Getting What We Deserve (Social Policies and Social Justice) (Melvin J. Lerner's "the Belief in a Just World: A Fundamental Delusion"‪)‬

IN HIS 1980 BOOK, The Belief in a Just World: A Fundamental Delusion, social psychologist Melvin J. Lerner presents empirical evidence indicating that we seem to have a strong need to believe that people get what they deserve and deserve what they get--that the world is just in that sense. Indeed, the famous biblical story of Job expresses the timeless longing for a just world, understood in that way. Job insists that he did nothing to deserve the disasters and tragedies visited upon him, presumably by God. But his friends who are trying to "console" him insist that the very fact of these calamities proves that Job hasn't been as righteous as he claims to be.