scholarly journals Rawls on Markets and Corporate Governance

2015 ◽  
Vol 25 (1) ◽  
pp. 29-64 ◽  
Author(s):  
Wayne Norman
Keyword(s):  
Political Economy ◽  
Political Culture ◽  
John Rawls ◽  
Market Failure ◽  
Regulatory State ◽  
Theory Of Justice ◽  
Theories Of Justice ◽  
Just Society ◽  
Egalitarian Theory

ABSTRACT:Like most egalitarian political philosophers, John Rawls believes that a just society will rely on markets and business firms for much of its economic activity—despite acknowledging that market systems will tend to create very unequal distributions of goods, opportunities, power, and status. Rawls himself remains one of the few contemporary political philosophers to explore at any length the way an egalitarian theory of justice might deal with fundamental options in political economy. This article examines his arguments and conclusions on these topics. It argues that contemporary Rawlsians will reach different conclusions if they take more seriously than Rawls himself did: (1) the implications, for the political culture and the democratic regulatory state, of large firms competing in adversarial markets characterized by the inevitable “fact of market failure,” and (2) the relevance of ownership and governance relationships involving different kinds of business firms. And with respect to the second point, Rawlsians and other egalitarians have much to learn from contemporary economic, legal, and sociological theories of the firm, and the role of these theories in the structure of and rationale for corporate law. This is the kind of social theory that Rawls believes is relevant to the justification and application of theories of justice, but he himself did not appeal to it in his writings on political economy. Contemporary egalitarians can and should appeal to it now, and in doing so correct errors and omissions in Rawls’s analysis. But taking seriously the two points mentioned above will also force egalitarians who support efficient markets to face difficult dilemmas or compromises of their own.

Aristotle, Kant and Rawls on Moral Motivation in a Just Society

1980 ◽  
Vol 74 (2) ◽  
pp. 385-393 ◽  
Author(s):  
Steven M. DeLue
Keyword(s):  
Political Theory ◽  
John Rawls ◽  
Moral Theory ◽  
Moral Motivation ◽  
Self Esteem ◽  
Mutual Respect ◽  
Theory Of Justice ◽  
Standards Of Conduct ◽  
Principles Of Justice ◽  
Just Society

John Rawls considers his Theory of Justice to be in the Kantian tradition. Generally there seems to be agreement among Rawls' critics that at least with respect to the procedural formulation of the principles of justice, it is difficult to call Rawls' position Kantian. In this article I will argue that Rawls' Kantianism is best understood as providing a motive source for acting upon known just standards of conduct. In this regard Rawls can be read as synthesizing aspects of Aristotle's Nicomachean Ethics and Kant's moral reasoning to provide the rationale to explain why an individual who knows what is morally correct conduct in a given situation, makes such knowledge the source of his action. Demonstrating the Aristotelean roots of Rawls' Kantianism with respect to the problem of motivation for just conduct helps one understand how Kant's moral theory can be viewed in Rawls' words not as a “morality of austere command but … [as] … an ethic of mutual respect and self esteem” (1971, p. 251). Secondly, this view of Kant provides the basis for understanding the anti-corporatist aspect of Rawls' political theory that my reading of Rawls makes necessary.

Rawlsian Affirmative Action

1998 ◽  
pp. 1-8
Author(s):  
Robert Allen
Keyword(s):  
Affirmative Action ◽  
John Rawls ◽  
Original Position ◽  
Remedial Measures ◽  
Theory Of Justice ◽  
Rational Person ◽  
Social Contracts ◽  
Primary Goods ◽  
Just Society

In A Theory of Justice, John Rawls presents a method of determining how a just society would allocate its "primary goods"-that is, those things any rational person would desire, such as opportunities, liberties, rights, wealth, and the bases of self-respect. Rawls' method of adopting the "original position" is supposed to yield a "fair" way of distributing such goods. A just society would also have the need (unmet in the above work) to determine how the victims of injustice ought to be compensated, since history suggests that social contracts are likely to be violated. This paper is an attempt to determine the remedial measures that would be selected using Rawls' method. I contend that only two of the three most widely used "affirmative action" policies would be selected from the original position. I also sketch another compensatory policy that would pass Rawls' fairness test.

