Nancy Fraser's view of social justice has evolved from a two-dimensional view of redistribution and recognition to a three-dimensional view that also includes representation. She argues that globalization requires considering how political structures frame issues of redistribution and recognition beyond the nation-state. Her current view is that achieving participatory parity requires addressing unfair social arrangements in all three dimensions through affirmative or transformative approaches depending on the issue.

1. Nancy Fraser’s idea of Social
Justice
Vivienne Bozalek
University of the Western Cape

2. Nancy Fraser’s three dimensational
view of social justice

3. Social Justice
• Fraser (2008; 2009) views social justice as
requiring social arrangements which make it
possible for all to participate on an equal
footing in social life– she calls this
participatory parity

4. How have her views of social justice
changed over the years?
• She has always viewed social justice from the perspective of participatory parity – how
we are able to participate as equals but she originally saw it from a two-dimensional
perspective (recognition and redistribution) – called a two dimensional view of social
justice
• She now includes representation as another dimension into this view and calls it a three-dimensional
view of social justice and she calls this a theory of post-Westphalian
democratic justice
• All three dimensions are mutually entwined and reciprocally influence and reinforce each
other but none are reducible to the other
• Efforts to work towards social justice must thus involve all three of these dimensions –
the emphasis will be tactical and strategic
• She uses the slogan “No redistribution or recognition without representation” (Fraser,
2008:282) – all three conditions are necessary for participatory parity and none alone is
sufficient

5. Why has she changed from a two- to a
three-dimensional view?
• She argues that globalisation has changed the way that we see social justice
• We used to see social justice in terms of territorial states which are national states
like South Africa
• This included socioeconomic redistribution and cultural or recognition claims
• In the age of globalisation, we can no longer take the territorial state for granted in
thinking about issues of justice, as our lives are also controlled by transnational
corporations and international currency, as well as INGOs and the global mass media
and internet – we need to think of who should be included in redistribution and
recognition – she calls this the frame of social justice

6. Social Justice from Fraser’s (2009;
2013) perspective – three-dimensional
• Recognition and misrecognition - economic
• Redistribution and maldistribution - cultural
• Representation and misrepresentation - political
Each one of these can be viewed from the following
perspectives
• Affirmative
• Transformative
She looks at the what, who and how of social justice

7. Redistribution and maldistribution
• People can be prevented from participating as equals
by economic structures which provide obstacles in
terms of denying them the resources they need to do
so – precludes economic structures that institutionalise
deprivation, exploitation and gross disparaties in
wealth, income, labour, leisure time
• The problem here is class structure or the economic
dimension of society – issues of education, health care,
food, housing, water, electricity
• What are South African issues of redistribution in
higher education which impact on how people in this
country can participate as equals at this present
moment?

8. Recognition and misrecognition
• People can be prevented from interacting as peers by the
institutionalised hierarchies of cultural value that deny them the
required standing – here they would suffer from status inequality
or misrecognition which depreciates some categories of people
and the qualities associate with them
• Recognition requires a status order where there is equal respect
for all participants and equal opportunity for achieving social
esteem
• The problem here is the status order which is the same as the
cultural dimension of society struggles over – race, gender,
sexuality, religion, nationality etc
• What are South African higher education issues of recognition
which impact on how people can participate as equals at the
moment?

9. Redistribution and recognition
• These two dimensions don’t mirror each other
but do interact with each other to impact on
social justice or participatory parity
• Neither class or economics nor culture can
explain social justice and injustice
• That is why she proposed a two-dimensional
theory of justice
• But now she thinks this two-dimensional
theory doesn’t go far enough

10. Representation and misrepresentation
• This is a political dimension and concerns social
belonging – who counts as a member of the
community or who is included and excluded of
those entitled to a just distribution and of
reciprocal recognition
• It tells us who can make claims for social justice
and how such claims are adjudicated
• Misrepresentation happens when some people
are wrongly denied the possibility of participating
as equals with others in social interaction

11. Representation and misrepresentation
• Two types – ordinary political misrepresentation
e.g. race, gender, age etc
• Misframing – constitutes members and non-members
in matters of redistribution, recognition
and ordinary political-representation – very
serious form of injustice – kind of political death
• What are South African higher education issues
which impact on how is included in the political
community who can air their claims? Are some
communities wrongly excluded?

12. Representation and misrepresentation
• Misframing can be considered the defining form of
injustice in the globalising age
• National states or the Keynesian-Westphalian frame
prevents many poor and despised from challenging the
forces that oppress them
• They challenge their own contexts – powerless or
failed states
• This protects predator states (HEIs (Bozalek &
Boughey, 2012), transnational foreign investors &
governance structures, international currency and
transnational organisations from democratic control
and decision-making

13. Three dimensional view of justice
• Fraser (2008:283) asks the question:
How can we integrate struggles against
maldistribution, misrecognition and
misrepresentation within a post-Westphalian
frame?

