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RAWLS’S A THEORY OF JUSTICE Continuum Reader’s Guides Continuum’s Reader’s Guides are clear, concise, and accessible intro- ductions to classic works of philosophy. Each book explores the major themes, historical and philosophical context, and key passages of a major philosophical text, guiding the reader toward a thorough understanding of often demanding material. Ideal for undergraduate students, the guides provide an essential resource for anyone who needs to get to grips with a philosophical text. Reader’s Guides available from Continuum: Aristotle’s Nicomachean Ethics – Christopher Warne Aristotle’s Politics – Judith A. Swanson and C. 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Cook Wittgenstein’s Tractatus Logico Philosophicus – Roger M. White RAWLS’S A THEORY OF JUSTICE A Reader’s Guide FRANK LOVETT Continuum International Publishing Group The Tower Building 80 Maiden Lane 11 York Road Suite 704 London SE1 7NX New York, NY 10038 www.continuumbooks.com © Frank Lovett, 2011 All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or any information storage or retrieval system, without prior permission in writing from the publishers. Excerpts from A Theory of Justice by John Rawls reprinted by permission of the Belknap Press of Harvard University Press, Cambridge, MA. Copyright © 1971, 1999 by the President and Fellows of Harvard College. British Library Cataloguing-in-Publication Data A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library. ISBN: 978-0-8264-3781-5 Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Lovett, Frank. Rawls’s A theory of justice : a reader’s guide / Frank Lovett. p. cm. Includes bibliographical references. ISBN: 978-0-8264-3781-5 1. Rawls, John, 1921–2002. Theory of justice. 2. Justice. I. Title. JC578.R383L58 2010 320.01'1–dc22 2010013372 Typeset by Newgen Imaging Systems Pvt Ltd, Chennai, India Printed and bound in India by Replika Press Pvt Ltd For Liz This page intentionally left blank CONTENTS Acknowledgments viii 1 Introduction and Context 1 1.1 Biography and historical background 1 1.2 The philosophical background 4 1.3 Overview of Rawls’s writings 12 2 Overview of Themes 14 2.1 The main idea of A Theory of Justice 14 2.2 The text: a quick guide 20 3 Reading the Text 23 3.1 An outline of justice as fairness (§§ 1–3) 23 3.2 Utilitarianism and intuitionism (§§ 5–8) 30 3.3 Reflective equilibrium and method (§§ 4, 9) 37 3.4 The two principles of justice (§§ 10–14) 44 3.5 Characterizing justice as fairness (§§ 15–17) 65 3.6 The original position (§§ 20, 22, 24–25) 75 3.7 The presentation of alternatives (§§ 21, 23) 87 3.8 The argument for justice as fairness (§§ 26–30, 33) 94 3.9 The institutions of a just society (§§ 31–32, 34–39, 41–43) 110 3.10 Completing the argument (§§ 40, 44–50) 117 3.11 Justice and the individual (§§ 18–19, 51–59) 128 3.12 The search for stability (§§ 60–87) 136 4 Reception and Influence 143 4.1 A Theory of Justice as a classic 143 4.2 The liberal-communitarian debate 144 4.3 Further debates and current standing 150 Notes 155 Bibliography and Further Reading 159 Index 163 vii ACKNOWLEDGMENTS When I was first invited to write this reader’s guide by Sarah Campbell, I naively assumed that it would be a simple matter of transcribing my well-worn lecture notes on Rawls’s A Theory of Justice into prose. In the event, it not only proved much more challenging, but also much more rewarding than I had anticipated. I would like to thank Ian MacMullen, Ron Watson, and my wife Liz Vickerman for carefully reading and com- menting on earlier drafts; Amanda Sabele for helping secure the necessary permissions; Sarah Campbell, Tom Crick, and P. Muralidharan at Continuum Books for guiding the book to print; and finally, my students at Washington University in St. Louis, who have consistently challenged me to understand Rawls better than I might ever have done on my own. viii CHAPTER 1 INTRODUCTION AND CONTEXT 1.1 BIOGRAPHY AND HISTORICAL BACKGROUND John Rawls (1921–2002) was an American political philosopher. His father, William Lee Rawls, was a successful and respected lawyer whose family had moved to Baltimore from the south when he was a child; his mother, Anna Abell Rawls, descended from the formerly affluent Stump family. Both his parents were strongly interested in politics, and his mother in particular campaigned for women’s rights with the League of Women Voters. Rawls had four brothers, one older and three younger, two of whom died from illness when he was still young. He attended Princeton University as an undergraduate, completing his AB in philosophy in the fall of 1943. Though he briefly contemplated going on to seminary school to study religion after college, like most of his classmates at that time he chose first to enlist in the army. He served with an intelligence and reconnaissance unit in the Pacific theater for 2 years, earning a Bronze Star, but his experiences there weakened his religious convictions. When he began his graduate studies after the war—again at Princeton—it was in philosophy not religion. Rawls completed his PhD in 1950, writing a dissertation on moral philosophy. During this time he also married Margaret Warfield Fox, with whom he eventually had four children (two daughters and two sons). After lecturing and extending his studies for two extra years at Princeton, Rawls won a Fulbright scholarship to study at Oxford in the 1952–1953 academic year. There he encountered H. L. A. Hart, Isaiah Berlin, Stuart Hampshire, R. M. Hare, and some other major philosophers of the time, who greatly influenced the development of his own views. On returning to the United States, he landed his first faculty position at Cornell University, where he taught from 1953 until 1959. 1