Conclusion

2020 ◽  
pp. 171-174
Author(s):  
Timothy Fowler
Keyword(s):  
Interpersonal Relationships ◽  
John Rawls ◽  
Well Being ◽  
Fair Share ◽  
Theory Of Justice ◽  
Principles Of Justice ◽  
Economic Fairness ◽  
Children's Interests ◽  
Good Environment

The central arguments of this book have been that children are owed a good environment in which to grow up and that adults are owed the stable and supported right to care for children if they so desire. In Part I, I explored how to conceptualize children’s justice and how to measure whether children’s interests are being met by their society. I showed why children’s interests cannot be understood in terms of holding a set of resources, even if resources are understood in a very broad sense. When the subject of justice is understood to be adults, then it makes sense that the role of principles of justice simply be giving each person their fair share. This was the perspective taken by the two most influential liberal thinkers of the last century, John Rawls and Ronald Dworkin. I suggested their approach cannot cope with the needs of children, since children might have a fair share of economic resources yet grow up socialized into beliefs, values and practices that are harmful to their current and future flourishing. A theory of justice must, therefore, take holistic account of the various ways in which upbringing might affect a person’s life, thus looking at its effects on children’s well-being. To meet this challenge, I offered an objective list account of children’s well-being which suggested that this is principally driven by the quality of their relationships with others. This theoretical shift implies a reconceptualization of what justice is about. Instead of justice being understood primarily as economic fairness, it must be seen as fundamentally about creating a society with norms and practice which foster flourishing interpersonal relationships, with a particular concern for the least advantaged children whose interests must be given priority....

Ideal and Nonideal Theory in Political Philosophy

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Christopher Thompson
Keyword(s):  
John Rawls ◽  
Social Institutions ◽  
Comparative Judgment ◽  
Ideal Theory ◽  
Nonideal Theory ◽  
Theory Of Justice ◽  
The Status ◽  
Just Society ◽  
Methodological Concern ◽  
The Many

The distinction between ideal and nonideal theory is an important methodological concern in contemporary political theory. At issue is the extent to which political theorizing is a practical endeavor and, consequently, the extent to which real-world facts should either be factored into political theorizing or else be assumed away. The distinction between ideal theory and nonideal theory was first introduced by John Rawls in his classic A Theory of Justice. Rawls’s ideal theory is an account of the society we should aim for, given certain facts about human nature and possible social institutions, and involves two central assumptions. First, it assumes full compliance of relevant agents with the demands of justice. Second, it assumes that historical and natural conditions of society are reasonably favorable. These two assumptions are individually necessary and jointly sufficient for his ideal theory. For Rawls, nonideal theory primarily addresses the question of how the ideal might be achieved in practical, permissible steps, from the actual, partially just society we occupy. The account of ideal and nonideal theory advanced by Rawls has been subject to criticism from different directions. Amartya Sen accepts Rawls’s distinction between ideal and nonideal theory but argues that Rawlsian-style nonideal theory is too ideal. Given the many and severe injustices we face we do not need to know what ideal (or “transcendental”) justice looks like; our focus should not be on how to transition toward this ideal. Instead, the advancement of justice requires a comparative judgment which ranks possible policies in terms of being more or less just than the status quo. G. A. Cohen, by contrast, argues that Rawlsian-style ideal theory is not really ideal theory as such, but instead principles for regulating society. Our beliefs about normative principles should, ultimately, be insensitive to matters of empirical fact; genuine ideal theory is a form of moral epistemology (an exercise of identifying normative truths).

