Basic Income as a Rectification Instrument

Some contemporary philosophers, such as Gary Chartier, Matt Zwolinski, and Miranda Fleischer, propose that a basic income should be seen as an instrument for rectifying historical injustices. This article examines the arguments for this proposal based on Robert Nozick’s historical theory of justice. The first part of the article formulates the normative basis of Nozick’s theory, as well as his three principles of distributive justice: the principle of original appropriation, the principle of voluntary transfer, and the principle of rectification. Nozick himself believed that, in modern societies, the principle of rectification may require the redistributive policies envisaged by John Rawls’s difference principle. The second section examines reasons why historical justice theorists should prefer basic income, including the arguments by Milton Friedman, Matt Zwolinski, and Philippe Van Parijs. The third section responds to several objections to rectification redistribution proposed by Loren Lomasky and Jan Narveson. In order to counteract these objections, Hillel Steiner’s liberal theory of exploitation is proposed, which serves as an additional argument in favor of the fact that rectification can be organized through a basic income.