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Includes bibliographical references and index.1. Rawls, John, 19212002. 2. Justice. 3. Political

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For Annetteand

in memory of John Rawls

Preface and Acknowledgments xList of Abbreviations xviii

Chronology xix

Introduction One 1Biography 1

Motivations Underlying Rawlss Lifework 8Historical Influences 12

Rawls on Justification in Moral Philosophy: Reflective Equilibrium 29

Liberalism, Democracy, and the Principles of Justice Two 43

The First Principle of Justice: the Basic Liberties 44Liberty and the Worth of Liberty 59

The Priority of Liberty 64Some Objections to the Priority of Liberty 72

Summary 79

The Second Principle and Distributive Justice Three 86Fair Equality of Opportunity 88

Economic Justice and the Difference Principle 99Objections to the Difference Principle 115

Fair Equality of Opportunity and the Difference Principle 125The Just Savings Principle 136

Conclusion 139

The Original Position Four 141The Original Position: Description of the

Parties and the Conditions on Choice 142Arguments from the Original Position 167

Conclusion 197

Just Institutions Five 199Applying the Principles of Justice: the Four-Stage Sequence 200

The First Principle of Justice: Specification of Constitutional Rights 209

Constitutional Democracy and Its Procedural Requirements 212

Economic Institutions: a Property-owning Democracy 219The Institution of the Family 235

The Stability of Justice as Fairness Six 243Stability and the Sense of Justice 245

Moral Motivation and the Development of a Sense of Justice 253Goodness as Rationality, the Congruence Problem,

and the Aristotelian Principle 263The Good of Justice and the Kantian Congruence Argument 272

Finality and the Priority of Justice 278Conclusion 282

Kantian Constructivism and the Transition to Political Liberalism Seven 284

Kantian Constructivism 284The Independence of Moral Theory 310

The Social Role of a Conception of Justice and Problems with the Kantian Interpretation 315

Political Liberalism I the Domain of the Political Eight 324

The Problem of Political Liberalism 324A Freestanding Political Conception of Justice 331

Political Constructivism 351

Political Liberalism II Overlapping Consensus and Public Reason Nine 365

Overlapping Consensus 366The Liberal Principle of Legitimacy 371

The Idea of Public Reason 381

The Law of Peoples Ten 416The Law of Nations 416

viii Contents

The Law of Peoples and Political Liberalism 424Toleration of Decent Societies 429

Human Rights as the Primary Condition of Social Cooperation 435

The Duty of Assistance 439Distributive Justice and Rawlss Rejection of a

Global Distribution Principle 442Conclusion 455

Conclusion Eleven 457Rawlss Legacy and Influence 457

Concluding Remarks 460

Glossary 463Notes 485

Bibliography 515Index 536

Contents ix

The aim of this book is to explain the main ideas in John Rawlsspolitical and moral philosophy. Rawls is the foremost politicalphilosopher of the twentieth century, and is recognized by many asone of the great political philosophers of all time. His main work, ATheory of Justice, has now been translated into more than thirtylanguages. Rawls devoted his entire career to one general philosoph-ical topic and as a result wrote more on the subject of justice thanany other major philosopher. The general features of his vision of ajust society are familiar a constitutional democracy that givespriority to certain fundamental rights and liberties, while expandingequal opportunities among all persons and guaranteeing a minimumsocial income for all. Other than his difference principle, what ismost distinctive about his position are not his principles of justice the principles of equal basic liberties and fair equal opportunitiesresemble in many important respects ideas found in Kant, J.S. Mill,and other representatives of the high liberal tradition. It is rather hisphilosophical argument for these social and political institutions.Rawls revived the natural rights theory of the social contract found inLocke, Rousseau, and Kant, and joined it with an account of moraljustification that is more suited to the modern sensibilities of a moresecular, democratic, and scientific age.

The guiding purpose of Rawlss work is to justify the primaryinstitutions of a liberal and democratic society in terms of a concep-tion of justice that democratic citizens themselves can accept andrely upon to guide their deliberations and to justify to one anotherthe basic institutions and laws governing a democratic society.The goal of providing a public charter for a democratic society,

Preface and Acknowledgments

or (as he also called it) a public basis for political justification,becomes especially prominent in Rawlss later works. This goalconnects with his early reliance on the liberal and democraticsocial contract traditions of Locke, Rousseau, and Kant. For thebasic idea of their doctrine is that the members of society ought tobe able to freely accept and generally endorse the main politicaland social institutions that regulate and shape their everyday lives.Rawlss well-known version of the social contract an impartialagreement on principles of justice behind a veil of ignorancethat deprives the parties of knowledge of all particular facts aboutthemselves and their society is but one part of his extendedcontractarian argument. Equally important is a second contrac-tarian argument, that free and equal citizens situated in awell-ordered society who are morally motivated by their senseof justice can also accept and agree to the same principles of justice.The idea of a well-ordered society is the controlling influencebehind Rawlss contractarianism, including the original position.

