Justice as a project

The sense of injustice appears early. Children notice an unequal share-out of sweets long before they study law.

That feeling does not prove there is a universal formula for justice. People disagree about what should count as fair:

• equal shares;
• shares by need;
• reward by contribution;
• compensation for damage suffered;
• the same rules for all;
• an advantage for the weaker;
• preserving whatever came out of voluntary choices.

The same outcome can look fair by one principle and unfair by another.

So justice is not an object you can find under the table. It is a way of assessing relations and building rules.

It does not follow that looking for it is pointless. Without an attempt to agree on acceptable rules, what remains is force, chance, and whoever took the comfortable chair first.

The fight for justice, though, needs a budget.

Sometimes repairing the damage costs more than the damage. A lawsuit over a small sum can swallow years, money and attention. A person will formally win and discover that the case has long owned most of his life.

Before the fight it helps to define the goal:

• recover what was lost;
• stop the violation;
• obtain acknowledgement;
• punish the culprit;
• prevent a repetition;
• establish a rule;
• protect others.

These goals call for different means.

Revenge wants the other person to suffer too. That can bring brief satisfaction, but it rarely restores what was lost. Punishment is sometimes necessary, yet it does not bring the past back and does not guarantee any correction.

Justice becomes practical not when evil has received a symmetrical portion of pain. It becomes practical when the consequences are reduced, rights are restored, and the conditions for a repetition are changed.

Sometimes it is better to walk away with a small loss. Sometimes silence lets the violation continue. There is no universal answer.

There is only the question:

What result do I want, and how much am I willing to pay for it?

The different goals show up in a household example. The neighbour upstairs flooded your kitchen. If the goal is to get the money back for the ceiling, a repair estimate and a conversation with his insurer will do. If the goal is that he stop leaving the house with the tap running, you need a conversation, not a claim. If the goal is that he admit fault in front of the whole stairwell, no authority will grant it: courts award sums, not remorse. The first goal is closed by an estimate, the second by one conversation, the third is not closed at all, however much is spent on a lawyer.

Most long conflicts run on this substitution. A person demands money while wanting acknowledgement; the money is eventually paid, and it turns out not to be enough, because what he asked for was not what he needed.