UTILITARIANISM

Moral Conversation Project Assignment for 9/20-9/24:  Discuss the relationship between 
the following in Rawls’s theory of justice as fairness:  “principles of justice” (B, 62, col 
2); “original position” (or “initial situation”) (B, 61-65); and “veil of ignorance” (B, 63).  
How do Rawls’s principles of justice differ, respectively, from libertarianism and 
utilitarianism?  Is Rawls right that neither libertarianism nor utilitarianism would be 
chosen in the original position? 

I. Utilitarianism’s Historical Roots:  Bentham, Mill and Social and Political Reform

II. The Principle of Utility

A. Bentham: An action, policy, or social or political institution is to be approved 
of “according to the tendency which it appears to have to augment or diminish 
the happiness” of all interested parties (i.e., anyone who might be affected). 
(B, 44)
B. Mill: “actions are right in proportion as they tend to promote happiness; 
wrong as they tend to produce the reverse of happiness.  By happiness is 
intended pleasure and the absence of pain; by unhappiness, pain and the 
privation of pleasure.” (B, 50)

III. Rationales for the Principle of Utility

A. Equal Concern (Benevolence)
1. To care about some person is to want his or her happiness.
2. From the moral point of view, everyone is equally deserving of our 
concern.
3. Therefore, the moral point of view is one of universal benevolence, i.e., a 
desire for the happiness of all.
4. Therefore, morality should rank possible actions, policies, etc., by their 
impact on overall net happiness.

B. Fairness and Liberty
1. Liberty:  A free society evaluates social and political institutions by how 
these affect citizens’ lives, not in terms of some imposed, objective 
standard of the good life (i.e., what would be better for them), but in terms 
of what citizens’ themselves care about, their happiness.  
2. Fairness:  Since everyone matters equally, social policies and institutions 
should distribute scarce resources in ways that take everyone’s happiness 
equally into account (Bentham: Everyone is to count for one and no more 
than one.)

IV. Interpreting the Principle of Utility

A. Who counts?  Just human beings or any being that can experience pleasure 
and pain?  (Bentham: any being who can suffer)
B. How do we aggregate happiness?
1. Everyone counts equally—no special weight for time, place, or personal or 
communal connection.
2. Therefore, any consequence for anyone is equally relevant, no matter how 
distant in time or place.
3. Happiness (pleasure) must be balanced against unhappiness (pain).  To 
aggregate, subtract amounts of unhappiness from happiness to get net 
happiness.
4. Consider all alternatives in terms of net unhappiness (over time).
5. The morally best act (policy, institution) is whichever would maximize net 
aggregate happiness.

V. Utilitarianism is a version of Consequentialism.

A. Consequentialism holds that acts, policies, etc., are evaluated morally in terms 
of the net overall value (goodness) of their consequences.
B. A consequentialist will not be a utilitarian if she believes that happiness is not 
the only kind of good consequence.