Central to the justification of principles of justice for Rawls isthe realistic possibility of a well-ordered society in which allreasonable and rational persons agree to and generally complywith the same principles of justice. Rawlss political liberalism isspecifically designed to show how the basic contractarian ideal ofreasonable agreement among all free and equal citizens is afeasible social ideal, compatible with human nature and theconstraints of social cooperation. His accounts of public reason, apolitical conception of justice, and a public basis for political justi-fication take social contract doctrine one step further than hisillustrious predecessors. Rawls thought that citizens acceptanceof both the principles of justice behind the constitution and alsoof their justification are necessary if we are to take seriouslyfreedom and equality as the foundational political values of ademocratic society. A guiding theme in this book is the centralityof the ideal of a well-ordered society to Rawlss contractarianismand the development of his theory of justice.

It is often said that Rawls sought to justify a constitution resem-bling the U.S. Constitution, with a bill of rights, separation ofpowers, and judicial review. While this was not a specific aim, it

Preface xi

is true that he thought highly of these institutions and saw themas more likely to realize the equal basic rights and fair opportuni-ties of citizens than other democratic alternatives. The mainrespect in which justice as fairness departs from the Americanconstitutional system is its account of economic justice, includingfair equal opportunities and the difference principles requirementthat the economy be organized to maximize the benefits going tosocietys least advantaged members. Currently, social and politicalpolicies in the U.S. increasingly focus on its most wealthy membersand allows wealth to trickle-down to those less advantaged. (Thisis apparent in proposals to eliminate the estate tax and not to taxunearned investment income, including capital gains, while leavingtaxes on workers earned income undisturbed.) Rawls himselfis sometimes accused of endorsing a trickle-down economybecause his difference principle allows for inequalities of incomeand wealth in order to provide people with incentives to educatetheir capacities, work longer hours, take risks, and so on.1 But ifby trickle-down is meant an economy that maximally or evenpredominantly benefits the more advantaged in hopes that it willcoincidentally benefit the least, then Rawlss position is exactly theopposite: the difference principle requires societies to focus on theeconomically least advantaged first and take measures to maximizetheir economic prospects (including opportunities to exerciseinfluence and control in their work). Under the difference principleonly incentives designed to maximally benefit the least advantaged,not the most advantaged, are permitted; permissible incentives andinequalities are those that leave the least advantaged better situatedthan all other workable alternatives. In this regard it is more accu-rate to say that under the difference principle wealth and incomeare allowed to suffuse upwards from the less advantaged, ratherthan trickle down from the more advantaged. The general pointis that, assuming that inequalities can work to everyones benefit,no other principle allowing for inequalities benefits the leastadvantaged more than does the difference principle.

Rawls says in his Lectures on the History of Political Philosophy that amoral theory is best understood when considered in its bestlight, and that there is no point in criticizing a theory otherwise

xii Preface

(LHPP, xiii, 105). I have tried to present Rawlss theory of justice atits best. Accordingly, one of my aims is to clear up some of themore frequent misunderstandings of his position. But I also discusswhat (I believe) are some genuine problems and obscurities.Primary among these are his several efforts to formulate a concep-tion of justice that can be publicly accepted by all reasonablepersons within the feasible social world he calls a well-orderedsociety. Rawlss account in A Theory of Justice of how such a well-ordered society is realistically possible ultimately encountersdifficulties, and this leads him to the revisions made in PoliticalLiberalism (see Chapter 7 below). But in his final work, The Idea ofPublic Reason Revisited, Rawls seems to have accepted thatgeneral agreement by all citizens on justice as fairness is an unreal-istic possibility. This must have been an enormous disappointmentfor him, for he had worked for nearly forty years trying to showhow a well-ordered society where everyone accepts justice as fair-ness as its public charter is a realistic possibility, compatible withhuman nature and general facts about social cooperation. Heremained confident to the end, however, that, whatever the short-comings of human nature, reasonable people are still capable of aneffective sense of justice and morally endorsing a liberal concep-tion that protects basic liberties, provides equal opportunities, andsecures a social minimum for all citizens. Whether or not Rawlssconfidence in the human condition is justified or misplaced, hisworks will remain a major accomplishment in the history of moraland political thought for generations to come.

