A Short Note on Globalization, Inequality and Distributive Justice

In the present post, we shall talk a bit about the existing inequalities in the wealth and the opportunities in this world vis-à-vis globalization. The whole idea behind globalization is wealth and opportunity for the people. The basic problem now is how to distribute the wealth and the opportunities. This is known as distributive justice meaning thereby how you distribute and on what basis. This question has always led to serious consequences such as class war, war between capital and labour, war between the rich and the poor, war between the talented and the less talented and on what basis do you distribute this wealth in the society has been a very difficult problem to solve. World over, there are three factors that are pushing our democracy to a failure:

1. Poverty

2. Ignorance

3. Inequality in the wealth and the opportunities

This could also be termed as the disparities between the wealth and the opportunities. After free market and globalization, rich have become very rich and poor have not become that rich because so far we have not been come to the conclusion that what would be basis to distribute nation’s wealth and opportunities.

The second reason in India are the fault lines created by the caste, religion, language and regionalism. The third reason is maladministration and corruption.

With respect to globalization, in these three factors, we are simply concerned with one of them i.e. disparities in the distribution of wealth and opportunities. It is not a new fact that in US, top ten percent of the people receive 50% of national wealth and bottom 50% get only 20% of the total wealth. In the middle, the 40% get 40%.

At the global level, 20% of the people consume 80% of the world resources. Rest of the people consume the remaining 20% resources. Disparities have increased after the globalized free market.

There are two factors of earning wealth. One of them is capital. The capital that is the source of wealth is concentrated in few places especially the developed world and it is said that 70% of the capital is controlled by 10% people of the world. Capital is the main source of generating wealth and opportunities. The good thing about capital is that it can be stored. It can be inherited. It carries power to generate wealth.

Whereas the other source of generating wealth is labour means the salaries, the wages the other benefits. But labour cannot be stored. Thus the labour is always at a disadvantage. The main problem has always been to determine a way to balance these two factors. Capital will always have an advantage over labour.

In the next post, we shall discuss the various theories of Distributive Justice.

(This short essay was prepared while taking notes in the Class of Professor I.P. Massey)