Normative and Empirical Justice Research : A Preliminary Exploration of Public Administrators in the Health Care Context

Social equity and social justice have been a fundamental concern for public administration scholars and practitioners. So far the literature is largely normative in nature and centered on John Rawls’ theory of justice, paying less attention to how public administrators actually think about justice. This article reviews the background of justice theories and debates, compares three empirical justice beliefs, and explores public health administrators’ principles of justice. Drawing from an online survey of a convenience sample, the authors find both merit-based and equality-based beliefs among public administrators in the heath care context. The results show that respondents’ justice beliefs affect their attitudes toward government spending on health care, and the respondents’ justice beliefs are not affected by their factual knowledge about inequalities