The book is organized chronologically, to accord with theorder of publication of Rawlss three main books and their mainparts. The first chapter consists of a short biography of Rawlsslife, followed by a discussion of the major philosophers whoinfluenced his works and his interpretations of them. The chapterconcludes with a discussion of Rawlss account of justification as areflective equilibrium of our considered convictions, an ideawhich informs all his works. (For readers less interested in histor-ical influences or philosophical issues of justification, thesesections can be skipped without too much loss of understanding.)Chapters 26 cover Rawlss major work, A Theory of Justice. Chapters

Preface xiii

24 are the most central to an initial understanding of Rawlssmain contributions, since they explain Part I of A Theory of Justice onthe principles of justice (chs. 23) and Rawlss argument for theseprinciples from the original position (ch. 4). Chapter 5 coversmaterial in A Theory of Justice, Part II and elsewhere, and discussesthe institutions required by justice as fairness. Chapter 6 then takesup A Theory of Justice, Part III, on goodness as rationality, the senseof justice, and stability, and discusses Rawlss congruence argu-ment, that justice is essential to the human good. Chapter 7 is atransition chapter, discussing the interim between A Theory of Justiceand Political Liberalism, and includes Rawlss accounts of KantianConstructivism and the independence of moral theory. (Thesediscussions are of more interest to specialists.) It concludes with adiscussion of some of the main problems Rawls found with hisarguments in Part III of A Theory of Justice, which led him to formu-late the doctrine of political liberalism. The main ideas in PoliticalLiberalism are covered in the next two chapters, with Chapter 8discussing lectures IIII and the ideas of a political conception ofjustice and political constructivism, and Chapter 9 discussinglectures IV and VI, including the ideas of overlapping consensusand public reason. Finally, Chapter 10 takes up Rawlss final work,his account of international justice in The Law of Peoples, anddiscusses how it is part of political liberalism and the basis for theforeign policy of a liberal constitutional democracy.

I am grateful to many friends and colleagues over the years fortheir comments, advice, criticisms, and discussions; especially toJoshua Cohen, Amy Gutmann, Paul Guyer, Rahul Kumar, StephenPerry, Andrews Reath, Thomas Ricketts, T.M. Scanlon, SamuelScheffler, K.C. Tan, and R. Jay Wallace. To Andrews Reath andK.C. Tan I am especially grateful for devoting the time and effortrequired to read the manuscript, and providing many hours andmany pages of critical feedback. Extensive comments by fouranonymous reviewers for Routledge helpfully led to many neededrevisions. Mark Kaplan read Chapter 4 and provided much helpfuladvice regarding my discussion of decision theory. Matt Lister andMark Navin provided many helpful comments too. I am especiallygrateful to my former student and good friend Joseph Farber, who

xiv Preface

before his tragic death in May 2006 read much of this manuscriptand gave me many helpful comments while undergoing treat-ments for cancer. Other students who have worked with me andfrom whom I have learned much about Rawls and politicalphilosophy over the years include Melina Bell, Ned Diver, JohnOberdiek, Paul Litton, Tom Sullivan, Maria Morales, and JennieUleman. I am very grateful to Mardy Rawls for correcting the pageproofs and providing biographical information and editorialsuggestions. Many thanks to Betsy Freeman Fox, who corrected allpage proofs, and to Matt Lister and Erin Lareau. I am also gratefulto the contributors to the Cambridge Companion to Rawls, from whom Ilearned a good deal in the process of editing that volume.

Among my greatest debts are those owed to Rawlss mostconscientious and trenchant critics and commentators: including myteachers Ronald Dworkin, Martha Nussbaum, as well as RobertNozick, and Burton Dreben, both now deceased; then to G.A.Cohen, Joseph Raz, Brian Barry, Amartya Sen, Thomas Nagel,Jrgen Habermas, Thomas Pogge, Charles Beitz, Jeremy Waldron,Will Kymlicka, Michael Sandel, Philippe van Parijs, and others toonumerous to mention whose work is discussed or touched onherein. I have tried to address their criticisms and assessments tosome degree, no doubt not satisfactorily enough. Reflection ontheir criticisms and remarks on Rawls has helped me perhaps morethan anything to become clear in my own mind about the ramifi-cations, obscurities, and occasional lacunae in Rawlss positions.

