Anarchy, State, and Utopia by Nozick - Book Report/Review Example

The En ment theory According to Nozick, the en ment theory, justice in holding consists of three key topics. The first one is the original acquisition of holdings and appropriation of things that are unheld. He uses the term, ‘holding’ to mean possessions. It includes the process of how unheld things come to be held, the issues involved and things that may come up to be held in these processes, and the extent to which the things get possesed. The second topic involves the transfer of holdings from a person to another. It describes voluntary exchange, gift and fraud as ways of acquiring holdings. The theory insists on distributive justice and includes principles that govern how someone can divest himself from a holding and pass it to an unheld state. The principle of justice mainly states that a person who acquires a holding in accordance to this principle in acquisition then automatically becomes entitled to the holding. Also a person who acquires a holding in accordance to the principle from someone who is entitled to the holding then he genuinely becomes entitled to the holding (Nozick 154). In the principle of distributive justice, Nozick stresses that a distribution is just if every person is entitled to the holding they possess in the distribution. Distribution is just when and if the holdings emerge from another distribution that is just and legitimate. The principle specifies the legitimate means and ways of moving from one distribution of holdings to another in the transfer process. Whatever arises from a just process and just situation makes itself just because it has been acquired in the required and legitimate manner. The principle is meant to preserve justice in the transfer hence referred to as truth preserving. This means that a situation arising from repeated transitions in accordance to the principle from a just situation is itself just. Not all situations are generated in accordance to the principles of justice in holdings. Some people defraud or steal from others or enslave people in order to seize their products and at the same time prevent them from living freely as they choose or please. Others forcibly exclude other people from competing in the exchanges. These methods and modes are not permissible ways of transition from a situation to another because they are unlawful and unfair. The existence of the injustices and mean not sanctioned by the principle leads to the third topic under justice in holdings, the rectification of injustice in holdings (Corlett 234). Nozick suggests that the rectification of injustice in holding tries to determine what ought to be done to rectify the situation. It tries to figure out the obligation that the performers of injustice have towards those in worse positions. It also tries to determine the direct and indirect beneficiaries of the injustices. It further goes to determine what the victims of injustices might do to rectify the injustices getting carried on them. This principle uses the historical information about the previous occurrences and situations and the injustices involved in them (Nozick 157). It also uses information about the course of events that emerged from the injustices until the present time and it offers a description of holding in the society. It applies estimates of subjunctive information to determine what would happen should injustices in transfer and acquisition fails to occur. Applying the estimates of subjunctive information in rectifying injustices ensures that everybody gets closer to a just allocation of holdings and that the rights of people do not become violated. According to Nozick, the general outlines of the justice theory in holdings are that a person’s holding is just if he or she is entitled to them by the principles of justice in transfer and acquisition or by the rectification of injustice principle (Arrow 265). If everyone’s holdings are just, then it means that the total distribution or set of holdings are just. I defend Nozick’s arguments as they are both logical and realistic. According to Nozick, the arguments of end state and pattern principle did not seem right at first as it is only the bad people who think capitalism is the best system. But at some point, one could tell that Nozick’s heart and mind were in unison with the arguments. He argued that the distributive justice theory disposed people in a pattern which had blank spaces. He suggests that distribution and production should be addressed as two independent separate issues. However, from an entitlement viewpoint, production and distribution is the same thing and they cannot be separated. He says things come to the world already attached to people who have entitlements over them. From the historic entitlement conception of justice in holdings, those who start a fresh treated objects like they appeared from nowhere and out of nothing. He suggests entrenched are maxims of the usual form which we should present entitlement conception as competition. Ignoring rectification and acquisition concepts Nozick says, “From each according to what he chooses to do, to each according to what he makes for himself, perhaps with the contracted aid of other, and what others choose to do for him and choose to give him of what they’ve been given previously, under this maxim, and havent yet expended or transferred” (Nozick 159-160). Since he noticed that this has defects as a slogan he came up with, “From each as they choose and to each as they are chosen” (Nozick 159-160). Nozick argues in his essay that patterned principles regarding distributive justice make the redistributive activities necessary. The chance or likelihood is minimal that an actual freely arrived at holdings sets fits a particular pattern. And there is no chance at all that the set of holdings will continue fitting in the pattern as people give and exchange. From his point of view of entitlement theory, redistribution is a significant matter as it involves violation of people’s rights. Nozick argues that Taxation of peoples earning is the same and at par with forced labour. People find this claim true as he says that taking the earnings of k hours is the same as taking k hours from the person. It is also the same as forcing a person to work for another person’s purpose for the same time. He argues that if people object to forced employment or labour it would oppose forcing the unemployed people to work for the needy’s benefit (Nozick 169). Nozick also argues that patterned principles give people a chance to choose to expend on themselves and they forget others, yet all of them are entitled to it under the distribution pattern D1. If this is the trend in several people, then it automatically means that some people will receive more than their D1 share and this will affect and disturb the favorable distribution pattern (Nozick 2). According to Nozick, maintaining a particular distributional pattern promotes individualism with vengeance (pp 167). This is because the patterns don’t give people what the entitlements do as they do not give the chance to choose what one has, Not only that, but they also do not give the right to choose or pursue an end involving the improvement of another person’s position. He suggests that with such views, families will be disturbing as the transfer might upset distribution pattern that is favoured. He says a family should not devote its resources to the least well off member of the family and in the process hold back the other children. The family should not follow a policy in their lifetime that maximizes on the least fortunate or talented sibling as this is inappropriate for a wider society. Finally, Nozick argues that the natural distribution is neither unjust nor just as they are natural factors which people have no control over. What is unjust or just is how institutions deal with the facts. The people who have been favoured by nature may gain good fortune if they use their favour to improve the situation of people who have lost out (Arrow, 265). He argues that no one deserves a greater or more natural capacity and that nobody deserves a more favourable starting place in the society. Works Cited Arrow, Kenneth J. "Nozicks entitlement theory of justice." Philosophia (1978): 265-279. Corlett, J. Angelo. Equality and Liberty: Analyzing Rawls and Nozick. London: Macmillan Academic and Professional, 1991. Nozick, Robert. Anarchy, State, and Utopia. New York: Basic Books, inc., Publishers, 1974. —. "Nozicks Libertarian Critique." Social and Political Philosophy (2014): 1-4. Read More