RAJIV GANDHI NATIONAL UNIVERSITY OF LAW, PATIALA,

PUNJAB

JURISPRUDENCE

(SEM-3)

SUBMITTED BY: ABHIGYA SINGH

SUBMITTED TO: MR. SACHIN SHARMA

ROLL NO.: 19169 GROUP NO.: 31

TOPIC: CONFLICT BETWEEN INDIVIDUAL UTILITARIANISM VS.

SOCIAL UTILITARIANISM AND ANALYSIS

RESEARCH QUESTION: THE IMPLEMENTATION OF SOCIAL

UTILITARIANISM IS ALWAYS A DEBATABLE ONE DEPENDING
FROM CASE TO CASE

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ACKNOWLEDGEMENT
This project would not have been possible without the kind support and help of my friends, and
my Jurisprudence teacher. I would like to extend my sincere thanks to all of them. I am highly
indebted to Mr. Sachin Sharma for his guidance and constant supervision as well as for providing
necessary information regarding the project & also for their support in completing the project. I
would like to express my gratitude towards my parents & my seniors as well for their kind co-
operation and encouragement which help me in completion of this project.

CERTIFICATE
This is to certify that the Jurisprudence project on the topic ‘CONFLICT BETWEEN
INDIVIDUAL UTILITARIANISM VS. SOCIAL UTILITARIANISM AND ANALYSIS’ has
been positively and successfully completed and researched upon by Abhigya Singh (2nd Year,
B.A. LL.B. (Hons), Roll no. 19169) of Rajiv Gandhi National University of Law, Punjab, under
the supervision of Mr. Sachin Sharma, Assistant Professor of Law, Rajiv Gandhi National
University of Law, Punjab.

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 TABLE OF CONTENTS
S NO. TOPICS P. NO.
1. INTRODUCTION 4
2. ANALYSIS OF SOCIAL 5-6
UTILITARIANISM AND INDIVIDUAL
UTILITARIANISM
3. IMPLEMENTATION OF SOCIAL 7-8
UTILITARIANISM IS ALWAYS A
DEBATABLE ONE DEPNEDING
FROM CASE TO CASE
4. CRITICISM OF THE UTILITARIAN 9
THEORY
5. CONCLUSION 10

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 INTRODUCTION
Utilitarianism is a theory which was given in 18th and 19th century by philosophers Jeremy
Bentham and John Stuart Mill according to which an act will be considered good or bad
depending on its after effect on all the individuals. If the consequences of the particular act make
all the people happy then it is good and if it makes them sad then it is not accepted.
Utilitarianism is a theory of morality, which advocates actions that foster happiness or pleasure
and opposes actions that cause unhappiness or harm. When directed toward making social,
economic, or political decisions, a utilitarian philosophy would aim for the betterment of society
as a whole. Utilitarianism would say that an action is right if it results in the happiness of the
greatest number of people in a society or a group.

Utilitarianism is a tradition of ethical philosophy that is associated with Jeremy Bentham

and John Stuart Mill, two late 18th- and 19th-century British philosophers, economists, and
political thinkers. Utilitarianism holds that an action is right if it tends to promote happiness and
wrong if it tends to produce sadness, or the reverse of happiness—not just the happiness of the
actor but that of everyone affected by it. At work, you display utilitarianism when you take
actions to ensure that the office is a positive environment for your co-workers to be in, and then
make it so for yourself.

The Three Generally Accepted Axioms of Utilitarianism State That

• Pleasure, or happiness, is the only thing that has intrinsic value.

• Actions are right if they promote happiness, and wrong if they promote unhappiness.
• Everyone's happiness counts equally.

Rudolf Van Ihering presented the theory of social utilitarianism in his book, Der Zweck in Recht,
translated as Laws as a Means to an END. His work on social utilitarianism demanded the union
of legal conception with social realities. Ihering disagreed with the individualist assumptions of
Bentham and his colleagues. He found that positive human purposes are the basis of justice. He
had the opinion that the purpose of a legal rule is always in the interest of the society. He argued
that every one exists not merely for himself, but also for others. Individual is bound to contribute
to the social purposes. For example, social life requires a member not to encroach upon another’s
property or to repay money borrowed or to return the goods belonged to another, etc. if the
person refuses, then the state uses force or compulsion. Ihering uses the term social mechanism
for the means used by society for controlling individual purposes. Law is one of such means.
Whenever the government decides to undertake a particular task for the betterment of the society
then there will always be a particular section of the society which will not be happy with it. For
example, the government decides to clear a forest to build a road through it then there will be
some environment activist who will protest against it.

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Every individual has got its equal rights which are sacred and must be respected. So, whenever
there is any law made by the legislature, it is taken into account that how it will affect the rights
of the individual and whether the particular law will be beneficial for the welfare of the society
or not by taking into account utilitarianism concepts.