PROCEDURAL VERSUS SUBSTANTIVE JUSTICE: RAWLS AND NOZICK

2006 ◽  
Vol 24 (1) ◽  
pp. 164-186 ◽  
Author(s):  
David Lewis Schaefer
Keyword(s):  
John Rawls ◽  
Free Society ◽  
Robert Nozick ◽  
Difference Principle ◽  
Political Justice ◽  
Theory Of Justice ◽  
Liberal Societies ◽  
Substantive Justice ◽  
The Difference ◽  
Just Society

This paper critically assesses the “procedural” accounts of political justice set forth by John Rawls in A Theory of Justice (1971) and Robert Nozick in Anarchy, State, and Utopia (1974). I argue that the areas of agreement between Rawls and Nozick are more significant than their disagreements. Even though Nozick offers trenchant criticisms of Rawls's argument for economic redistribution (the “difference principle”), Nozick's own economic libertarianism is undermined by his “principle of rectification,” which he offers as a possible ground in practice for the application of something like the difference principle. Both Rawls's and Nozick's accounts of justice fail because of their abstraction from human nature as a ground of right. At the same time the libertarianism on which they agree in the non-economic sphere would deprive a free society of its necessary moral underpinning. Rawls and Nozick err, finally, by demanding that the policies pursued by a just society conform to theoretical formulas concocted by philosophy professors, rather than leaving room (as Lockean liberalism does) for the adjustment of policies to particular circumstances based on statesmen's prudential judgment and the consent of the governed. Particularly troubling from the perspective of a citizen seriously concerned with the advancement of justice and freedom is both thinkers' shrill denunciations of existing liberal societies for failing to conform to their particular strictures.

Need for a Shot of Justice

2019 ◽  
pp. 1-50
Author(s):  
Ali Mehdi
Keyword(s):  
Political Philosophy ◽  
Social Justice ◽  
John Rawls ◽  
Child Survival ◽  
Equality Of Opportunity ◽  
Theory Of Justice ◽  
Child Deaths ◽  
Just Society ◽  
Breaking Work

Given the backlash against the politics and practice of social justice, this chapter provides a justification for an engagement with the proactive debate in political philosophy on ‘equalisandum’—what is to be equalized across individuals in a just society—since the publication of John Rawls’ path-breaking work, A Theory of Justice, in 1971. Since injustice faced by children is the biggest blot on the promise of equality of opportunity, it makes a case for anchoring the discussion of equalisandum in the context of child survival, in India. Millions of children continue to lack the opportunity to even survive within the first five years of birth, and India has recorded not only the highest number of child deaths for decades, but also some of the worst forms of injustice. The chapter ends with a brief discussion on why Amartya Sen’s capability metric is preferable vis-à-vis its Rawlsian and resourcist counterparts, both conceptually and contextually.

Introduction

John Rawls ◽  
2020 ◽  
pp. 163-169
Keyword(s):  
John Rawls ◽  
Social Cooperation ◽  
Theory Of Justice ◽  
Egalitarian Theory

Any egalitarian theory of justice must have some measure by which one can determine whether a system of social cooperation is fair or not. In particular, one must have some metric by which to tell if a system is working to the advantage or disadvantage of a citizen, or as John Rawls puts it, we need “an idea of each participant’s rational advantage, or good.”...

scholarly journals Political Economy and the roots of Rawls’ original position

DoisPontos ◽  
2013 ◽  
Vol 10 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Fabrício Pontin
Keyword(s):  
Political Economy ◽  
John Rawls ◽  
John Stuart Mill ◽  
Original Position ◽  
Theory Of Justice ◽  
Kenneth Arrow

O impacto e a relevância da teoria econômica para o desenvolvimento de A Theory of Justice são, frequentemente, deixados de lado na imensa literatura a respeito das obras de John Rawls. Ainda assim, entender os elementos de economia política na obra de Rawls é fundamental para a compreensão dos motivos pelos quais ele abandonará uma abordagem utilitarista para a filosofia política e, consequentemente , par a noss o entendimento das principais questões que dão origem à noção de justiça como equidade. Este artigo tem dois objetivos principais: primeiramente, descrever a influência de John Stuart Mill, Kenneth Arrow e Vilfredo Pareto na virada metodológica encontrada na ideia de posição original; segundo, descrever os elementos históricos pressupostos para a compreensibilidade dos ideais rawlsianos. Concluirei com algumas observações que sugerem um complemento historicista e fenomenológico para as descrições ideais encontradas no liberalismo político tal como é entendido por Rawls.

