Today the problem of the "just" distribution of social primary goods (power, status, property, rights, and duties) is in the fore front of discussion in Moral Philosophy and in Economics. The scope of this article is to inform the reader about the recent discussion in the allied disciplines of sociology and to remind him of the way social justice is treated by Marx, Durkheim, and Spencer. Part I begins with a discussion of the basic problems of normative theories of distributive justice. Subsequently, the idea of "socialist justice" is outlined. It is shown that there are significant differences between Marx, Lenin, and neo-Stalinistic Marxism-Leninism. The thesis put forward suggests that Marx did not condemn capitalism for injustice. Furthermore, the analysis proves that it makes no sense to understand the "principle of needs" as being Marx's principle of justice. This widespread assumption which cannot be found only among philosophers (e.g. Kelsen, Topitsch, Husami) but also among social-psychologists (e.g. Leventhal) overlooks that, according to Hume's criterion, communism is a society beyond law and justice.