Rawls’s duty of assistance and relative deprivation: Why less is more and more is even more

Abstract

John Rawls’s case for a duty of assistance is partially premised on the assumption that liberal societies have an interest in assisting burdened societies to become well-ordered: Not only are well-ordered peoples inherently peaceful, but negative spillover effects would also disappear where peoples have a just or decent institutional order. Drawing on relative deprivation theory, this article argues that the kind of limited assistance that Rawls proposes to help burdened societies to become well-ordered would not reduce but actually increase international terrorism and unwanted immigration by raising unwarranted expectations and enhancing the resources that are needed to emigrate. Thus, if Rawls is concerned about negative externalities, he should argue for either more extensive assistance or no assistance at all.