Between Sentimentalism and Instrumentalism. The Societal Role of Work in John Rawls’s Property-Owning Democracy and Its Bearing upon Basic Income

2013 ◽  
Vol 35 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Michael G. Festl
Keyword(s):  
Sense Of Community ◽  
John Rawls ◽  
Economic Order ◽  
Basic Income ◽  
Alternative Account ◽  
Policy Consideration ◽  
Just Society ◽  
Community Component ◽  
Societal Role

AbstractIn recent years research on John Rawls has experienced a surge in interest in Rawls’s elaborations on the economic order of a just society. This research entails the treatment of the issue which societal role Rawls attaches to work. Somewhat dissatisfied with these treatments the article at hand develops an alternative account of the function Rawls has in mind for work. It will be argued that within Rawls’s idea of a just society the societal role of work consists of three components: an ‘efficiency component’, a ‘self-respect, component’, and a ‘sense of community component.’ Based on that, reconstruction of the Rawlsian position I will investigate whether such a position is reconcilable with the demand for an unconditional Basic Income. The article’s contribution is mostly exegetical albeit, in dealing with Basic Income it elucidates how an oft-proposed policy consideration with a bearing upon work can and cannot, be justified.

scholarly journals POLÍTICAS PÚBLICAS EDUCACIONAIS À LUZ DA TEORIA DA JUSTIÇA DE JOHN RAWLS

2021 ◽  
Vol 25 (1) ◽  
pp. 449
Author(s):  
Rafael Soares de Lima ◽  
Murilo Chaves Vilarinho
Keyword(s):  
John Rawls ◽  
Public Policies ◽  
Basic Structure ◽  
Research Literature ◽  
Exploratory Research ◽  
Equitable Distribution ◽  
National Education ◽  
Theory Of Justice ◽  
Principles Of Justice ◽  
Just Society

Segundo John Rawls, uma sociedade justa é aquela em que há garantia da liberdade individual e da promoção e distribuição equitativa de oportunidades e recursos. O presente artigo objetiva abordar os princípios da justiça como equidade, em Rawls, enquanto instrumentos para a reflexão acerca das políticas públicas educacionais no Brasil, em especial o Plano Nacional de Educação (PNE). Metodologicamente, o estudo se baseia em pesquisa exploratória, bibliográfica e análise documental. Como resultados,  identifica correlações entre os objetivos do PNE, a manutenção das liberdades iguais e a maximização das expectativas dos menos favorecidos, bem como limitações em relação à distribuição equitativa de oportunidades de ocupação, no âmbito da estrutura básica da sociedade, com atenção especial para a educação.EDUCATION POLICY ACCORDING TO JOHN RAWLS’ THEORY OF JUSTICEAbstract According to John Rawls, a just society is one in which individual freedom and the promotion and equitable distribution of opportunities and resources are guaranteed. The present article aims to address the principles of justice as equity, in Rawls, as instruments for reflection on educational public policies in Brazil, especially the National Education Plan (PNE). Methodologically, the study is based on exploratory research, literature and document analysis. As a result, it identifies correlations between the objectives of the PNE, the maintenance of equal freedoms and the maximization of the expectations of the less fortunate, as well as limitations regarding the equitable distribution of occupation opportunities, within the basic structure of society, with special attention to the education.Keywords: Education. Public Policies. Theory of Justice. John Rawls.

Sign in / Sign up

Export Citation Format

Share Document