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CIAO DATE: 03/02
Critical Review
Is the Idea of Social Justice Meaningful? Rejoinder to Feser
By David Johnston
Abstract
Hayek claimed that the idea of social justice is meaningless in a market economy because in that context, no identifiable agent intentionally brings about the distribution of wealth. But the assumption that the existence of injustice entails an identifiable agent of injustice is erroneous. Moreover, Hayek ignores the fact that in a market economy, the broad pattern of economic outcomes is foreseeable even if detailed, person-by-person outcomes are not. Hayek's rejection of the idea of social justice reveals a striking naivete' about his own ethical presuppositions.