Veil of Ignorance

Yesterday, mr. Woyunohs joined our corporation, and had his interview with the Directrix. I remember vividly doing this interview myself - pertinent questions are asked by Lunarisse, and often the candidates are rather nervous. Maybe you too, dear reader, if you belong to our corporation, remember your own very first face-a-face with the Directrix? I too was ill at ease, but the main reason of my discomfort was that the interview was held in the corporation's canteen. Or bar, probably that is a better name for it, since far more calories are consumed there via beverages than via solid food.

One of the recurring questions at these interviews relate to the function of slavery in today's empire. Oh, I could talk a long time about the history of slavery, its waxing and waning over the course of the millennia in our empire. I do believe the most recent high tide is behind us, and slavery has been ebbing ever since the Pax Amarria. This of course brings all sorts of turbulence with it. There is always resistance to social change.

 

Anyway, I overheard mr. Woyunohs interesting answer : "If you had to live in a society with slaves, not knowing if you would be the slave or not, would you still choose that society?". He had picked this up at Hedion, he said.

 

I surmise he followed a class on moral or political philosophy. The principle mr. Woyunohs so pointedly refered to is the "veil of ignorance". Imagine a committee that has to choose how to organise society. They have absolute power. If the committee members are to design a fair and just society, so the principle claims, they have to be ignorant of their future position in that society. After the people drafting a constitution finish their job, they should trade places with a random person in that society through some lottery. They just jump clone into that randomly chosen person, not knowing in advance who that will be, and live the life of that person. You may jump clone into a slave or into an Heir, you may jump clone into Ishta or into Nauplius. How would you organise society?

 

This principle has been used by Federation philosophers to "demonstrate" that slavery is not just, because they claim no-one would want to risk being a slave. But their reasoning is flawed, and not only because they have no idea how it is to be a slave in the Empire. Every person is shaped by their upbringing and their culture, and what a person considers a worthwhile life depends on this upbringing and culture. Our concept of fairness and justice is shaped by the culture we grow up in. And so, a panel with representatives from all of the Empires would never agree on what is fair, even if they would work under the "veil of ignorance".

 

Of course a Federation philosopher would choose the Federation democracy and freedom! Well, probably just tweaked a bit to have a little less corruption. But equally an Amarrian would choose a slightly tweaked version of the Empire. And a Caldari would choose some form of the State. I believe most slaves in our Empire would probably not choose the system of the Minmatar republic with all its uncertainty and cutthroat violence, he or she would go for the lottery ticket to improve his or her lot in Amarr. And I? I would not want to live in a society that does not put scripture first, no matter what station I would have!