Kathleen Moran, my research assistant, spent many hoursformatting and helping me to edit the manuscript and prepare theindex; I am especially thankful for her invaluable assistance duringthe past two years on this and two other manuscripts. I appreciateall the attention that my production editor, Annamarie Kino ofRoutledge gave to the manuscript, and I am most grateful for herhelp and advice. Thanks to Brian Leiter for his invitation to writethis book. I am grateful to the School of Arts and Sciences at theUniversity of Pennsylvania and to Deans Samuel Preston andRebecca Bushnell for providing a years leave in 20056, so that Icould write the second half of the book. Thanks also to BarbaraFried, Larry Kramer, and the Law School at Stanford University for

Preface xv

providing an office during that year; to Debra Satz, MichaelBratman, and the Stanford Philosophy Department for their hospi-tality and accommodations; to Samuel Scheffler, Eric Rakowski,and Sandy Kadish of the JSP Program at the Law School at UC-Berkeley for allowing me to be a Kadish Fellow and participate intheir seminars for the year; and finally to my good friend JayWallace of the Philosophy Department at Berkeley, who allowedme to take over his office to work on this manuscript during myweekly visits that year.

My wife, Annette Lareau-Freeman, has for years provided mewith sound and sensible advice about how to write this book. Sheemphasized the kinds of questions and objections I shouldaddress, as well as those I should avoid. She painstakingly read themanuscript and urged me to clarify ideas for the benefit of non-specialists. Above all I appreciate her optimism, and her constantencouragement and moral support; and for this and so much else Idedicate this book to her.

Finally, my greatest debt is to John Rawls, who was my teacherand friend for over twenty-five years. I was a third-year lawstudent in the mid-1970s when I first read A Theory of Justice, and,like many people, I felt the book gave philosophical expression tomy most deeply held moral convictions. I decided then (foolishlyperhaps at the time since I had a one-year-old daughter) to giveup a legal career and study political and moral philosophy. Afterserving as a law clerk in federal and state courts, I applied to grad-uate schools, and much to my surprise and good fortune I wasable to study under Jack at Harvard. Thereafter, I regularly talkedwith Jack and traveled from Philadelphia to Lexington to visit withJack and Mardy at their home two or three times each year. UponJacks request I had the great honor to edit his Collected Papers and,with Mardys help, his Lectures on the History of Political Philosophy. Hewas a genuinely singular individual. For in addition to being aworld-historical thinker, he was generous and unassuming, andcompletely decent and fair-minded, a rare combination of attributes.Jacks modesty was evident in his self-effacing sense of humor.For example, towards the end of his life he composed a shortautobiography for his friends, called Just Jack. Its title derives

xvi Preface

from a true story he relates therein, told him by Paul Freund ofHarvard Law School. There were once two local judges on thefederal courts in Chicago named Julius Hoffman. To distinguishthem Chicago lawyers called one, who was highly respected, Juliusthe Just. The other Judge had notoriously presided over theChicago Seven trial in the 1970s.2 They called him just Julius. SoJack took to signing letters and inscribing books for his friendsjust Jack. However much he thought of himself, and wantedothers to think of him, as just Jack, he was indeed Jack the Just,the preeminent theorist of justice in the modern era. This book isdevoted to his memory.

Preface xvii

The following abbreviations for Rawlss work appear throughoutthe text.CP Collected Papers, edited by Samuel Freeman, Cambridge, MA:

Harvard University Press, 1999.JF Justice as Fairness: A Restatement, edited by Erin Kelley,

Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2001.LHMP Lectures on the History of Moral Philosophy, edited by Barbara

Herman, Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press,2000.

LHPP Lectures on the History of Political Philosophy, edited by SamuelFreeman, Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press,2007.

LP The Law of Peoples, Cambridge, MA: Harvard UniversityPress, 1999.

PL Political Liberalism, New York: Columbia University Press,1993; revised paperback edition, 1996; expanded edition,2005.

TJ A Theory of Justice, Cambridge, MA: Harvard UniversityPress, 1971; revised edition, 1999.

