Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Introduction: Gherardo Colombo’s Concern for the Democratic State under the Rule of Law: A Work in Progress
- Why?
- 1 An Imaginary Country
- Contents
- Part I The Ambiguities of Justice
- Part II Horizontal Society and Vertical Society
- Part III Towards a Horizontal Society
- Part IV How Do We Get There?
- Conclusion
- Acknowledgments
4 - ‘Justice’ is an Ambiguous Word
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 24 December 2020
- Frontmatter
- Introduction: Gherardo Colombo’s Concern for the Democratic State under the Rule of Law: A Work in Progress
- Why?
- 1 An Imaginary Country
- Contents
- Part I The Ambiguities of Justice
- Part II Horizontal Society and Vertical Society
- Part III Towards a Horizontal Society
- Part IV How Do We Get There?
- Conclusion
- Acknowledgments
Summary
The value of laws was, and still is, assessed in relation to the notion of ‘justice’.
Even this notion, however, turns out to be strongly ambiguous.
First of all, the term is employed with different meanings. It is used indifferently to refer to justice and to its administration.
The first meaning indicates a yardstick, a basic principle of living together, or an aspiration – something people aim at in their own interest or in their relationship with others. For this meaning we have a wealth of adjectives (social justice, distributive justice, retributive justice, and so on), all of which qualify the term giving it a particular meaning in relation to the field to which it is applied.
The second meaning of the term ‘justice’ describes a way of managing that eminently practical mechanism, namely the system humans have devised (although in very different ways) to solve controversies, to establish who is right and who is wrong in relationships between private parties (for instance, regarding the validity of a contract or a will), or between citizens and the public administration (for instance, to ascertain whether a license to build a house can be denied), or between the state and someone suspected of having committed a crime. When we talk about lawyers, judges, public prosecutors, court hearings, prisons, ministers, the lack of xerox machines, and so on, we use the term ‘justice’ in this second meaning.
When we say that justice is not functioning properly, we refer to its administration. On the contrary, when someone says that there is no justice in a certain country, they refer to the fundamental principles of living together. It is also said that laws (and/or behaviour) in a country are not in keeping with justice.
Even thus specified, this term is interpreted in very different ways.
Have you ever heard someone, apart from madmen and provocateurs, publicly declare that they pursue injustice?
Whatever the purpose, and regardless of the means used to achieve it, everybody describes themselves as a just person, as someone who aims to achieve justice.
In the name of this principle revolutions have broken out, uprisings have been stifled, genocides have been perpetrated, appalling crimes have been committed.
- Type
- Chapter
- Information
- On Rules , pp. 36 - 38Publisher: Amsterdam University PressPrint publication year: 2016