Executive Seminar Readings on Justice and Society

Executive Seminar Readings on Justice and Society

Description

The Seminar on Justice and Society, for which these materials have been prepared, is an important development in the Executive Seminar series of the Aspen Institute. The Institute had its origins in the Goethe Bicentennial Celebration in 1949. The first program activity the following year was the Executive Seminar, which brought together leaders from business, labor, the media and the academic and public sectors of society to discuss the relevance of the seminal ideas of mankind to the unsettle and unsettling issues of the day. The program has been so successful that 15 to 20 Executive Seminars are now offered each year. More recently, the format has been adapted to a Seminar on The Corporation and Society, which is offered several times a year. The Program on Justice, Society and the Individual, the sponsor of the new Seminar on Justice and Society, was established in 1975 as one of the five Thought-Leading-to-Action programs of the institute. Issues of social justice, fairness and individual freedom have always been central to the Institute. The creation of the Justice Program provided a specific focus for those issues as an integral part of all Institute activities. The work of the Justice Program is especially relevant to the Institute’s present overarching concern for sustained examination of the crucial issues of Governance: how societies and their institutions, public and private, national and international, can better respond to the often conflicting pressures for justice, fairness and efficiency. The Justice Program in mindful of the word of Judge Learned Hand: “If we are to keep our democracy, there must be on commandment: Thou shalt not ration justice.” In that spirit, the Justice Program endeavors to clarify the concept of justice in modern society, enlarge pubic understanding of the history and meaning of justice and seek practical applications of justice in an interdependent nation and world. The five major categories of Justice Program activities are Conflict Resolution; Criminal Justice, Understanding and Improving the Justice System; Justice and Ethical Values, and Human Rights. The seminar on Justice and Society builds upon the methods of the Executive Seminar and The Corporation and Society Seminar and draws upon the ongoing work of the Justice Program and the Institute-wide activities relating to Governance. The objective is to provide an opportunity for reflective discussion of significant issues of justice, illuminated by a humanistic viewpoint. Participants include members of the judiciary, lawyers in the private and public sectors, law teachers, and nonlawyers who bring to the discussions the perspective of an informed public. The idea of a Seminar on Justice and Society was first suggested by Mr. Justice Harry Blackmun of the Supreme Court of the United States following his enthusiastic participation in an Executive Seminar. The proposal was shaped under the supervision of Robert B. McKay, the Director of the Justice Program, and Alice H. Henkin, the Associate Director. The readings were prepared by Professor David A. J. Richards of New York University School of Law. This Seminar is an essential building block for all activities of the Institute with special relevance to Governance. . . . The Justice and Society Seminar is intended to examine in a broadly humanistic perspective the role of justice in society, particularly in the form of a discussion of contemporary and classical readings. It is hoped that these reading may stimulate self-critical reflection on the values of justice and the role those values should play in legal institutions and on the part of lawyers and others in the making of a decent society. The Table of Contents indicates the range of subjects and perspectives that we hope will engage the participants’ moral imagination. The anthology begins with background reading to be read prior to the Seminar. They include major statements regarding the concept of justice and alternative attempts to translate that concept into principles of social action. These readings are intended to provide a general review of philosophical traditions regarding justice which will then be more concretely examined in the course of the Seminar itself. One of the main objectives of this anthology is to suggest the fruitfulness of re-engaging general philosophical perspective with critical reflection on exigent matters of social and political concern. The anthology is divided into several topics and subdivided into eleven days. The readings for each section are prefaced by a note which attempts to tie together the issues posed by the readings. The Seminar is intended as an exercise in reciprocity and dialogue among equals, and the readings are designed to afford a common basis for such discussion. But each participant is free to bring his or her own sense of which issues most critically bear discussion. The reading thus provide a background for such exchanges; they do not necessarily define their scope or content or emphasis. This first Seminar on “Justice and Society” is experimental. The direction, the mix of participants, the orientation of the material and, especially, the choice of readings themselves will be evaluated and reassessed during the sessions and in a concluding twelfth session. Therefore, the participants in the inaugural Seminar are collaborators with the Justice Program and are invited to share with the Institute both the challenge of a major new initiative and the constructive excitement of making improvements for the future.

Publication Date

1979

Executive Seminar Readings on Justice and Society

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