Philosophical Theories on Poverty Alleviation Essay

Introduction

In this paper, will present thoughts on why poverty is a greatest social injustice that continues to affect most people around the world. Poverty is evident even in the both developed countries developing, and affects the quality of lives of people in many undesirable ways. I will try to prove why it is wrong to let people live in poverty. To do that, I am going to talk about the problem in libertarian view that liberty is the most basic human right. This perspective is used by many to support the thought that people are poor because they choose to live in those conditions. Again, this one of the philosophical problems as seen from the class. If the social injustice is not solved, we will have problems in the societies including high rates of crime that affect us as a whole. After that, I will discuss three theories from the class including Utilitarian, Libertarian, and Kant's Theory because they provide insight into the issue of poverty including its causes and effects. The theories also give arguments as to why poverty is considered to be a social injustice.

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Philosophical Problems Related to Justice in the Course

In this course, we have learned several theories on justice including Utilitarian, Libertarians, Kant's arguments among others. While these theories provide useful insights to understanding social justice issues of the world today, they have problems. In this section, I will identify the philosophical issues relating to justice as seen from these theories. The Utilitarian theory's primary weakness is justice. For instance, the proponents support that it is necessary to sacrifice one or few people if it results in the happiness of more significant number of people. As a result, utilitarian supports punishing an innocent person if the net gain in happiness in the society increases. Punishing a wrong person is unjust because it violates their rights.

Libertarianism destroys moral responsibility. As a result, it may lead to unjust decisions primarily in the judicial systems by arguing that guilty criminals were coerced into doing their criminal activities may be based on their upbringing and emotional state among other factors. Additionally, according to libertarians, liberty is the most basic human right above all including property and life. This is another problem with this concept because the proponents fail to justify their argument.

As I was reading chapter 5 of Second Treatise by John Locke, I realized that his assumption in property rights is actually more puzzling than I previously realized. From his revelations, Locke maintains that God gave the world to all the humankind in common. But how can this be? It is clear from the scriptures that the Promised Land was only given to Israel. Again, Locke argues that we are all equal and have equal rights to natural resources. Despite this argument, various groups have continued to dominate over others in control of the natural resources that are equally owned. The philosophical problem with this argument is that poverty affects people even where there are resources. For instance, some of the countries that are worst affected by poverty in Africa have the best and most expensive minerals including diamonds and gold.

Reasons they are Philosophical Problems/ Assumptions

The main assumption of the Utilitarian philosophy is that the main objective in the life of an individual in the pursuit of happiness. Therefore, utility in its essence is achieving pleasure itself. As a result, it is possible to predict actions of an individual based on the most exceptional level of happiness. Another assumption of Utilitarian approach is known as Greatest Happiness which states that activities by individual or society that promote happiness are right. Conversely, actions that result to reverse happiness are considered to be wrong. The Greatest Happiness Principle maintains that happiness is the sole pursuit of every individual and that each person tries to achieve this by adapting to the direction of their life. Another assumption of the Utilitarian philosophy is that measurement of individual and aggregate happiness in the society is possible.

One of the main assumptions of libertarianism is that humans desire liberty more than they desire choice and consumption. This assumption is the main cause of the philosophical problem in this approach because only libertarians and conservatives demonstrate a preference for liberty over property and life. Across the planet, almost all other human beings exhibit a preference for consumption. Additionally, liberalism assumes natural rotation commonly known as a meritocracy. However, in a real-world situation, people cannot willingly rotate their expenditure downwards because it would impact their social status. The social status of individuals is valued more than any asset individuals own.

My Thoughts on the Problems

The consequences of the actions should matter. However, according to utilitarian, results are all that matters. I agree that consequences of our actions are important, but they are not all that matters. The principle of utility from utilitarian moral theory, the right actions are the ones that result to the highest level of happiness. Happiness is defined as the absence of pain and presence of pleasure. Accordingly, satisfaction can be categorized into to higher and lower levels of happiness. One positive side of utilitarian relates to the alleviation of problems we might face. This would result because utilitarian approach would make people more unselfish because every person's happiness matters. However, the provision that it is necessary to sacrifice several people for the greater happiness of more people is unjustified. From this perspective, it is clear that utilitarianism supports punishing or prosecution of innocent people when certain circumstances arise.

