The entitlement theory insists on distributive justice and includes principles that govern how someone can divest himself from a holding and pass it to an unheld state. The principle of justice mainly states that a person who acquires a holding in accordance with this principle in acquisition then automatically becomes entitled to the holding. Also, a person who acquires a holding in accordance with the principle from someone who is entitled to the holding then he genuinely becomes entitled to the holding (Nozick 154).

In the principle of distributive justice, Nozick stresses that a distribution is just if every person is entitled to the holding they possess in the distribution. Distribution is just when and if the holdings emerge from another distribution that is just and legitimate. The principle specifies the legitimate means and ways of moving from one distribution of holdings to another in the transfer process. Whatever arises from a just process and just situation makes itself just because it has been acquired in the required and legitimate manner. The principle is meant to preserve justice in the transfer hence referred to as truth-preserving. This means that a situation arising from repeated transitions in accordance with the principle from a just situation is itself just. Not all situations are generated in accordance with the principles of justice in holdings. Some people defraud or steal from others or enslave people in order to seize their products and at the same time prevent them from living freely as they choose or please. Others forcibly exclude other people from competing in the exchanges. These methods and modes are not permissible ways of transition from a situation to another because they are unlawful and unfair. The existence of the injustices and mean not sanctioned by the principle leads to the third topic under justice in holdings, the rectification of injustice in holdings (Corlett 234).

Nozick suggests that the rectification of injustice in holding tries to determine what ought to be done to rectify the situation. It tries to figure out the obligation that the performers of injustice have towards those in worse positions. It also tries to determine the direct and indirect beneficiaries of the injustices.