<P> The first modern usage of the specific term `` social justice '' is typically attributed to Catholic thinkers from the 1840s , including the Jesuit Luigi Taparelli in Civiltà Cattolica , based on the work of St. Thomas Aquinas . He argued that rival capitalist and socialist theories , based on subjective Cartesian thinking , undermined the unity of society present in Thomistic metaphysics as neither were sufficiently concerned with moral philosophy . Writing in 1861 , the influential British philosopher and economist , John Stuart Mill stated in Utilitarianism his view that `` Society should treat all equally well who have deserved equally well of it , that is , who have deserved equally well absolutely . This is the highest abstract standard of social and distributive justice ; towards which all institutions , and the efforts of all virtuous citizens , should be made in the utmost degree to converge . '' </P>
when was the term social justice first used
the 1840s