5.3: Virtue vs. Disability: The Case of Casey Martin
Read this ruling by the Supreme Court on the case of PGA Tour, Inc. v. Casey Martin. The Aristotelian conception of justice as honoring an individual's virtues is called into question in the case of Casey Martin, who sued the PGA for refusing to allow him the use of a golf cart during the tour. In this case, the court decides in favor of Martin, or, in other words, against a purely virtue-based policy of distributive justice.
5.3.1: Does Respect for Virtue Mean Sacrificing Freedom?
Watch the rest of this lecture, from 27:02. In this lecture, Sandel addresses a major challenge to Aristotle's virtue-based theory of justice. What happens if people want to do something other than what they are best suited for? Should they be denied that freedom in order to maintain an ideal society? Or, is this curtailment of personal freedom itself unjust? Aristotle's surprising view of natural slavery has led many to accept the latter view.
5.3.2: Aristotle on Citizenship, Justice, and the State
Read Book Three of Aristotle's Politics. Aristotle begins by defining what the state is and what the conditions for citizenship are. The second half of the book is devoted to the topic of justice, and it is here that Aristotle makes his famous argument about equality. For Aristotle, justice is not simply a matter of respecting the equality of all citizens, but of determining in what specific ways people are said to be equal or unequal.
5.3.3: Aristotle on Virtue, Pleasure, and Pain
Read sections 1-3 of Book II from Nicomachean Ethics. In these passages, Aristotle discusses his idea that moral virtue is a matter of habit. He also mentions that the role of good legislators is to instill good habits in the citizens they govern. But in order for the legislators to help citizens develop their virtues, they would first need to know what it means to live virtuously and what specific virtues there are.