Tensions of Social Justice

Abstract

The achievement of social justice is vital to the future of human civilization. Debates about social justice are deeply complicated, however, as evident in the range of responses to the events of September 11, 2001. In this essay I trace micro-level phenomena and processes that contribute to understanding social justice and the tensions that surround it. I argue that the Western social contractarian conception of justice does not incorporate the legacies of historical inequities and therefore is less useful than conceptions of justice that emphasize compassion, need, and forgiveness. I review a wide-ranging social psychological literature on social cognitive and social interactive dynamics that both contribute to and could be used to minimize social inequities, emphasizing dynamics of social categorization and ways in which social power shapes the construction and use of social categorization. I argue that the achievement of social justice will require not only institutional interventions but, in the end, that individuals act for justice.