Abbreviations

1921 born on February 21 in Baltimore, MD, U.S.A., toWilliam Lee Rawls, an attorney, and Anna Abell StumpRawls

193539 attends and graduates from Kent School, an Episcopalpreparatory school for boys in Western Connecticut

1943 completes B.A. in Philosophy at Princeton University(Princeton, NJ) in January, and immediately enlists inU.S. Army

194346 serves in the US infantry in the Pacific; fights in 36-daybattle at Leyte (New Guinea) and 120-day battle atLuzon (Philippines). Serves four months in occupiedJapan

1949 marries Margaret Warfield Fox of Philadelphia uponher graduation from Pembroke College at BrownUniversity; four children are born to their marriage of53 years

1950 receives Ph.D. from Princeton; W.T. Stace supervisor ofdissertation on moral worth and moral knowledge,which begins formulation of idea of reflective equilib-rium

195052 instructor at Princeton195253 receives a Fulbright Fellowship to Oxford University

(Oxford, U.K.) where he studies with H.L.A. Hart,Isaiah Berlin, and Stuart Hampshire

1953 Assistant and later Associate Professor at CornellUniversity

1957 publication of the paper Justice as Fairness where atthe age of thirty-four, Rawls first presents the argu-ments later developed in A Theory of Justice

Chronology

195960 Visiting Associate Professor at Harvard1960 joins Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT,

Cambridge, MA) as Professor of Philosophy1962 joins the Philosophy Department at Harvard University

(Cambridge, MA)1963 publishes The Sense of Justice, his account of moral

psychology later developed as chapter 8 of A Theory of Justice1967 publishes Distributive Justice, initial account of the

difference principle1969 publishes The Justification of Civil Disobedience,

later revised to appear in chapter 6 of A Theory of Justice1971 publication of A Theory of Justice, his most famous work,

presenting his well-known accounts of the originalposition, veil of ignorance, equal basic liberties, anddifference principle. Goes on to sell over half a millioncopies and is translated into more than 30 languages

197475 serves as President of the Eastern Division of theAmerican Philosophical Association

1979 becomes James Bryant Conant University Professor ofPhilosophy at Harvard

1980 presents three Dewey Lectures at Columbia University,Kantian Constructivism in Moral Theory, whichemphasize centrality of the idea of free and equal moralpersons to justice as fairness

1981 presents the Tanner Lectures at University of Michigan,The Basic Liberties and Their Priority, a significantdevelopment of his first principle of justice

1985 publishes Justice as Fairness: Political, not Metaphysical,a significant stage in development of his doctrine ofpolitical liberalism

1987 publication of The Idea of an Overlapping Consensus,originally presented as the Hart Lecture in Jurisprudenceand Moral Philosophy at Oxford University in 1986, inhonor of H.L.A. Hart

1989 publishes Themes in Kants Moral Philosophy, theinitial presentation of his lectures on Kant laterpublished in full in 2000

1991 retires from full-time position at Harvard; continuesteaching yearly course in Modern Political Philosophyuntil 1995

xx Chronology

1993 publication of Political Liberalism, where Rawls develops theideas of political constructivism, overlapping consensus,public reason, and public justification. Delivers andpublishes Amnesty International Lecture, The Law ofPeoples, the initial account of his theory of internationaljustice

1995 suffers first stroke in October and retires from teachingand public lectures, but continues writing

1997 publishes The Idea of Public Reason Revisted, which heregarded as final statement of political liberalism

1999 publication of The Law of Peoples, Collected Papers, and therevised edition of A Theory of Justice. Awarded NationalHumanities Medal by President Clinton, and also RolfSchock Prize in Logic and Philosophy

2000 publication of Lectures on the History of Moral Philosophy, withlectures on Leibniz, Hume, Kant, and Hegel

2001 publication of Justice as Fairness: A Restatement, which wasoriginally part of his lectures on Modern PoliticalPhilosophy at Harvard

2002 dies November 22 at home in Lexington, Massachusetts,at age 81; buried in Mt. Auburn Cemetery, Cambridge,Massachusetts

2007 publication of Lectures on the History of Political Philosophy, withlectures on Hobbes, Locke, Hume, Rousseau, Mill, Marx,Sidgwick, and Butler

Chronology xxi

BIOGRAPHY

John Rawls was born in Baltimore, Maryland, 21 February 1921,to William Lee and Anna Abele Stump Rawls. He was the secondof five sons, two of whom died in childhood. He grew up inBaltimore, where his father practiced law. John Rawlss mother camefrom an established and once well-to-do Baltimore family. She wasan intelligent and accomplished woman, and an early President ofthe new League of Women Voters in Baltimore.

