Day 220: Justice and Human Rights - Part 2

This blog-post is a continuation to
Day 118: Justice and Human Rights

Legal Justice - Procedural

As said in the blog 'Day 118: Justice and Human Rights', Legal Justice entails both procedural justice and substantive justice.

Procedural justice, otherwise known as formal justice, refers to the procedures that are followed when making rules. It has to do with how decisions are made, not what the decisions entail. Substantive justice, as the term indicates, has to do with the substance or content of the decisions.

Procedural justice is underpinned by two important principles:
1. That all members of the population are equal before the law and thus, that no discrimination may occur on any basis. This requires 'impartial judges' who will not allow bias within the decision-making process. We will get back to this subject at a later point in the discussion.
2. That all is innocent until proven guilty beyond a reasonable doubt.

The second principle partially shines a light on what society regards as being ' moral justice'. When a situation of harm occurs, what is done in our current legal system, is to pin-point the one party that is guilty for the harm caused. During trials - many factors and participants are often identified as possibly having contributed to the harm - but if there is no proof that this factor/participant is the origin of the harm - then there are no further consequences. This obviously raises concern - because it would mean that accountability and responsibility is a very limited concept in our current understanding - where we believe that we are only accountable and responsible for harm that actually took place as a result of our actions. But the truth is - we are responsible and accountable for any harm that COULD take place as a result of our actions. If during trial, many factors and participants are seen to have possibly contributed to the manifestation of harm - then why are these points not addressed, so that - even if in this particular case these factors/participants were not the cause of the harm - that the possibility of harm manifesting as a consequences of these factors/participants' behavior is ruled out?

Is justice only trying to find blame and claim reparation for damages that were suffered? Or does justice also entail the prevention of possible harm? We can ask if those participants whose behavior was identified to have possibly caused the harm (even though it happened to not be the so in the particular case) are equally responsible and accountable for the harm that took place. Because they equally allowed the possibility of this harm to take place. Is it not problematic that during trial we become aware of all kinds of possibly harmful factors - yet, ignore them, just because there has been no consequence of them yet? Do we need to wait for harm to actually occur before the word 'justice' becomes an issue?

To be continued.

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Day 218: Justice and Human Rights

Within this Blog I will be exploring different concepts of Justice and investigate what Justice would be in the context of upholding Constitutional Equality as What is Best for All in an Equal Money Capitalistic system. This will probably turn out to be a series rather than one blog-post. So - walk with me.

The word 'Justice' has been applied in different contexts, which can be laid out as follows:

1. Legal Justice
    a. Procedural Justice
    b. Substantive Justice
2. Moral Justice
    a. Distributive/Social Justice
        I. Justice as Entitlement
        II. Justice as Fairness

Legal Justice vs. Moral Justice

Legal justice refers to adherence to the law as a set of rules that determines part of how humans are to behave towards each other and towards the environment. Legal justice, then, as to do with the content of these laws as well as how these rules are established, applied and enforced.

Moral justice has to do with moral values of what is fair, right and correct. Moral justice then has to to with prescribing how humans ought to interact with each other and who ought to get what.

Looking at the relationship between moral justice and legal justice - it is obvious that legal justice attempts to specify moral justice in relation to specific circumstances and situations - where legal justice is the 'concretization' of moral justice. Now, what is fascinating - is that 'moral justice' is often seen as a 'fuzzy' concept, or having to do with 'fuzzy concepts' such as 'rightness' and 'goodness' - where it seems it is hard to define what those words actually entail - and yet, it is those words that serve as the basis for legal justice - where legal justice - where legal justice is the justice that is applied unto a population and is supposed to yield just results - and where it is trusted that this is what the legal system intends to do. But if we are not clear on what moral justice exactly is - then how can we assess that the legal system is in fact just?

We have in all countries and even between countries a complex legal system in place - but when the question is asked: 'but what is morally just?' - then we have to scratch our heads and we refer to the law - saying that 'well, whatever the law says'. So - we're running in circles where we are attempting to establish just and good societies, where we all have an opinion about what rules should be in place, and where each one thinks their proposed rule is the right one - but where no-one has ever stopped to sit and discuss what 'rightness' is - and where the time has not been taken to come to a definition of 'justice' that all can agree on.

Many parts of the legal system are, for instance, determined by customary law - and all that means is that legal status has been given to customs and 'how things are usually done' - this ultimately proving that we cannot trust that the legal system in any way has the purpose of justice at heart - but rather attempts to merely control transactions, interactions and individual behavior.

To be continued.

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• Day 352: Occupy Wall Street and Zeitgeist: Can the 99% Count?
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Day 131: The Justice System – also a Scam?

Foreign Farmers Undermine Food Security in Zambia

Unlike in many countries, where large-scale farming companies dominate the agricultural landscape – it is smallholder farmers who constitute most of the farming activity in Zambia.

Many foreign and local companies are now involved in land-grabs, where large stretches of land are taken to develop their plants and factories.

On this land, live many people – who all depend on the land they have to survive, to grow food, to send their children to school. The problem is that most of these people do not hold official title deeds of the land – so legally speaking, they do not own the land: they are squatters.

So when these companies move in and take the land, things like this happen:

“They (the South African agribusiness) came with guns and threatened to shoot anyone who resisted moving out. They burnt all our household properties without any notice. We were almost 200 households. They burnt my food barns, clothes, blankets, bedding, television set – they even burnt my fields”

Before colonization, the common way of land tenure was through customs. You get a piece of land, you work it, you “own” it. Only after colonization, was statutory tenure introduced , where the whole legal technicalities and you having a particular piece of paper saying you own the land became a requirement.

So, imagine you are one of these Zambian farmers. You live on a piece of land, you grow and eat your own food for most of your life, and then someone comes chasing you off with guns and burns your shit down because you don’t have a paper that proofs that this land belongs to you. You live in a rural area, you are poor – the process of acquiring such a legal document can cost up to $2000 and take anything from 2 months to 10 years. There’s not much choice now is there? You’d have to basically sell your land to come up with the money to get a paper that says you own the land – but by then of course it’s already too late.

Zambia’s situation is not a very pleasant one, 59% of the people live below the poverty line, and 65% of the people live in rural areas. The dislocation of these farmers does not just destroy their personal lives, but will also generate consequence for the whole of the population, as food security turns into insecurity.

If we look at the definition of ‘justice’ we get:

1. Just behavior or treatment.
2. The quality of being fair and reasonable.

The situation described above is not fair nor reasonable – these people’s lives are completely disregarded in the favour of those who can afford to acquire legal documents. This in itself shows that the Justice/Legal System is corrupt – as one has to bribe their way in to be able to be part of the legal system.

This is completely unacceptable and goes contrary to everything justice as a principle is supposed to stand for.

It is time, once more, to critically investigate the nature of our reality and what we participate in.

In an Equal Money System, no such phenomenon will have space to take place – as all will be IN FACT equal, and not have to buy their way in. You are here on Earth, you should not have to ‘earn’ your living or prove that you are worthy of existing based on your economic and legal status. Investigate Equal Money – the only valid alternative to transform our world of abuse and corruption to a world that is Best for All Life.

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• Foreign farmers undermine food security in Zambia

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