Injustice is a quality relating to unfairness or undeserved outcomes. The term may be applied in reference to a particular event or situation, or to a larger
status quo
is a Latin phrase meaning the existing state of affairs, particularly with regard to social, political, religious or military issues. In the sociological sense, the ''status quo'' refers to the current state of social structure and/or values. W ...
. In
Western philosophy
Western philosophy encompasses the philosophical thought and work of the Western world. Historically, the term refers to the philosophical thinking of Western culture, beginning with the ancient Greek philosophy of the pre-Socratics. The word ' ...
and
jurisprudence
Jurisprudence, or legal theory, is the theoretical study of the propriety of law. Scholars of jurisprudence seek to explain the nature of law in its most general form and they also seek to achieve a deeper understanding of legal reasoning a ...
, injustice is very commonly—but not always—defined as either the absence or the opposite of
justice
Justice, in its broadest sense, is the principle that people receive that which they deserve, with the interpretation of what then constitutes "deserving" being impacted upon by numerous fields, with many differing viewpoints and perspective ...
.
The sense of injustice is a universal human feature, though the exact circumstances considered unjust can vary from culture to culture. While even acts of nature can sometimes arouse the sense of injustice, the sense is usually felt in relation to human action such as misuse,
abuse
Abuse is the improper usage or treatment of a thing, often to unfairly or improperly gain benefit. Abuse can come in many forms, such as: physical or verbal maltreatment, injury, assault, violation, rape, unjust practices, crimes, or other t ...
, neglect, or malfeasance that is uncorrected or else sanctioned by a
legal system
The contemporary national legal systems are generally based on one of four basic systems: civil law, common law, statutory law, religious law or combinations of these. However, the legal system of each country is shaped by its unique history an ...
or fellow human beings.
The sense of injustice can be a powerless motivational condition, causing people to take action not just to defend themselves but also others who they perceive to be unfairly treated. Injustice within legal or societal standards are sometimes referred to as a ''two-tiered system''.
Relationship with justice
Professor
Judith Shklar
Judith Nisse Shklar (September 24, 1928 – September 17, 1992) was a philosopher and political theorist who studied the history of political thought, notably that of the Enlightenment period. She was appointed the John Cowles Professor of Govern ...
has written that Western philosophers tend to spend much more time discussing the concept of 'justice' rather than 'injustice'. On the other hand, she states both historical writing and fiction use instances of injustice as subject matter far more often than justice.
In philosophy and jurisprudence, the dominant view has been that injustice and justice are two sides of the same coin—that injustice is simply a lack of justice. This view has been challenged by professors including Judith Shklar,
Thomas W Simon and
Eric Heinze
Eric Heinze is Professor of Law and Humanities at the School of Law Queen Mary, University of London. He has made contributions in the areas of legal philosophy, justice theory, jurisprudence, and human rights. He has also contributed to the law ...
, who consider that justice and injustice are independent qualities. So, in this minority view, you can increase the justice of a situation without reducing the injustice. Heinze has even gone as far as to argue that an increase in justice can actually cause an increase in injustice.
A relatively common view among philosophers and other writers is that while justice and injustice may be interdependent, it is injustice that is the primary quality. Many writers have written that, while it is hard to directly define or even perceive justice, it is easy to demonstrate that injustice can be perceived by all.
According to
von Hayek, the earliest known thinker to state that injustice is the primary quality was
Heraclitus
Heraclitus of Ephesus (; grc-gre, Ἡράκλειτος , "Glory of Hera"; ) was an ancient Greek pre-Socratic philosopher from the city of Ephesus, which was then part of the Persian Empire.
Little is known of Heraclitus's life. He wrote ...
, whose view was echoed by
Aristotle
Aristotle (; grc-gre, Ἀριστοτέλης ''Aristotélēs'', ; 384–322 BC) was a Greek philosopher and polymath during the Classical period in Ancient Greece. Taught by Plato, he was the founder of the Peripatetic school of phil ...
and dozens of others down the centuries. Hayek said that writers often express the idea that injustice is the primary concept "as though it were a new discovery", suggesting the view is rarely directly expressed in theories on Justice. But Hayek went on to say that
legal positivism
Legal positivism (as understood in the Anglosphere) is a school of thought of analytical jurisprudence developed largely by legal philosophers during the 18th and 19th centuries, such as Jeremy Bentham and John Austin. While Bentham and Austin de ...
has proved that injustice, not justice, is the primary quality.
Sense of injustice
![Flickr - Yale Law Library - Beast of Injustice](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/6/62/Flickr_-_Yale_Law_Library_-_Beast_of_Injustice.jpg)
Scholars, including Judith Shklar, Edmond Cahn and
Barrington Moore Jr.
Barrington Moore Jr. (12 May 1913 – 16 October 2005) was an American political sociologist, and the son of forester Barrington Moore.
