On Pigou's Justice

Abstract

In this article, I would like to explore justice in Pigou, which has not been previously studied.
Typical utilitarians have tried to demonstrate that relying on the hypothesis of the declining marginal utility, equality or taking right seriously will maximize general utility. However, I will take a different line of reasoning in my investigation. I intend to reconstruct Pigou's justice through consulting the re-examination of utilitarianism by J. O. Urmson and to construct the logic for basing justice upon utilitarian principles.
Urmson states that it is extremely important for us to logically distinguish ‘value’ from ‘ought’; more accurately, the logic of value (good) from the logic of duty. That is to say, however good something may be, there is clearly a case in which it is not always our duty to realize it. Therefore, it follows undeniably that even when an action is evaluated as good, the action shouldn't necessarily be carried out. There is a range of actions which are of moral value, but which cannot be demanded and whose omission cannot be called wrong. According to what Urmson argues, those moral values which ought to be done (duty) are only parts of the whole, and the obligatory moral value cannot be dominated by the non-obligatory moral value. Hence, we all ought to respect each one's particular kind of utility which represents ‘right’ regardless of the maximum of general utility which concerns the nonobligatory moral value.
Pigou tries to define ‘the National Minimum’ relying on the notions of absoluteness, infinity and incommensurability that are similar to Mill's. What is secured by the national minimum, according to Pigou, roughly corresponds to the ‘particular kind of utility’ (obligatory moral value) mentioned above. Consequently, the right which justice requires can be established in terms of Urmson's reasoning which I have explained.