49 pages • 1 hour read
Iris Marion YoungJustice and The Politics of Difference
Nonfiction | Book | Adult | Published in 1990A modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more.
Key Figures
Iris Marion Young
Iris Marion Young, the author, was a political theorist and social activist who died of cancer in 2006. Receiving a doctorate from Pennsylvania State University in 1974, Young later became a professor of political science at the University of Chicago. Young builds an academic argument in this work by engaging with several different schools of academic thought, such as Marxism and modern liberalism, and reviewing the positions of each school. It is essential that academic arguments acknowledge the scholarly findings to date in the area about which they are writing. Young does this throughout the work and thereby participates in a scholarly conversation. She does not align herself entirely with any school of thought but is more critical of some schools than others. Considering such approaches tools to building her theory, she avoids association with all the positions in any given theory and makes a unique contribution to the academic literature.
Young clearly has the academic credentials to make this philosophical argument. Her standpoint as a woman born in 1949 and an activist in the feminist movement also provide her with meaningful experiences to speak about issues of oppression. She additionally interacted with members of several other social movements in an effort to appreciate diverse perspectives. As a child, Young was sent into the foster care system after the death of her father. Social workers judged her mother’s cleaning standards in the home to be deficient and concluded that Young was neglected. That experience made Young suspicious of bureaucratic authority and its willingness to judge others, such as single mothers, by harsh standards. Her life experiences and commitment to social activism gave Young the insight to question the biases of “universal” standards of reason and the compassion to consider the effects of those biases on excluded social groups. Combining her academic skills with her social experience, Young articulates the multiple forms of oppression in the late 20th century and expands on the understanding of the concept by emphasizing that oppression can be unintentional or non-verbal. Young was thus among the first to theorize what we now commonly refer to as structural or systemic oppression (on the institutional level) and implicit bias (on the personal level).
Liberals
The most influential school of thought in the late 20th-century US (and throughout US history), liberalism assumes that individuals, not social groups, are the basic units of society. It advocates for formal equality, with individuals assured due process or equal treatment under the law. Individuals possess rights, such as free speech and association, but are not guaranteed an equality of outcome. Since the Enlightenment, liberal theorists have commonly cited “reason” as the basis for deducing principles of justice, such as the existence of rights: This basic premise underpins the US Constitution and everything that flows from it. Young uses critical theory to expose the biases of liberal thought, which purports to be universally applicable. She faults its individualism and asserts that differential treatment of social groups is necessary for justice; for example, a male-dominated theory of employment may struggle to recognize pregnancy or may conceptualize it as a disability, so the acknowledgment of difference is crucial for equitable treatment. However, Young does not reject all liberal thought. She wants to build upon its progressive gains and holds onto the ideas of equality, albeit redefined, and political rights.
Communitarians
Communitarians share with liberals a belief in reason as a means to identify just principles. However, communitarians reject the individualism of liberal thought. While liberal thought accepts a form of politics in which individuals form interest groups to fight for their self-interests, communitarians believe in the idea of a public good. They celebrate small forums where people can come together and deliberate with the goal of reaching agreement on policies. Young agrees with the communitarian critique of individualism and interest-group politics but departs from this school of thought over its claim that one common good can be discerned. According to Young, communitarians fall prey to the same error as liberal thinkers: assuming that reason can dictate one solution upon which all rational people will agree. Concerned that small decision-making units will repress difference and represent the dominant social group, Young argues that the smallest unit of government should be regional, not local. This insight is arguably particularly relevant with regards to the US (Young’s main focus throughout the work) because the structure of the American political system tends to emphasize and (proportionally) overrepresent the local.
Marxists
Marxists employ class analysis to explain exploitation. According to Marxists, the economic system of capitalism is the problem, with the working class at the mercy of the bourgeoisie—the owners of the means of production. Young agrees with Marxists that the economic system, with its hierarchical division of labor, is a source of oppression and domination. She seeks to restructure the workplace democratically. However, Young faults Marxists for claiming that class is the only or main form of injustice, arguing that they neglect race and gender as axes of oppression. In explaining the five faces of injustice, Young deviates from a purely economic perspective in her inclusion of cultural imperialism and violence. Young additionally chastises modern Marxists for failing to embrace the language of justice and redefine the term. Marxists often dismiss concepts such as rights and justice as bourgeois inventions that serve to legitimate class oppression. Understanding the allure of these concepts, Young wants to reclaim them.
Postmodernists
Like Young, postmodernists challenge the idea of universal principles. While there is great diversity among postmodern theories, all are critical of liberal or modern thought. Postmodern theorists are suspicious of reason and deny the idea of one truth. In other words, they share with Young a rejection of abstract reasoning dictating policy outcomes. Young’s exposure of liberal ideology and the distributive model of justice as legitimating the dominant group’s position of power is grounded in postmodern thought, of which critical theory is a part. However, Young seeks to avoid the relativism sometimes associated with this school of thought. She does not reject the entirety of Enlightenment philosophy and wants the rights of political participation and freedoms to apply to all.
