Was John Rawls a Conservative?

Note: Last fall, in the midst of the debate over S-CHIP, I wrote an op-ed article arguing that the Bush Administration had adopted the simplest and most powerful idea in John Rawls's A Theory of Justice -- the "difference principle." For years, Rawls has been the bete noire of conservatives everywhere for his intellectual justification for the welfare state. Today I read an article in The American Conservative making a similar argument. Seems to me, the cons have an ally in the late liberal philosopher. Below is my op-ed. What do you think?

By Charles Euchner

The partisan battle over children’s health care masks the most important element in the debate. George W. Bush is a closet Rawlsian.

John Rawls was the Harvard philosopher whose 1971 study A Theory of Justice has been a touchstone for a generation of liberals. Rawls argues for a robust role for the state in establishing fair opportunities in unequal societies.

At the heart of his theory is the “difference principle,” which holds that policies that increase inequality—tax policy, government benefits, wage structures, educational opportunities—can only be justified if the poorer members of society benefit. What sounds like a logical mistake—how can poor people be better off when inequality increases?—actually offers a dynamic way to think about complex societies.

“[T]he higher expectations of those better situated are just,” Rawls writes, “if and only if they work as part of a scheme which improves the expectations of the least advantaged members of society.”

If the government wants to grant industrial or agricultural subsidies—which make their way into the pockets of mostly privileged people—there must be some assurance that those subsidies benefit the less well-off members of society too. Same goes for tax breaks, research funds or universities, social security, and health care.

That’s where President Bush enters the picture.

As part of his plan to reauthorize the State Children’s Health Insurance Program (S-CHIP), President Bush wants higher participation rates for poor and working-class families before expanding the program to middle-class families. Specifically, Bush wants to see an enrollment rate of 95 percent of all eligible participants—children in families with incomes 200 percent or less of the federal poverty level, which is about $20,000—before expanding the program to others.

S-CHIP represents the Clinton Administration’s second-best approach to health care, after the failed effort to provide universal care. In the span of a decade, the program has provided health care for three-quarters of all eligible children get care under the program. When kids get the health care they need, they do better in school and other activities.

The states enjoy wide latitude in running the program. Some have increased the eligibility standard to families living at 250 percent and even 350 percent of the poverty line. Other states have offered coverage to expectant mothers and the parents of eligible children.

Democrats in Congress have sought to expand the program ever more. President Bush has responded that such expansions change S-CHIP from an entitlement for families who cannot afford health care into a general entitlement. That is dangerous for two reasons. First, it would explode the federal government’s commitment for health care at a time when it’s already out of control.

Second, a super-sized S-CHIP program would encourage employers to back out providing insurance for workers.

But there’s a bigger problem still. When social programs cater to the middle class, the poor often get left behind. Social Security and Medicare provide important benefits to middle-income Americans, but do less for poor people. Welfare and Medicaid have always borne the brunt of budget cuts.

Why not tie middle-class benefits to greater participation among the poor? For his justification, the President could do worse than turn to Rawls.

“Consider any two representative men A and B, and let B be the one who is less favored,” Rawls writes. “B can accept A’s being better off since A’s advantages have been gained in ways that improve B’s prospects. If A were not allowed his better position, B would be even worse off than he is.”

The difference principle offers a more realistic and dynamic approach to justice than standard schemes of redistribution. Rather than ranting against inequality, Rawls uses inequality to help everyone. He understands that social policy that ignores this reality is worthless—or even destructive, since it fosters resentment, envy, and a zero-sum approach to common concerns.

Communitarian liberals and compassionate conservatives often talk about the need to connect the interests of different groups in society. A Rawlsian approach to entitlements like S-CHIP—now carrying the endorsement of President Bush—offers a useful way to do just that.

The difference principle can be applied to other areas of public policy as well. We might offer more programs for gifted math and science education, as well as better opportunities for disadvantaged children. We might devise strategies to increase housing supply, as long as inexpensive housing is part of the mix.

The irony of President Bush’s Rawlsian turn is that conservative intellectuals abhor John Rawls. The National Review chided Rawls for his “childlike innocence about the ways of the world.” Robert Nozick, a libertarian colleague at Harvard, wrote his own masterpiece, Anarchy, State, and Utopia, partly to challenge Rawls.

Rawls, though an academic liberal to the nth degree, was determined to balance the needs of individual and community, equality and efficiency, dynamism and security. The difference principle provides his mechanism. It’s imperfect, to be sure, but it’s creative and practical.

At the time of Rawls’s death in 2002, there were 5,000 books and articles about his work. As theorists nit-picked the details of his work, Rawls backed off some aspects of the difference principle. But the idea remains important. Maybe it doesn’t stand up to the academic’s angels-on-the-head-of-a-pin analysis. But it’s a good guideline for fostering fairness.

Ultimately, politics involves contests over two kinds of issues—principles and details. Democrats concerned about poverty should embrace President Bush’s endorsement of Rawlsian justice. Then they can bargain about the details of health care and other policies.