Defender of the Interests of All Humankind: Justice

Ideals are wonderful as they are, but what really can we say are the practical implications for speaking or believing in a principle as lofty as the spiritual concept of ‘Justice’? Are its implications for social and economic development really as profound as they seem to be presented? Are we not hedged in and confined on many sides by practical, real-life constraints about what can be done? What can we do as a student, a mother, a school teacher, an engineer, a sick person, a doctor, a para-military force, a grocery bagger at the local Walmart, a child playing in the dust of a day care sandbox? As organizations, governments, and multi-national corporations, perhaps the question seems as tenuous to answer as it does for the individual. Equally futile it seems for collectives and individuals alike. As individuals or communities, the question begs of itself, it inquires of Justice, the question asks the principle, “What really can be done?” What can one sincere heart do, if she or he wanted to, to assist in the materialization of the structure of justice in the world we live in? The enthusiastic social activist says, “what am I to do?” The vengeful communities of the disadvantaged conglomerated into like-minded and similarly victimized social sub-factions, appropriately named and extant on every college campus, ask, “what are we to do, if we wish to enact the principle of Justice within society?” Finally, the corporation and materially rich institution says to itself, “what”, as it inquires, “am I do to about my conscience – it being that I seek to see Justice realized world-wide before my days on this earth come to an end?” So speaks the voice of Justice as it ponders its destiny during its days in the hearts and minds of women and men, communities, and institutions. So speaks the discourse on Justice as presently manifest in human deliberations, thoughts, and discourses of society.

Practical Implications of the Principle of Justice: From Ideals and Concepts to Realities and Reconstruction

I built this iPad, says the late CEO. I built this iPad for $800 bucks a piece. A cost of this technology was the human lives I destroyed to manufacture the 10 million units I sold on American soil with Chinese sub minimum-wage labor. Suicide, STD’s, family unit decimation, mass relocation, biohazardous dormitories, temporary economic surges with counteracted depressions, itty-bitty living space – these are all my concerns regarding the building of my iPad. iPad is progress, however. iPad is science, speaks the conscious pride of our people, boasted on CNN for all to glory in. Behold, as if to say, our human ingenuity. iPad is a cultural phenomenon, an accomplishment felt for all by all. It redounds to the conscience of the species as a symbol of the transcendent genius of our race. Beggar and orphan alike delight in its beauty and efficiency. CNN reports: Chinese orphan sells kidney for iPad II.

Justice implies that progress cannot be defined in terms of this situation. That which progress consists in must rather be of utility to a larger majority of possible beneficiaries of human struggle within our global population. That which constitutes scientific and social progress must answer the global travesties of shortages of infrastructure in literacy, education, health, peace and security, non-corrupt governance, intellectual open-mindedness and freedom from the ravaging influence of materialism. Misapplication of the priorities and resources of science towards esoteric playthings for the fetishes of an elite minority is no science at all.  Inventing contraptions to satisfy the entertainment quest of an increasingly parasitical technocracy is nothing for our species to take pride in. Addictions progressively increase in the cost to the buyer and in the quantity of stimulant needed to generate the effective euphoria. Western elite technocrats are at the tipping point where fetishes become desperate and insatiable and break under the crushing exhaustion of the world’s collective resource-cash unable to satisfy the irresponsible habits of consumption. Cars and global warming. Alcoholism and social responsibility. Television and activism. Night clubs and emotional integrity. Apple products and Foxconn’s rural genocide. Ultimately, concern for justice prevents humanity from defining progress in a way that endorses sacrificing  the well-being of global prosperity and the planet itself to technological breakthroughs for privileged minorities. In design and planning, Justice ensures that limited resources are not diverted to the pursuit of projects extraneous to a population’s internal social and economic needs in structure, application, or resource-allocation. Need is the imperative here. Massive global need determines the fact that social solidarity, literacy, agriculture, healthcare, and international relations are the topics in which glory can be achieved in inventions. Not hand-held 3G enabled contraptions. Development programs that inculcate just and equitable goals will engage the commitment of the masses of humanity. Mass commitment and coordination is the sole force upon which the generation and application of solutions to universal and important human needs fundamentally depends. Virtues such as honesty, a dedicated work ethic, and united collaboration are harnessed towards the achievement of enormously challenging global achievements. Every member of society, every institution, and every social community or group  has the capacity to learn to trust the unity and cooperation of the collective as a destiny that champions the rights and participation of every contributor, and assures the benefits and basic standards to which all are entitled, and most importantly, that applies the products of science and endeavors that utilize planet earth’s inherited human and material resources for the prosperity of all individuals equally, equitably, and with an unerring justice.