ANALYSIS OF SOCIAL UTILITARIANISM

AND INDIVIDUAL UTILITARIANISM
According to the utilitarian theory, the highest principle of morality is to increase social welfare
keeping in mind the collective happiness of all the people. So, to decide whether a particular act
is good or bad we have to take into account that how much happiness it is bringing to the people
because as per this theory, if the act brings reverse of happiness that is sadness then it is not a
good task. But if we look into the practical life, it is obvious that a particular act cannot make
everyone happy in the society because there will be individuals who will be affected by it. For
example, Newton’s third law of motion says, “To every action there is an equal and opposite
reaction”, in a similar way, if the authorities take the decision to implement a policy, then there
will a positive effect on majority of the society but there will also be a section which will not be
satisfied by the implementation of the policy. So, the bigger question arises that how will the
authorities address those dissatisfied with the policy or will they ignore their dissatisfaction
because it brings happiness to majority of the society.

In deciding what the best policy is, in deciding what the law should be, in deciding what is just,
citizens and legislators should ask themselves the question that if we add up, all of the benefits of
this policy to be implemented and subtract all of the cost, the right thing to do is the one that
maximizes the balance of happiness over suffering. So, when the government decides to clear a
forest and undertake a particular venture there, then there will be some environment activist who
will argue that it is affecting the ecosystem and can result in devastating consequences in the
near future in the form of climate change and the government must take steps to preserve these
natural resources. The government will answer by saying that they have done a complete study
about all the consequences arising from the said act and they have come to the decision that it
will do better good to the society as it will increase employment opportunity and there will be
rise in the national income which will increase the standard of living of the people and they will
be happier than before. In the particular incident the utilitarianism of the majority prevails over
the minority which means social utilitarianism is given the go in long run for social welfare of
the society.

One of the major elements of the Indian constitution where social utilitarianism is given
preference over individual utilitarianism is the Reservation System given under Article 15(4)
where the government can undertake policies and provide special provisions to promote the
interest and betterment of the backward class of the society. A society will flourish and excel

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where there is equality and everyone is respected and given equal rights and opportunities. There
exists some evil practices in the society which results in discrimination of the people who belong
to the backward section of the society and they found themselves in a tighter situation. So, the
government gives reservation to them that they can get equal opportunity and come to the similar
position in the society as the other sections have. There may be arguments that it is arbitrary and
unjust with the people belonging to the general category of the society and they are unhappy with
this policy, so in this case as per the utilitarianism theory, the reservation system prevails as it
promotes social welfare and helps the society to progress and excel in various sectors as a result
it provides higher level of happiness than reverse of happiness. The particular reason of this will
be that we go with social utilitarianism as we take into consideration the greater interest of
human mankind in a long run without doing any injustice to the rights of individual
utilitarianism.

The bigger question lying before the State is that how they choose whether social utilitarianism
promotes higher happiness and welfare or individual utilitarianism does so. The common
practice undertaken by the government is ‘Cost Benefit Analysis’ which takes into count value of
human life to decide the worthiness of a particular activity. In this they calculate all the cost
arising due to the particular act as well as all the benefits arising from it and then they go ahead
with the particular act if the benefits are higher than cost incurred. But there is a major drawback
of this method because it is difficult or completely impossible to calculate and put exact value of
a human life in monetary terms. The other major practice to decide which act brings greater
happiness was given by John Stuart Mill. Mill tried to find that type of utilitarian method which
can take into account humanitarian concepts like individual rights, health, education, etc. He said
that it is possible to distinguish between higher pleasure and lower pleasure only when someone
has experienced both the activities and he can provide the answer to which pleasure is higher.
Under this, the individual rights are privileged and taken into account but they must not come in
a way of justice as it is higher.

The legislators and other authorities under state prefer social utilitarianism over individual
utilitarianism because the follow the concept of “Greater Good for Greater Number” in most of
the cases. The legislator will go with the process of implementing a law if it promotes the rights
and interests of the majority of the society and those in the minority can argue for its validity but
the principle of greater good for greater number will outcast them but the government will not
ignore them and will address their problems and the law will be implemented. But there are
certain situations in our legal system where individual utilitarianism is given preference over the
social utilitarianism such as the rights of an accused under article 22 of the Indian constitution.

So, individual utilitarianism and social utilitarianism co exist and go hand in hand in the society
because it is obvious that social welfare can only be done if the individuals are satisfied and
happy which paves the way for growth and betterment of the society. Sometimes there occurs
conflict between social utilitarianism and individual utilitarianism in the society. In majority of
the conflicts, social utilitarianism has the upper hand because it promotes greater good for

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greater number because the state looks at in a bigger picture by taking into account all the factors
and sections of the society being affected by it. Before a policy is implemented, studies and
research are undertaken by various agencies of the government to ensure that proper analysis has
been done and interests of the individual has been respected and taken care of.

