Psychological Perspectives on Justice
Theory and Applications

Explores how the distribution of costs and benefits determine our intuition about fairness to provide a balanced look at the psychology of justice.

Barbara A. Mellers (Edited by), Jonathan Baron (Edited by)

9780521089982, Cambridge University Press

Paperback / softback, published 13 November 2008

364 pages
22.9 x 15.2 x 2.1 cm, 0.53 kg

"This edited volume is a splendid introduction to an important set of psychological studies in normative reasoning....These studies, and some of their implications, should indeed be grist for an ethicist's preferred theory of moral behavior." Ethics

Justice, equity, and fairness are central concerns of everyday life, whether we are assessing the fairness of individual acts, social programmes, or institutional policies. This book explores how the distribution of costs and benefits determine our intuition about fairness and why individual behaviour sometimes deviates from normative theories of justice. To make any comparison, one must first state how fair distributions of resources or burdens should be made. Here, competing theories, such as utilitarianism and economic efficiency, are discussed. The chapters cover many topics including an investigation of various rules and heuristics that people use to make fair distributions; the motivation for people to conform to rules of fairness even when they conflict with self-interest; differences between the views of liberals and conservatives; societal rules for the distribution or allocation of critical or scarce resources; and implications for public policy. This mixture of theoretical and applied perspectives provides a balanced look at the psychology of justice.

1. Introductory remarks
Part I. Psychological Perspectives: 2. Equality as a decision heuristic David Messick
3. Two insights occasioned by attempts to pin down the equity formula Richard Harris
4. Judgments of justice Maya Bar-Hillel and Menahem Yaari
Part II. Economic Perspectives: 5. Justice in organised groups: comparing the self-interest and social identity perspectives Tom Tyler and Robyn Dawes
6. Heuristics and biases in equity judgments: a utilitarian approach Jonathan Baron
7. Tradeoffs in fairness and preference judgments Lisa Ordoñez and Barbara Mellers
8. Information, fairness, and efficiency in bargaining Colin Camerer and George Loewenstein
Part III. Variations in Perspectives of Justice: 9. The unfolding of justice: a developmental perspective on reward allocations Colleen Moore, Sheri E. Hembree, and Robert D. Enright
10. Of Ants and Grasshoppers: the political psychology of allocating scarce resources Linda Skitka and Philip E. Tetlock
11. Liberal and conservative approaches to justice: conflicting psychopolitical perspectives Philip E. Tetlock and Gregory Mitchell
Part IV. Policy Perspectives: Justice and the allocation of scarce resources Jon Elster
12. Models of equity in public risk Rakesh Sarin
13. Fairness of distributions of risks with applications to Antarctica Ivy Broder and Robin Keller
Part V: Postscript.

Subject Areas: Psychology [JM]