His father came from eastern North Carolina, in the area nearGreenville. Ill with tuberculosis, his grandfather left North Carolinafor Baltimore to be near Johns Hopkins Hospital when Rawlssfather was 12. Needing to help the family financially, his fatherleft school at 14 and took a job as runner for a law office. Makinguse of the firms law library in his free time, Rawlss father taughthimself law. With no further formal education, he passed the statebar exam and became a practicing lawyer in 1905, at age 22. In1911 he became a partner in the law firm of Marbury, Gosnell,and Williams, one of the oldest law firms in the U.S.A. Its founderwas the Marbury of the famous Supreme Court case Marbury v.Madison (1813), in which Chief Justice Marshall held that theSupreme Court had the power to judicially review the constitu-tionality of acts of Congress and the Executive branch.

Despite his lack of academic training, Rawlss father was learned,cultivated, and a highly respected lawyer. As early as 1909, heargued before the U.S. Supreme Court a border dispute betweenWest Virginia and Maryland, and in 1930 he was appointed by

One Introduction

the Supreme Court as Special Master in a boundary disputebetween New Jersey and Delaware. His report was adopted by theCourt with high commendation. In 1919 he was elected Presidentof the Bar Association of Baltimore City, probably the youngestman chosen for that office up to that time.

While Rawlss father was a highly successful lawyer, and thefamily was sufficiently well-to-do to provide the children withexcellent educations, he did not handle money well. Upon hisdeath in 1946 he left no will and almost no money. Mrs. Rawls wasleft quite destitute. Her mental health was affected, and she andher 12-year-old son Richard were thereafter provided for until herdeath in 1954 by two of her nephews and Rawlss older brother,Bill.

John Rawls attended the Calvert School in Baltimore for sixyears, then a public school, Roland Park Junior High for twoyears, while his father was President of the School Board ofBaltimore City, after which he attended high school from 1935 to1939 at the Kent School in western Connecticut, an Episcopalschool for boys. He graduated in 1939, and entered PrincetonUniversity.

Regarding his reasons for majoring in philosophy at Princeton,Rawls said:

I never thought of the law, the chosen career of my father and mybrother, as I felt that my stammering would prevent that; andbesides it never appealed to me any more than business did. Insuccession I tried various subjects. Chemistry, which I beganwith, soon proved beyond me, as did mathematics, even more so.I experimented with painting and art. I took a course in music andwas told gently by my greatly talented teachers, Roger Sessionsand Milton Babbitt, whose talent was really wasted on me, that Ishould do something else instead. This advice would have gainedA.W. Tuckers approval, had he cared; for he muttered, when Itold him I had given up the idea of studying mathematics, I hopeyou find something you can do, Rawls, as if he couldnt imaginewhat it might be. Nor at that time could I, but I kept trying andeventually ended up in Philosophy.

2 Rawls

Upon graduating from Princeton in January 1943, Rawls promptlyjoined the U.S. Army as a Private in the Infantry; after basic traininghe was sent to fight in the Pacific with the 32d Infantry Division(the Red Arrow Division) in its 128th Infantry Regiment. Hefought at the 36-day battle of Leyte in New Guinea, and then foughtagain at the 120-day Battle of Luzon in the Philippines. Upondrinking from a stream one day without his helmet, an enemybullet grazed his head, leaving a scar for the rest of his life. As aradio operator Rawls often had to go on dangerous patrols behindenemy lines along the treacherous Villa Verde Trail on Luzon, forwhich he was awarded a Bronze Star. When General Yamashita,head of the Japanese forces, surrendered on Luzon, around August21, 1945, Rawls volunteered to take part in a party of about 25men who were sent deep into the jungle to lead the General out.Since many Japanese soldiers did not know that the war was over,it was a dangerous hike, but Rawls said that he felt he needed tobe there on that particular mission. Rawls entered Japan with theoccupying forces in September 1945. His troop train wentthrough the remains of Hiroshima soon after its atomic destruc-tion in August 1945, which, together with word of the Holocaustin Europe, had a profound effect upon him. Many of Rawlssfriends in his regiment and classmates from Calvert, the KentSchool, and Princeton were killed during the war.

Upon completing military service in January 1946, Rawls enteredgraduate studies in Philosophy at Princeton University on the GIBill, spending the year 194748 at Cornell. He completed anddefended his thesis in 1949, just before his marriage, and receivedthe Ph.D. Degree in June 1950. He wrote his dissertation under W.T.Stace, on moral knowledge and judgments on the moral worth ofcharacter. Rawls then taught for two years as an Instructor atPrinceton (195052), after which his contract was not renewed.

