The Centrality of Fairness in Shaping Attitudes toward Inequality

• In Event: The Subjective Perception of Inequality, Status, and Insecurity

Abstract

This paper, which is part of a book project, proposes a theoretical model of support for redistribution in which the perceived fairness of redistributive policy plays a central role. The model builds on the recent body of research in social psychology and political science, in which an emerging consensus points to the importance of perceived fairness in determining attitudes toward economic inequality and redistribution. A key insight in this literature is that people accept inequalities that are seen as fair, and they evaluate fairness by referring to predictable and widely shared normative rules that govern resource allocation. This means that people can and do support substantial inequalities of outcome as fair, even when such inequalities do not serve their personal economic self-interest. I will propose that a theoretical model of inequality- oriented attitudes that centers perceptions of fairness can be both useful and rigorous. I discuss likely determinants of perceived fairness, highlighting that fairness is structured, rather than existing ‘in the eye of the beholder’. In the case of redistributive politics and economic inequality in capitalist societies, most citizens evaluate the fairness of inequality by considering whether the justice principle of proportionality (also known as equity) holds. They apply this consideration to whether ‘people like them’ get what they deserve, but also consider their mental representations of two social groups: the rich and the poor. Whether inequality is fair depends on whether it looks like each of these three entities “gets what they deserve” based on an intuitive sense of proportionality. These properties of fairness evaluations mean that perceived fairness is predictable and can therefore be used to make hypotheses regarding support for redistribution.

Author

• Kris-Stella Trump, Johns Hopkins University