power must agree to conform to communal understandings of the goods epitomized in the numerous spheres. This would all come at the cost of the state violating the people’s liberty and own personal understanding of the social meanings of goods in order to maintain a society that is egalitarian in every sense of the word.
Complex equality may champion egalitarianism but it certainly does not champion freedom since it is a totalizing system of domination. Walzer’s theory of Complex Equality is antithetical to the social contract pushed by John Rawls or the racial contract pushed by Charles Mills but in fact is acknowledging that no single popular ethical standard pushed by modern philosophers can adequately address all important areas of social life: education, family, relationships, the workplace, and the government. Each area is different so therefore they each require their own distinctive rules. “No social good x should be distributed to men and women who possess some other good Y merely because they possess y and without regard to the meaning of X” (p. 20). For example, if someone is more intelligent than others, or better looking, should not warrant them greater political power or a bigger piece of the public pie. Likewise, a rich person does not have the right to eat the biggest slice of public recognition. This is not universal equality but rather “equalities” in which different societies arrange equality in different spheres according to their own respective values. For Walzer, relative material wealth is not problematic as long as it is confined to only material possessions. It is a caricature of the Athenian model where citizens have equal political rights but are economically unequal and are awarded on the premise of their integrity not their level of income. This model was successful in ancient Greece for a short period of time as well as in Hindu dominated India with the caste system. This model, despite its support for reparations and better living conditions, is unrealistic because political power and the judicial system is bought and paid for, an aspect that is not addressed by Walzer. He does not confront the financial obstacle but instead focuses on addressing how to distribute plasma screen TVs and shoes within a sphere. His rationalization does push for a reanalyzing of the concept of equality, but his belief that it is possible to reform a society in which citizens are on the margins in some spheres while dominating in others and his remodeling of an Athenian democracy where the citizen is seen as someone who is suited to be both a follower or a ruler is as illogical as it was both in the past and in the present (Walzer 53). The contrapositive of complex equality would also roughly mean that nobody should be denied the social good y due to their lack of ownership of the unrelated good x. Inequality in the quality of public education, health care, life expectancy, and job opportunities are essentially tied to inequality in revenue and wages is incompatible a society having continuous levels of poor inequality.