Rawls went to Oxford on a post-doctoral Fulbright Fellowshipfor the academic year 195253, where he was a member of theHigh Table at Christ Church College. Rawlss year at Oxford wasone of the most formative of his long career. While at OxfordRawls was especially influenced by lectures by H.L.A. Hart on thephilosophy of law, as well as seminars by Isaiah Berlin and Stuart

Introduction 3

Hampshire, and he took part in a periodic discussion group heldin Gilbert Ryles living quarters.

Rawls returned to the U.S.A. in 1953 and went to CornellUniversity in Ithaca, New York, as Assistant Professor ofPhilosophy, where he joined his former teacher Norman Malcolmon the faculty, as well as his former Princeton classmates and life-long friends Rogers Albritton and David Sachs. Rawls was soonpromoted to tenure, and remained at Cornell until 1959, when hevisited Harvard University for one year. He then joined the facultyat MIT (Massachusetts Institute of Technology) in Cambridge,Massachusetts, in 1960. Two years later Rawls assumed aProfessorship at Harvard. He remained a member of the standingfaculty at Harvard until his retirement in 1991, and continuedteaching his course in political philosophy until 1995.

At Harvard Rawls occupied the John Cowles Chair in Philosophyuntil 1978, when he succeeded Kenneth Arrow as James BryantConant University Professor, one of the most prestigious positions atHarvard. A Theory of Justice was published in 1971 and was awarded thePhi Beta Kappa Ralph Waldo Emerson Prize in 1972. He wasChairman of the Harvard Philosophy Department from 1970 to 1974,and in 197475 was President of the American PhilosophicalAssociation, Eastern Division. Rawls was a member of the HarvardPhilosophy Department during its greatest years. Among hiscolleagues were W.V. Quine, Nelson Goodman, Hilary Putnam,Stanley Cavell, Robert Nozick, Rogers Albritton, G.E.L. Owen, RoderickFirth, Israel Scheffler, and his good friend, especially in his later years,the logician Burton Dreben. Rawlss students Martha Nussbaum,Warren Goldfarb, T.M. Scanlon, and then Christine Korsgaard becamecolleagues in the latter half of his career at Harvard.

In 1999, Rawls was awarded a National Humanities Medal byPresident Clinton. He was awarded the Rolf Schock Prize in Logicand Philosophy the same year. He received honorary degreesfrom Oxford, Princeton, and Harvard universities, which werethe universities to which he felt a special attachment. A quiet,witty, and modest man, Rawls taught and influenced a greatmany of Americas best-known contemporary philosophers. Hewas a private person who spent his time either at his work, or

4 Rawls

with his family and close friends. He regularly declined requestsfor interviews, and chose not to take an active role in publiclife. He conscientiously avoided a celebrity status. Rawls believedthat philosophers are normally misunderstood when theyaddress the public, and that though philosophy has a majorinfluence on political life, its influence is indirect, taking manyyears before it becomes a part of a communitys moral conscious-ness.

Rawlss lifelong interest in justice developed out of his earlyconcern (discussed in greater detail in the next section) withthe basically religious question: Why is there evil in the worldand is human existence redeemable in spite of it? This questioneventually led him to inquire whether a just society is realisti-cally possible. His lifes work is directed towards discoveringwhat justice requires of us, and showing that it is within humancapacities to realize a just society and a just international order.

In his later years Rawls was especially interested in history,particularly books on World War II and on Abraham Lincoln,whom he especially admired as a statesman who did not compro-mise with evil. These interests are evident in Rawlss late works onjustice between nations. Of Rawls, Rogers Albritton of UCLA wasquoted in the magazine Lingua Franca as saying: Jack is . . . a manwho has an incredibly fine moral sense in his dealings with otherhuman beings. He is not just the author of a great book, he is avery admirable man. He is the best of us.

In 1949 Rawls married Margaret Warfield Fox of Baltimore,upon her graduation from Pembroke College in Brown University.Mrs. Rawls is an artist, has been active in local politics in Lexington,Massachusetts, and has worked in Environmental Planning for thestate. Among her many portraits are several of John Rawls. Sheassisted in the editing and production of John Rawlss final books.Four children were born to John and Margaret Rawls. The Rawlsfamily lived in a large nineteenth-century white-frame house inLexington, Massachusetts, beginning in 1960, where Mrs. Rawlscontinues to reside.