14. Affirmative and transformative approaches
• Affirmative – contests boundaries of existing frames but accepts the Westphalian
grammar of frame-setting- redraw existing boundaries or create new ones but still
think territorial state is appropriate unit to pose and resolve justice disputes
• Transformative – while state-territorial principle remains relevant for some
purposes, it is not so in all cases
• Structural causes of injustices in globalising world include financial markets,
offshore factories, global economy, information networks e.g. digital divide,
climate, disease, drugs, weapons, biotechnology – not ‘the space of places’ but ‘the
space of flows’ (Castells, 1996:440-460)
• Transformative politics of framing changes frame-setting in a globalising world –
looking not only at the boundaries of justice but the way they are drawn
• All-affected principle - all those affected by a social structure or institution have a
moral standing as subjects of social justice in relation to it – not geographic
proximity but that they are all affected by a framework, which sets the rules
governing their social interaction and which shapes their life chances of advantage
and disadvantage – e.g. environmentalists and indigenous peoples – international
social movements – seek to change the grammar of and democratise frame-setting
making it dialogical – giving collective voice to those harmed

15. Affirmative vs Transformative
Misrecognition Maldistribution Misframing
Affirmative multi-culturalism liberal welfare state
still assumes legitimacy of
territorial state
Transformative Deconstruction
socialism - deep
restructuring
changes boundaries of
justice and how they are
drawn

16. Expanded view of affirmative vs
transformative
Misrecognition Maldistribution Misframing
Affirmative
mainstream multiculturalism - surface
reallocations of respect to existing identities
of existing groups - supports group
differentiation (Fraser 2008:34) revaluing
blackness while leaving unchanged the
binary black-white code that gives the latter
its sense (Fraser 2008: 36)
the liberal welfare state surface
reallocation of existing goods to existing
groups; supports group differentiation;
can generate misrecognition
contests boundaries of existing frames but accepts Westphalian grammar of frame-setting.
Redraw boundaries of existing territorial states or create new ones but still
assume that territorial state is the appropriate unit to pose and resolve issues of
justice. injustices of misframing aren't a function of Westphalian political space but
from faulty way in which principle is applied. Accept state-territorial principle.
Accept principle of state territorality as the proper basis for understanding the 'who'
of justice. They agree, in other words, that what makes a given collection of
individuals into fellow subjects of justice is their shared membership of the political
community that corresponds to such a state. Thus, far from challenging the
underlying grammar of the Westphalian order, those who practice affirmative
politics of framing accept its state-territorial principle.
Transformative
deconstruction deep reconstructuring of
relations of recognition, destabilizes group
differentiation.
socialism -deep restructuring of relations
of production redistributing income or
wealth, reorganising the division of
labour, changing the structure of
property ownership etc
state-territorial principle not adequate for determining the 'who'of justice in all
cases - remains relevant for many purposes however. Structural causes of many
injustices are global economy, digital divide, biopolitics of climate, disease, drugs,
weapons, determining who will live long or die young - not the 'space of places'but
the 'space of flows. The aim is to overcome injustices of misframing by changing the
boundaries of the who of justiceand the way they are drawn - the mode of their
constitution - post-territorial mode of political differentiation. The 'all-affected'principle
- all those affected by a given social structure or institution have
moral standing as subjects of justice in relation to it. e.g. environmentalists and
indigenous peoples claims in relation to extra- and non-territorial powers that
impinge on their lives or structures that harm them that cannot be located in the
spaces of places. They are also claiming a say - democratising the process by which
frameworks of justice are drawn and revised. They are also then transforming the
'how'as well as the 'who'. Transformative movements are demanding or creating
themselves new democratic arenas for entertaining arguments about the frame.

17. References
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Bozalek, V. and Boughey, C. 2012. (Mis)framing Higher Education in South Africa. Social Policy and
Administration 46(6): 688–703.
Bozalek, V. & Carolissen, R. (2012) The potential of critical feminist citizenship frameworks for citizenship and
social justice in higher education, Perspectives in Education, 30(4):9-18.
Fraser,N. (2000). Rethinking Recognition. New Left Review, 3 (May/June): 107–20.
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Fraser, N. (2003) Social justice in the age of identity politics: Redistribution, recognition and participation. In N.
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Fraser. N. (2005) Mapping the Feminist Imagination:From Redistribution to Recognition to Representation.
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Fraser, N. (2009) Feminism and the Cunning of History. New Left Review, 56:97-117.
Fraser, N. (2008). “Reframing Justice in a Globalizing World in K. Olson (ed.). Adding Insult to Injury: Nancy
Fraser Debates her Critics. London: Verso, 273-291.
Fraser, N. (2009). Scales of Justice: Reimaging Political Space in a Globalizing World. New York: Columbia
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Fraser, N. (2013). Fortunes of Feminism: From State-Managed Capitalism to Neoliberal Crisis. London: Verso.
Holscher, D. & Bozalek, V. (2012) Encountering the Other across the Divides. Re-Grounding Social Justice as a
guiding principle for Social Work with refugees and other vulnerable groups. British Journal of Social Work, 42
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