He is well-known for his ''Social Origins of Dictatorship and Democracy'' (1966), a comparative study of ...
have surveyed anthropological and historical work on injustice, concluding that the sense of injustice is found everywhere there are men and women; it is a
human universal
A cultural universal (also called an anthropological universal or human universal) is an element, pattern, trait, or institution that is common to all known human cultures worldwide. Taken together, the whole body of cultural universals is known ...
.
These writers, and others like
Simone Weil
Simone Adolphine Weil ( , ; 3 February 1909 – 24 August 1943) was a French philosopher, mystic, and political activist. Over 2,500 scholarly works have been published about her, including close analyses and readings of her work, since 1995.
...
, Elizabeth Wolgast and Thomas W Simon, hold that the sense of injustice is a powerful motivational condition — unlike the sense of justice, which tends to be conceived in more abstract ways, and tends to inspire contemplation rather than action.
Cahn held that, for
evolutionary reasons, humans who witness others being subjected to injustice can respond as though it was an act of aggression towards themselves. There can be an immediate, visceral activation of the
flight or fight system. As American
civil rights movement
The civil rights movement was a nonviolent social and political movement and campaign from 1954 to 1968 in the United States to abolish legalized institutional Racial segregation in the United States, racial segregation, Racial discrimination ...
leader
Martin Luther King Jr.
Martin Luther King Jr. (born Michael King Jr.; January 15, 1929 – April 4, 1968) was an American Baptist minister and activist, one of the most prominent leaders in the civil rights movement from 1955 until his assassination in 1968 ...
wrote, in 1963, "injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere". Spinner-Halev spoke about enduring injustices where it will still persist to this day without any action to address them. A 2012 study published in
Psychological Science
''Psychological Science'', the flagship journal of the Association for Psychological Science (APS), is a monthly, peer-reviewed, scientific journal published by SAGE Publications.
Publication scope
''Psychological Science'' publishes research r ...
found that even babies have a sense of injustice and dislike having it violated, even when they witness events that do not directly effect them.
In the field of jurisprudence, Cahn has argued that it is an important skill for lawyers to know how to rouse a jury's sense of injustice — something best done by appeals to the particular, not by abstractions or
boilerplate type statements. Barrington Moore asserts that the reasons why populations often submit to
oppression
Oppression is malicious or unjust treatment or exercise of power, often under the guise of governmental authority or cultural opprobrium. Oppression may be overt or covert, depending on how it is practiced. Oppression refers to discrimination w ...
for long periods of time is that they consider it inevitable and so their sense of injustice is not aroused. He says that a widely shared sense of injustice is an essential, though not sufficient, cause of rebellion. Writers including Simone Weil, Elizabeth Wolgast and Judith Shklar have said that an aroused sense of injustice can be an essential prerequisite to action needed for protecting the weak and afflicted.
Causes
A common cause of injustice is human selfishness. As
Plato
Plato ( ; grc-gre, Πλάτων ; 428/427 or 424/423 – 348/347 BC) was a Greek philosopher born in Athens during the Classical period in Ancient Greece. He founded the Platonist school of thought and the Academy, the first institution ...
described at length in ''
The Republic'', people will often commit acts of injustice when they calculate it is in their interests to do so.
Plato also adds that "The highest reach of injustice is to be deemed just when you are not". Human injustice is not always caused by attempt to gain unfair advantage or malice; it may be simply the result of the flawed human
decision making
In psychology, decision-making (also spelled decision making and decisionmaking) is regarded as the cognitive process resulting in the selection of a belief or a course of action among several possible alternative options. It could be either rati ...
. With the
hungry judge effect for example, studies have found that judges sitting on review boards are less likely to reach decisions favorable to applicants depending on how long it is since the judges had their last food break.
[For more on the substantial difference in judges' decisions depending on time since last food break, see chpt 3 of ]Thinking, Fast and Slow
''Thinking, Fast and Slow'' is a 2011 book by psychologist Daniel Kahneman.
The book's main thesis is a differentiation between two modes of thought: "System 1" is fast, instinctive and emotional; "System 2" is slower, more deliberative, and mo ...
. Misuse and abuse with regard to a particular case or context may represent a systemic failure to serve the cause of justice (cf.
legal vacuum).
Examples
The
Innocence Project
Innocence Project, Inc. is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit legal organization that is committed to exonerating individuals who have been wrongly convicted, through the use of DNA testing and working to reform the criminal justice system to prevent futur ...
provides a wealth of cases in which the U.S. justice system prosecuted and
convicted the wrong person.
Popular culture
*''
The Life of Emile Zola
''The Life of Emile Zola'' is a 1937 American biographical film about the 19th-century French author Émile Zola starring Paul Muni and directed by William Dieterle. It premiered at the Los Angeles Carthay Circle Theatre to great critical and f ...
