Hostname: page-component-cd9895bd7-7cvxr Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2025-01-05T00:27:49.641Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Choosing Justice in Experimental Democracies with Production

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 August 2014

Norman Frohlich  and
Joe A. Oppenheimer
Norman Frohlich
Affiliation:
University of Manitoba
Joe A. Oppenheimer
Affiliation:
University of Maryland
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

We examine in a laboratory setting how direct participation in choosing a principle of distributive justice and a tax system impinges on subjects' attitudes and subsequent productivity when they participate in a task, produce income, and then experience losses or gains according to the tax system. Experience with a redistributive principle and its associated taxation system in a production environment does not detract from overall acceptance of the distributive principle, particularly for subjects who participate in choosing the principle. Participation in discussion, choice, and production increases subjects' convictions regarding their preferences. For these subjects (especially recipients of transfers) productivity rises significantly over the course of the experiments. No such effect is evident for subjects who do not participate in setting the regime under which they are to labor. The results' implications for questions of democratic participation and the stability of income support programs are drawn.

Type
Articles
Information
American Political Science Review , Volume 84 , Issue 2 , June 1990 , pp. 461 - 477
Copyright
Copyright © American Political Science Association 1990

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Bierhoff, Hans-Werner, Cohen, Ronald L., and Greenberg, Jerald, eds. 1986. Justice in Social Relations. New York, NY: Plenum.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Brickman, Philip. 1977. “Preference for Inequality.” Sociometry 40: 303–10.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Bond, Douglas. 1989. “An Empirical Test of Rawls' Theory of Justice: A Second Approach in Korea and the USA.” Presented at the annual meeting of the Public Choice Society, Orlando, FL.Google Scholar
Dawes, Robyn M. 1980. “Social Dilemmas.” Annual Review of Psychology 31: 169–93.Google Scholar
Dawes, Robyn M., McTavish, Jeanne, and Shaklee, Harriet. 1977. “Behavior, Communication, and Assumptions about Other People's Behavior in a Commons Dilemma Situation.” Journal of Personality and Social Psychology 35: 1–11.Google Scholar
Deutsch, Morton. 1985. Distributive Justice: A Social-Psychological Perspective. New Haven: Yale University Press.Google Scholar
Downs, Anthony. 1957. An Economic Theory of Democracy. New York: Harper and Row.Google Scholar
Frohlich, Norman, and Oppenheimer, Joe A.. 1988. “Transcripts of Experiments.” University of Manitoba, University of Maryland. Typescript.Google Scholar
Frohlich, Norman, and Oppenheimer, Joe A.. 1989. Distributive Justice: An Experimental Approach. University of Manitoba, University of Maryland. Typescript.Google Scholar
Frohlich, Norman, Oppenheimer, Joe A., and Eavey, Cheryl. 1987a. “Laboratory Results on Rawls' Principle of Distributive Justice.” British Journal of Political Science 17: 1–21.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Frohlich, Norman, Oppenheimer, Joe A., and Eavey, Cheryl 1987b. “Choices of Principles of Distributive Justice in Experimental Groups.” American Journal of Political Science 31: 606–36.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Greenberg, Jerald, and Cohen, Ronald L., eds. 1982. Equity and Justice in Social Behavior. New York: Academic.Google Scholar
Harsanyi, John C. 1953. “Cardinal Utility in Welfare Economics and in the Theory of Risk-Taking.” Journal of Political Economy 61: 434–35.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Harsanyi, John C. 1975. “Can the Maximin Principle Serve As a Basis for Morality? A Critique of John Rawls's Theory.” American Political Science Review 69: 594–606.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hochschild, Jennifer. 1981. What's Fair. Cambridge: Harvard University Press.Google Scholar
Hoffman, Elizabeth, and Spitzer, Mark L.. 1985. “Entitlements, Rights, and Fairness: An Experimental Examination of Subjects' Concepts of Distributive Justice.” Journal of Legal Studies 14: 259–99.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Howe, Roger E., and Roemer, John E.. 1981. “Rawlsian Justice As the Core of a Game.” American Economic Review 71: 880–95.Google Scholar
Jasso, Guillermina. 1980. “A New Theory of Distributive Justice.” American Sociological Review 45: 3–32.Google Scholar
Jasso, Guillermina. 1986. “A New Representation of the Just Term in Distributive Justice Theory: Its Properties and Operation in Theoretical Derivation and Empirical Estimation.” Journal of Mathematical Sociology 12: 251–74.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Kanter, Rosabeth Moss. 1987. “Pay: From Status to Contributions: Some Organizational Implications.” Personnel 64: 12–37.Google Scholar
Lissowski, Grzegoryz, Okrasa, Wlodzimierz, and Tyszka, Tadeusz. 1989. “Principles of Distributive Justice. Experiments on Preferences in Poland and America.” Presented at the annual meetings of the Public Choice Society, Orlando, FL.Google Scholar
Messick, David M., and Brewer, Marylinn B.. 1983. “Solving Social Dilemmas: A Review.” Psychological Review Papers 11–44.Google Scholar
Nozick, Robert. 1974. Anarchy, State, and Utopia. New York: Basic Books.Google Scholar
Rawls, John. 1971. A Theory of Justice. Cambridge: Harvard University Press.Google Scholar
Rawls, John. 1985. “Justice and Fairness: Political Not Metaphysical.” Philosophy and Public Affairs 14: 223–51.Google Scholar
Soltan, Karol E. 1982. “Empirical Studies of Distributive Justice.” Ethics 92: 673–91.Google Scholar
Submit a response

Comments

No Comments have been published for this article.