John Rawls

Rawls's Theory of Justice

By David Gordon
The American Conservative, July 28, 2008

Edited by Andy Ross

John Rawls is the most important political philosopher of the 20th century.

Rawls provided a comprehensive philosophical system that justified the main preoccupations of the center-left, which dominates academic life, and put classical liberals and conservatives at a disadvantage.

Rawls published A Theory of Justice in 1971. Stuart Hampshire, writing in the New York Review of Books, called the book the most important work in moral philosophy since the end of World War II.

Rawls was born into a well-connected family in Baltimore. He attended Princeton University, fought in the Pacific during World War II, and thereafter led the life of a quiet academic. For most of his career he taught at Harvard.

The dominant approach in pre-Rawls political philosophy was utilitarianism, which says we should try to achieve the most satisfaction possible for everyone. Rawls pointed out the problem that some people’s interests can be sacrificed if doing so will maximize total satisfaction.

Rawls asks what we can do when faced with the fact that people do not agree on a common conception of the good. He answers that even if people do not agree on the good, they can accept a fair procedure for settling what the principles of justice should be.

Rawls invokes a veil of ignorance. Suppose five children have to divide a cake among themselves. One child cuts the cake, but he does not know who will get the shares. He is likely to divide the cake into equal shares. By denying the child information that would bias the result, a fair outcome can be achieved.

Rawls asks that we imagine an original position in which people do not know their own abilities, tastes, and conceptions of the good. Under this limit, individuals motivated by self-interest endeavor to arrive at principles of justice.

Rawls thinks that everyone will want certain primary goods, including rights and liberties, powers and opportunities, income and wealth, and self-respect. Without these primary goods, no one can accomplish his goals. Hence, individuals in the original position will agree that everyone should get at least a minimum amount of these primary goods.

Rawls thinks that people will agree to two principles of justice. The first calls for the greatest liberty for each person, consistent with equal liberty for all. Rawls thinks they will give this principle priority over the principle of difference, which in part deals with distribution of economic goods.

The most controversial part of the theory is the difference principle. Rawls contends that people in the original position would start by wanting to distribute wealth and income equally, but this is soon modified. People realize that we respond to incentives.

Rawls proposes that all inequalities must be to the advantage of the least well off group. His theory does not rule out the competitive pursuit of excellence. But he believes individuals cannot justifiably complain if they do not benefit fully from the fruits of their superior achievement. He argues that people do not deserve to reap the rewards of their talents.

Rawls never abandoned his theory of justice, but in his 1993 work Political Liberalism, he began emphasizing that in modern constitutional democracies like the United States, disagreements over fundamental values and issues such as abortion can threaten the stability of society.

Rawls says people must rely only on public reason. But his idea of public reason has little to recommend it. Rawls has simply defined a notion of social stability to suit his theory. He never shows that something bad will happen if a society is not stable in his sense.

Rawls's star is now in the ascendant, but philosophical fashions often change.


David Gordon is a Senior Fellow of the Ludwig von Mises Institute and editor of The Mises Review.
 

AR  Rawls's theory of justice was the latest fashion when I was a philosophy student in Oxford — Judy and I wrote essays on it.