IMPLEMENTATION OF SOCIAL
UTILITARIANISM IS ALWAYS A
DEBATABLE ONE DEPENDING FROM CASE
TO CASE
As it has been already discussed that whenever there is a law introduced or policy undertaken by
the government, there is a particular section of the society which is dissatisfied and unhappy with
it although it promotes happiness of other sections of the society. The government tries to
address and answer those who are dissatisfied with that it promotes welfare and happiness of
majority of the society and will prove beneficial in a long run. For example, the laws introduced
for abolition of sati system was not accepted by various sections of the society then because it
was considered as an attempt to take away their cultural rights but the law went on. If we look at
it today, that law proved beneficial for the society in the long run and paved way for better life
and situation of the women. In the said case, the overall happiness of the society was given
advantage over the dissatisfaction of a particular section i.e. social utilitarianism was chosen over
individual utilitarianism.

If we look at another example, there is a terrorist who was caught by the police and he had the
information about a future terrorist attack on 500-800 people. The policemen interrogated and
tried to find out the information from him which could save the life of number of peoples who
would be affected by the attack. So here arises the bigger question that can the terrorist be
tortured and inflicted suffering to get the relevant information or the policemen will take into
account the individual rights of the terrorist. The policemen can access the information from him
by giving him a dose of truth serum or by torturing him with electric shock but that is unlawful
under the laws as there are certain rights enjoyed by the accused under article 20(3) of the Indian
constitution. Under this, it is unlawful to do Narco analysis by the investigating agencies as it
will violate the above mentioned article. So, here the individual rights of the accused are
respected and promoted although its violation will help in protecting the life of a larger number
of lives. In the particular case, the principle of “Greater Good for Greater Number” by Mill is not
taken into consideration and individual utilitarianism prevails over social utilitarianism.

For example, there is large number of protests when government undertakes the construction of
dam on a particular river. The task of dam construction has been increasingly challenged by
environmental civil society network. We talk about the construction of Hirakund Dam which

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received backlashes by the local people and other environment activist. They argued that it will
result in displacement of the local people along with adversely affecting the ecosystem and
affecting day to day lives of a large number of people. The government in its answer said that the
dam is being constructed with the objective of achieving four tasks which were flood
management, hydropower production, irrigation and navigation and these objectives will result
in betterment and promotion of society welfare at large. It is another point that the government
failed poorly at accomplishing its objectives as it resulted in more displaced people than
estimated and more acres of land got submerged under the water. It also resulted in displacement
of people along with rise in health crisis, livelihood crisis. At the time of construction, the
government took into consideration social utilitarianism and the argument of the section of the
society which was unhappy was not considered.

One of the most relevant cases of conflict between social utilitarianism and individual
utilitarianism can be seen in the decision taken by the government to introduce “The Citizenship
Amendment Act, 2019” which resulted in widespread protest throughout the country. The bill
was passed by the government which amends the Indian Citizenship to illegal migrants from
Afghanistan, Bangladesh and Pakistan who belong to Hindu, Sikh, Jain, Parsi, Buddhist and
Christian community and had entered India before 2014. The bill did not mention anything about
the Muslim migrants. There was protest in the country as the bill was said to be discriminatory
on the basis of religion and it only targeted the Muslim community. The people of Assam did not
want this act to be implemented because it would put in danger their political rights, culture and
land. The government argument supporting the decision was that, millions of people of other
faiths were residing in Pakistan, Afghanistan and Bangladesh which provides for a state religion
and they had faced persecution on grounds of religion in those countries. They were denied the
right to practice, profess and propagate their religion. They fled to India and have taken shelter
since then and continue to live in the country. So, to protect their rights and interest the
government had decided to go ahead with this decision. Here, social utilitarianism was given
advantage over individual utilitarianism because the CAA will do greater good to greater
number.

One of the latest examples can be the abolition of some labour laws by the Uttar Pradesh
government during this pandemic of Corona virus. The government decides to suspend some
important laws such as ‘The Minimum Wages Act’ and ‘The Equal Remuneration Act’ to
promote economic interest of the state. Their stand was that it will enable the industries to work
efficiently in this pandemic and will encourage the investors to invest more. But what about the
rights and interests of these workers and how will they be protected against exploitation by the
owners? The decision completely ignores the happiness of workers as after the suspension of
these laws, there will be no security of their jobs and the owners are not obliged to pay the wages
as per the work done by the labour. The government argument was that it was an attempt to
promote and revive the economy of the state which got affected by the lockdown. Thus, the pain
and suffering of the worker has been overlooked in the greater interest of the state. Here, once

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again it is debatable whether social utilitarianism must be taken into account excluding the
individual utilitarianism as there is no complete answer as to what is more important i.e. rights of
the labour or the economic interest of the industry.

