Michael Walzer: Community in the spheres of justice

This text discusses Walzer?e position in relation to liberalistic concepts of justice, inequality, citizenship and ethnocultural identity. Unlike liberals, Walzer emphasizes the importance of nonvolntary associations and duties caused by such association, just as social inequality, which is the result of belonging to ethnocultural group. The text also considers Walzer?s answers to critiques that his position implies moral relativism. As far as politics is concerned, Walzer?s position claims that ethical systems on which communities in liberal society rely, are liberalized enough, with accepted principles of fairness, tolerance and intergroup justice. These systems correspond to political "liberal consensus", which cannot be derived from prepolitical ethos.

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Utilitarianism and beyond by Amartya Sen and Bernard Williams; Spheres of Justice: A Defense of Pluralism and Equality by Michael Walzer

Challenge ◽

10.1080/05775132.1983.11470886 ◽

1983 ◽

Vol 26 (5) ◽

pp. 60-64

Author(s):

Michael S. McPherson

Keyword(s):

Amartya Sen ◽

Michael Walzer ◽

Bernard Williams ◽

Spheres Of Justice

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Michael Walzer, Spheres of Justice

The Oxford Handbook of Classics in Contemporary Political Theory ◽

10.1093/oxfordhb/9780198717133.013.45 ◽

2016 ◽

Cited By ~ 3

Author(s):

Margaret Moore

Keyword(s):

Social Justice ◽

Political Theory ◽

Michael Walzer ◽

Spheres Of Justice ◽

Micro Level ◽

Different Levels

This essay examines the ideas and influence of Michael Walzer’s Spheres of Justice. It argues that Walzer’s influence on the discipline has taken a different form than many other writers on justice, such as Rawls, where the central ideas have been taken up and argued about in essentially Rawlsian terms. Walzer’s influence has operated on different levels, of which we can distinguish at least three. There is a micro level, with numerous authors picking up fruitful ideas, lines of inquiries or suggestions, found in Walzer’s work, and appropriating them or using them to pursue further arguments. There is a more general social justice level, where ideas that are central to his understanding of social justice have been appropriated by diverse thinkers, often in quite different ways. He has been also influential on a very general, methodological level, where theorists have adopted his method and style of doing political theory.

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