As for the libertarian philosophy, it argues that government is the leading cause of justice problems. The proponents go as far to propose that governments should be the only concerns that should be dealt with in pursuit of equality. This is contradictory to the roles played by governments across the world as they strive to ensure uniformity in resources and income distribution. However, the pursuit of political theory using economics as from the libertarian views is hindered by continued cases of misuse of power by the government officials for personal gains. Therefore, I agree that libertarian view has contributed significantly to development and advancement in social welfare of communities by pushing for great achievements under capitalism and empiricism regimes.

Justifications

In this course problems related to social justice are found in three theories found in the course textbook namely utilitarian, libertarian, and Locke's philosophy. One of the issues that I identified from the readings is poverty. The issue of poverty is essential to address because it makes people's lives unbearable. Additionally, I have realized that people born from poor backgrounds have the highest chances of remaining poor and thereby creating a vicious circle of poverty. For instance, when a child is born in a low-income family, he is unlikely to attend good schools and a favorable lifestyle. As a result, the person cannot find employment hence his family will live in the same condition. Again, poverty is a philosophical problem because most of the theories taught in class are concerned with the distribution of property and wealth as well as other aspects of life including freedom. For instance, John Locke's argument is based on the fairness in keeping contracts.

Even if poverty is not directly mentioned in the textbooks, I still find that the theories address the issue indirectly. The utilitarian view that every individual purpose in life is to pursue the most significant levels of happiness is a perfect example of why poverty should be eradicated. People are happy when they are able to access the things they need in life, for instance, education, basic needs, and other luxury things. However, it is important to note that the quality of these thongs affects the level of happiness achieved by the individuals.

Theories About the Problem

In this section, I discuss three approaches that impressed me on how they address the problem of poverty. An evaluation of their contribution to the topic is essential in understanding the issue and how it can be eliminated to improve the quality of lives of the affected people.

Utilitarianism

The debate surrounding what should be done to address poverty usually leads to the question of what people and the governments should do in order to help the people affected and preferably improve their livelihood to the better. It is generally accepted that we should help those in need of our help. But when it comes to poverty, is it obligatory? Utilitarian is a moral theory that states that an action is considered right if it maximizes positive consequences and wrong if it fails to achieve this result. In this case, consequences are more considered in justifying the end. In this sense, reducing the pain and suffering caused by poverty is justified under utilitarian unless if the actions to eliminate the pain only cause more unhappiness. Therefore, we have a duty to help the poor but only help as much as we would if everyone contributed to this effort.

Libertarianism

The core ideology of libertarianism is that individual rights of liberty, property, and life should be respected by the government as well as other individuals. Additionally, the libertarian philosophy proposes all the social transactions should be carried out voluntarily. Libertarianism would result in the establishment of a free market in the society which has regularly been argued to be the best way to minimize the effects of poverty in the community. Furthermore, a typical libertarian would hope for a situation whereby people are pulling together their resources in order to help the poor.

Kant's Theory

This is another justice theory taught in class. Kentia theory places its arguments on the idea that wrongness and rightness of an act is valuated based on its ability to fulfill its desired duty. Consequences of an act in this casa are not considered. The theory is based on the assumption that one ought to never act except in such a way that he could so that his maxim could become a universal law. In the book titled "Groundwork" Kant discusses how we should aid the poor. Similar sentiments are found in another work titled the Metaphysics of Morals. Kant's argument is based on the premises of duty of beneficence in the earlier book. In the second book, he argues in the view that citizens have a responsibility towards their fellow citizens. The duty of beneficence is a duty of virtue while the latter is a duty of justice. The function of justice can be explained in the following manner: the government has a direct right over its citizen because of the tax it imposes on them thereby taking over the duty of the people. The imposed taxes are argued to be used for preservation of the people. Therefore, the government should use these taxes to support the poor.

Problems with the Theories

The issues these theories arise from their assumptions. For instance, utilitarian philosophy assumes that it is right to violate a person's right if the action brings more happiness to other people. Consequently, some of the activities that may be considered as good for some people in the society can violate the rights of others. Another problem with this theory is that it requires a decision maker who is impartial. Total impartiality means that there is no close relationship between the decision maker and the people affected by actions chosen including friendships or family relationship. Finally, utilitarian theory gi...