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Expressions like right, wrong, justice, and sense of right are accepted without misunderstanding even with reference to social matters, they . . create the same hopeless confusion in any scientific investigation of economic relations as would be created, for instance, in modern chemistry if the terminology of the phlo­ giston theory were to be retained. (Quoted in Harvey 1 996, 3 3 1 ) Although Harvey ( 1 996, 332) agrees that justice as embodied in the law within capitalist states reflects the interests of the ruling class, he neverthe­ less believes the term can create a powerful mobilizing force for political action.

A further problem of the deliberative approach arises from the rela­ tionship between speech and action. Major changes in social conscious­ ness require deeper transformations than mere verbal assent ( Lukacs 1 97 1 ) . Even if perceptions of interest are biased or misdirected by dis­ torted speech and even if structures are socially produced, changing speech alone does not transform the structures that shape consciousness. Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels ( 1 947), in their critique of the Hege­ lians, assert that the world was changed through struggle, not the force of ideas.

He then presents a quote from Engels: Justice [ expressed in legal terms] is but the ideologized, glorified expression of the existing economic relations . . While in every­ day life . . expressions like right, wrong, justice, and sense of right are accepted without misunderstanding even with reference to social matters, they . . create the same hopeless confusion in any scientific investigation of economic relations as would be created, for instance, in modern chemistry if the terminology of the phlo­ giston theory were to be retained.