'' (1937), about the conviction of
Émile Zola
Émile Édouard Charles Antoine Zola (, also , ; 2 April 184029 September 1902) was a French novelist, journalist, playwright, the best-known practitioner of the literary school of naturalism, and an important contributor to the development of ...
*''
Beyond Reasonable Doubt
Beyond a reasonable doubt is a legal standard of proof required to validate a criminal conviction in most adversarial legal systems. It is a higher standard of proof than the balance of probabilities standard commonly used in civil cases, bec ...
'' (1982), about the conviction of
Arthur Allan Thomas
Arthur Allan Thomas (born 2 January 1938) is a New Zealand man who was granted a Royal Pardon and compensation after being wrongfully convicted of the murders of Harvey and Jeannette Crewe in June 1970. Thomas was married and farming a property in ...
*''
The Great Gold Swindle'' (1984), about the conviction of
the Mickleberg brothers
*''
The Thin Blue Line'' (1988), about the conviction of
Randall Dale Adams
Randall Dale Adams (December 17, 1948 – October 30, 2010) was an American man wrongfully convicted of murder and sentenced to death after the 1976 shooting of Dallas police officer Robert W. Wood. His conviction was overturned in 1989.
Throu ...
*''
In the Name of the Father
IN, In or in may refer to:
Places
* India (country code IN)
* Indiana, United States (postal code IN)
* Ingolstadt, Germany (license plate code IN)
* In, Russia, a town in the Jewish Autonomous Oblast
Businesses and organizations
* Indepen ...
'' (1993), about the conviction of
Gerry Conlon
Gerard Patrick "Gerry" Conlon (1 March 1954 – 21 June 2014) was an Irish man known for being one of the Guildford Four who spent 15 years in prison after being wrongly convicted of being a Provisional IRA bomber.
Biography
Gerard Conlon was ...
of the
Guildford pub bombings
The Guildford pub bombings occurred on 5 October 1974 when the Provisional Irish Republican Army (IRA) detonated two gelignite bombs at two pubs in Guildford, Surrey, England. The pubs were targeted because they were popular with British Army p ...
*''
The Fugitive'' (1993)
*''
The Crucible
''The Crucible'' is a 1953 play by American playwright Arthur Miller. It is a dramatized and partially fictionalized story of the Salem witch trials that took place in the Massachusetts Bay Colony during 1692–93. Miller wrote the play as a ...
'' (1996), about the
Salem witchcraft trials
The Salem witch trials were a series of hearings and prosecutions of people accused of witchcraft in colonial Massachusetts between February 1692 and May 1693. More than 200 people were accused. Thirty people were found guilty, 19 of whom w ...
*''
The Hurricane'' (1999), about the conviction of
Rubin Carter
Rubin "Hurricane" Carter (May 6, 1937 – April 20, 2014) was an American-Canadian middleweight boxer, wrongfully convicted and imprisoned for murder, until released following a petition of habeas corpus after almost 20 years in prison.
In ...
*''
The Great Mint Swindle
''The Great Mint Swindle'' is a 2012 Australian television film directed by Geoff Bennett and starring Grant Bowler, Todd Lasance and Josh Quong Tart. It is based on the Perth Mint Swindle which took place in the 1980s.
Plot summary
In the b ...
'' (2012), also about the conviction of the Mickleberg brothers
*''
Making a Murderer
''Making a Murderer'' is an American true crime documentary television series written and directed by Laura Ricciardi and Moira Demos. The show tells the story of Steven Avery, a man from Manitowoc County, Wisconsin, who served 18 years in pri ...
'' (2015), about the conviction of
Steven Avery
Steven Allan Avery (born July 9, 1962) is an American convicted murderer from Manitowoc County, Wisconsin, who had previously been wrongfully convicted in 1985 of sexual assault and attempted murder. After serving eighteen years of a thirty-tw ...
See also
*
Rule According to Higher Law
*
Rule of law
The rule of law is the political philosophy that all citizens and institutions within a country, state, or community are accountable to the same laws, including lawmakers and leaders. The rule of law is defined in the ''Encyclopedia Britannica ...
Notes and references
Further reading
* Barnett, Clive
''The Priority of Injustice: Locating Democracy in Critical Theory'' (Athens, GA: University of Georgia Press, 2017).
* McCoubrey, Hilaire and White, Nigel D. Textbook on Jurisprudence. Second Edition.
Blackstone Press Limited. 1996. . Chapter 14 ("The Concept of Injustice").
* Roberts, Rodney C. (2005)
''Injustice and Rectification'' Peter Lang.
* Jeff Spinner-Halev (2012)
''Enduring Injustice'' Cambridge University Press.
External links
Reasons For Injustice
{{Authority control
Philosophy of law
Concepts in ethics
Social concepts