lectures Flashcards
What are the goals of law?
Keep order, uphold justice, favor the market mechanisms
What is necessary to have law?
Humans, society
What are the tools to manage society?
Violence, power, law
What is the connection between law and religion?
Both the law and religion aim to make living together possible.
What is the difference between law and religion?
Religion is for those who believe a certain thing, it does not and cannot apply to everyone. The law is for everyone.
What is pluralism?
The separation between morals, religion and law.
What are human rights?
Rights inherent to all human beings, regardless of race, sex, nationality, ethnicity, language, religion or any other status.
What is the connection between the law and morals?
We follow laws naturally because of morals. The law influences morals and morals influence the law.
What is the law based on?
Common good and justice.
What is natural law?
Laws that are based on the morals we have as humans. A natural sense of what is right and what is wrong.
What is positive law?
Laws that are created and enforced by the government or other authorities, as opposed to laws based on natural rights or moral principles.
What are the two concepts of justice?
Commutative justice and distributive justice.
What is equilibrium?
A state in which opposite forces are balanced
What is the difference between commutative justice and distributive justice?
Distributive justice involves ‘treating equals equally’ and focuses on fairness in the distribution of societal resources while commutative justice involves giving people what they deserve and focuses on the fairness in individual transactions.
What is price gouging?
Making prices as high as possible.
Why doesn’t distributive justice always work?
Distributive justice is unsustainable and very complicated. The criterion which we must follow is not always clear and can be subjective.
It is difficult to balance equality/need/merit. Resources are limited
What is the best way to use scarce resources?
In a way that achieves the highest common good.
What is common good?
The benefits or interests of all.
Why doesn’t commutative justice always work?
If you give equal rights to everybody and don’t consider the background of those people it isn’t a just solution. Give more to those who have less so it balances out the people who have more. Equity over equality.
What is merit?
The best solution regardless of any outside factors.
What are the 3 criteria of justice?
Idea of equality, idea of merit, idea of needs
Why can power not be a criteria of justice?
Power has very little to do with common good.
What is a breach?
Not keeping promises.
What is insider trading?
Trading in public companies stock by someone who has non-public material information about the company.