CRITICISM OF THE UTALITARIANISM THEORY

There has been criticism leveled against the utilitarian theory given by Bentham and Mill. One of
the major criticisms of this theory is that a person can lie in public places to avoid
embarrassment but since it does no harm to anyone, it is permissible under the theory of
utilitarianism. For example, if there is a party of renowned people of a town and there have been
charges of corruption leveled against one of them and that individual out of embarrassment and
to protect his image among the other people, tells that there have been no such charges put
against him. This act of telling lie would not do harm to anyone but it is against the moral ethics
and standard of the society, thus this theory fails to take into account such acts.

Another criticism of this theory is that it solely focuses and talks about increasing the happiness
and welfare of the society by a particular act and does not focus on removing the sufferings and
pain incurred by the people. If an act is introduced with the intention of increasing the happiness
of the people without taking into account the pain and suffering of the people, then it will result
in increasing the happiness of already happy people. Increasing happiness must not only be the
focus but there must be measures taken to reduce or remove the evil practices existing in the
society which results in inflicting pain and suffering to the people.

Another criticism of the utilitarianism theory is that it talks about the happiness or reverse of
happiness arising out of a particular act, but cannot be certain or completely sure about the
consequences of it. The example of this criticism can be found in the earlier given example of
construction of Hirakund dam by the government. They argued that it will benefit at four
objectives which were flood management, hydropower production, irrigation and navigation and
these objectives will result in betterment and promotion of society welfare at large. But even
today after 50 years of construction there has been no benefit from the construction of dam and it
has failed poorly. So, this theory cannot be certain while predicting that a particular act will bring
happiness or not in the near future.

An important criticism of the utilitarian theory is that it does not take into account the rights and
interest of the minority as they follow the principle of “Greater Good for Greater Number”. The
question arising out of this approach that why the interest and arguments of minority is ignored
because the said law may adversely affect their culture. For example, if the government decides
to clear a forest to make roads then there may be a section of the society which will be unhappy
but the government will say that it is an act done for greater good and their plea cannot be
considered, then it is unjust and arbitrary. In a democratic country every sector of the society has
their individual rights which must be protected and respected. A government cannot ignore their
voices just because they are less in number.

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Another criticism of this theory is the measure of worthiness of an act by cost benefit analysis
where a monetary value is placed to calculate the value of human life. It is impossible to
calculate the value of human life in monetary terms because how will you assign that , what
factors you will consider, is there any uniform process for assigning the value, etc. The value of
human value may be different as per different individuals. For example, A can say that according
to him the value of life is two million and another individual B will argue that the value of
human life is ten million. So, the debate of arising at a particular is very difficult and next to
impossible.

CONCLUSION
As per the utilitarian theory, an act will be considered good or bad depending on its after effect
on all the individuals. If the consequences of the particular act make all the people happy then it
is good and if it makes them sad then it is not accepted. The motive of the individuals does not
matter but it is the consequences which matter in terming an act correct or wrong. There is the
principle of ‘Greater Good for Greater Number’ according to which an act is undertaken because
it helps in increasing the conditions of the larger section of the society. The government decides
to undertake a particular act or law to implement it in the society after considering its overall
affect on all the people. It is obvious that from every act every individual will not be happy, there
will some people who will disagree with it. But this is how government works by taking into
account the criticism faced by a particular section to make decisions for betterment and welfare
of the society.

In every act there will be a debate that whether it will be accepted by every member of the
society or will there be anyone opposing it? So, the legislators and authorities look at it in a
bigger picture as to what affect will it have on the majority of the society. For example, the
decision of passing CAA was looked as beneficiary for the larger section of the society and was
given preference although there were protests by a particular section of the society. Thus, it is
pretty obvious from the above arguments that Social Utilitarianism prevails over Individual
Utilitarianism in most of the cases.

The reason why we go with social utilitarianism over individual utilitarianism is that we take into
consideration the greater interest of human mankind in a long run. If we do justice and respect
the individual rights in terms of the betterment of the society then there will be progress and
welfare in the society. So to decide what the best law is, what the best policy is, what the right
action is, the government takes those acts only which bring higher happiness among the people
over the sufferings and pain. If we look into the practical life, once Chandragupta Maurya said
that “It is better to sacrifice an individual for family, family for town and town for state”, so it is
the betterment of the society which is given preference over individual interests in most of the
cases.

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Concluding the project, I have learnt that for choosing between higher pleasure and sacred
individual rights, we don’t have full answer as per the utilitarian theory but will require other non
utilitarian ways. There will always remain a conflict in front of the government that they should
go for social utilitarianism or individual utilitarianism.

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