Skip to main content
Log in

Equality, fairness, and social conflict

  • Published:
Social Justice Research Aims and scope Submit manuscript

Abstract

There are three generic problems that arise in the use of the concept of equality as a principle of fairness. These problems concern (i) determining when equality is appropriate as opposed to some other principle, (ii) deciding how equality is to be operationalized, and (iii) determining how to implement equality. The proposal is made that these intrapersonal decision conflicts are mirrored by social conflicts when multiple interests are involved. This way of looking at social conflicts also suggests some novel ways to approach conflict resolution.

This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.

Access this article

Price excludes VAT (USA)
Tax calculation will be finalised during checkout.

Instant access to the full article PDF.

Similar content being viewed by others

References

  • Allison, S. T., McQueen, L. R., and Schaerfl, L. M. (1992). Social decision making processes and the equal partitionment of shared resources.J. Exp. Soc. Psychol. 28: 23–42.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Allison, S. T., and Messick, D. M. (1990). Social decision heuristics and the use of shared resources.J. Behav. Decision Making 3: 195–204.

    Google Scholar 

  • Bies, R. J., and Shapiro, D. L. (1987). Processual fairness judgments: The influence of causal accounts.Soc. Justice Res. 1: 199–218.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Bies, R. J., Tripp, T. M., and Neale, M. A. (1993). Procedural fairness and profit seeking: The perceived legitimacy of market exploitation.J. Behav. Decision Making 6: 243–256.

    Google Scholar 

  • Coombs, C. H., and Avrunin, G. S. (1988).The Structure of Conflict, Erlbaum, Hillsdale, NJ.

    Google Scholar 

  • Dawes, R. M. (1993). Affirmative action programs: Discontinuities between thoughts about individuals and thoughts about groups. Unpublished manuscript, Carnegie Mellon University.

  • Deutsch, M. (1975). Equity, equality, and need: What determines which value will be used as the basis of distributive justice?.J. Soc. Issues 31 (3): 137–150.

    Google Scholar 

  • Eckhoff, T. (1974)Justice: Its Determinants in Social Interaction, University Press, Rotterdam, The Netherlands.

    Google Scholar 

  • Elster, J. (1992).Local Justice, Russell Sage Foundation, New York.

    Google Scholar 

  • Harris, R. J., and Joyce, M. A. (1980). What's fair? It depends on how you ask the question.J. Pers. Soc. Psychol. 38: 165–170.

    Google Scholar 

  • Kahneman, D., Knetsch, J. L., and Thaler, R. H. (1990). Experimental tests of the endowment effect and the Coase theorem.J. Polit. Econ. 98: 1325–1348.

    Google Scholar 

  • Keller, R. L., and Sarin, R. K. (1988). Equity in social risk: Some empirical observations.Risk Anal. 1: 135–146.

    Google Scholar 

  • Kirkman, B. L. Shapiro, D. L., Novelli, L., and Brett, J. M. (in press). Employee concerns regarding self-managing work teams: A multidimensional justice perspective.Soc. Justice Res.

  • Lind, E. A., and Tyler, T. (1988).The Social Psychology of Procedural Justice, Plenum Press, New York.

    Google Scholar 

  • Manz, C. C., and Sims, H. P. (1993).Business Without Bosses: How Self-Managing Teams are Buildings High Performance Companies. Wiley, New York.

    Google Scholar 

  • Messick, D. M. (1993). Equality as a decision heuristic. In Mellers, B. A., and Baron, J. (eds.),Psychological Perspectives on Justice, Cambridge University Press, New York, pp. 11–31.

    Google Scholar 

  • Messick, D. M., and Rutte, C. G. (1992). The provision of public goods by experts: The Groningen study. In Liebrand, W., Messick, D. M., and Wilke, H. (eds.)Social Dilemmas: Theoretical Issues and Research Findings, Pergamon, London, pp. 101–109.

    Google Scholar 

  • Messick, D. M., and Schell, T. (1992). Evidence for an equality heuristic in social decision making.Acta Psychol. 80, 311–323.

    Google Scholar 

  • Messick, D. M. & Sentis, K. (1983). Fairness, preference and fairness biases (61–94). In Messick, D. M., and Cook, K. S. (eds.)Equity Theory, Praeger, New York.

    Google Scholar 

  • Moessinger, P. (1990). Perfect justice procedures.Soc. Justice Res. 4: 105–113.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Rawls, J. (1971).A Theory of Justice, Harvard University Press, Cambridge, MA.

    Google Scholar 

  • Raiffa, H. (1982).The Art and Science of Negotiation, Harvard University Press, Cambridge, MA.

    Google Scholar 

  • Russo, J. E., and Schoemaker, J. H. (1989).Decision Traps, Doubleday, New York.

    Google Scholar 

  • Samuelson, C. D., and Allison, S. T. (in press). Cognitive factors affecting the use of social decision heuristics in resource sharing tasks.Organ. Behav. Hum. Decision Processes.

  • Shklar, J. (1990).The Sense of Injustice, Yale University Press, New Haven, CT.

    Google Scholar 

  • Steinhaus, H. (1948). The problem of fair division.Econometrica 16: 101–104.

    Google Scholar 

Download references

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

Authors

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

About this article

Cite this article

Messick, D.M. Equality, fairness, and social conflict. Soc Just Res 8, 153–173 (1995). https://doi.org/10.1007/BF02334689

Download citation

  • Issue Date:

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/BF02334689

Key Words

Navigation