In 1995 Rawls suffered the first of a series of strokes. In spite ofdeclining health, he continued to work for most of the remaining

Introduction 5

seven years of his life. With the help of Mrs. Rawls and his friendBurton Dreben, he completed the important Second Introductionto Political Liberalism, The Idea of Public Reason Revisited, and hisshort book The Law of Peoples. Rawls also oversaw the editing andpublication of his Collected Papers and two sets of his lectures inphilosophy, Lectures on the History of Moral Philosophy and Justice asFairness: A Restatement. His Lectures on the History of Political Philosophy willappear in 2007. With Rawlss approval Mrs. Rawls did consider-able preliminary copy-editing on the latter two books. John Rawlsdied at home on November 24, 2002, three months before his82nd birthday.

In an interview in 1990 Rawls said about A Theory of Justice: Itssize and scope was a little mad, actually. In writing it I guessed itwas about 350 pages; when it was put in galleys and the Presstold me it was nearly 600 pages (587 to be exact) I wasastounded. He said that after completing that book, I hadplanned on doing some other things mainly connected with thethird part of the book, which was the part I liked best, the part onmoral psychology. . . . I have never gotten around to that. Insome yet-to-be-published remarks on My Teaching (1993),Rawls says:

The part of the book I always liked best was the third, on moralpsychology. The reception of my book, though, took me by sur-prise and I looked for an explanation. I suppose it has somemerit, but I have always believed that most of its wider appeal layin the situation at that time, the time of the Vietnam war and thestate of academic and political culture then. For a long periodthere had been but few works of that kind I think of Berlin andHart, Barry and Walzer hence there was, it seems, a felt needfor them. The book gave a demonstration, however faulty, that itssubjects could be talked about as a coherent part of philosophy,supported by quite reasonable arguments, and not simply as theexpression of ones opinions and sentiments. I decided I shouldstudy many of the criticisms, as there were very good objectionsfrom people such as Arrow, Sen, and Harsanyi, as well as fromHart and Nagel, Nozick and Scanlon, to mention a few. I wanted

6 Rawls

to find ways to strengthen the idea of justice as fairness and tomeet their objections.

Of his teaching Rawls said:

[One] thing I tried to do was to present each writers thought inwhat I took to be its strongest form. I took to heart Mills remarkin his review of [Adam] Sedgwick: A doctrine is not judged at alluntil it is judged in its best form (CW: X, 52). So I tried to do justthat. Yet I didnt say, not intentionally anyway, what to my mindthey should have said, but what they did say, supported by what Iviewed as the most reasonable interpretation of their text. Thetext had to be known and respected, and the doctrine presentedit in its best form. Leaving aside the text seemed offensive, akind of pretending. If I departed from it no harm in that I hadto say so. Lecturing that way, I believed that a writers viewsbecame stronger and more convincing, and would be for studentsa more worthy object of study.

Several maxims guided me in doing this. I always assumed,for example, that the writers we were studying were alwaysmuch smarter than I was. If they were not, why was I wastingmy time and the students time by studying them? If I saw a mis-take in their arguments, I supposed they saw it too and musthave dealt with it, but where? So I looked for their way out, notmine. Sometimes their way out was historical: in their day thequestion need not be raised; or wouldnt arise or be fruitfully dis-cussed. Or there was a part of the text I had overlooked, orhadnt read.

We learn moral and political philosophy, and indeed any otherpart of philosophy by studying the exemplars those noted fig-ures who have made cherished attempts and we try to learnfrom them, and if we are lucky, to find a way to go beyond them.My task was to explain Hobbes, Locke and Rousseau, or Hume,Leibniz and Kant as clearly and forcefully as I could, alwaysattending carefully to what they actually said.

Introduction 7

The result was that I was loath to raise objections to theexemplars thats too easy and misses what is essential though it was important to point out objections that those cominglater in the same tradition sought to correct, or to point to viewsthose in another tradition thought were mistaken. (I think here ofthe social contract view and utilitarianism as two traditions.)Otherwise philosophical thought cant progress and it would bemysterious why later writers made the criticisms they did.

MOTIVATIONS UNDERLYING RAWLSS LIFEWORK

It is difficult to say what a great philosophers motivations are insetting forth a philosophical position. Fortunately some philoso-phers are explicit about their aims. In his lectures Rawlsemphasized the importance of reading the preface to any philo-sophical work, to gain an understanding of a philosophers reasonsfor writing the book. In the Preface to A Theory of Justice, Rawls indi-cates that one of his primary aims is to set forth the mostappropriate moral conception of justice for a democratic society, amoral conception that was better suited to interpreting the demo-cratic values of freedom and equality than the reigning utilitariantradition. For this reason, Rawls says, he sought to revive thephilosophical doctrine of the social contract that stems fromLocke, Rousseau, and Kant. Rawlss concern with democraticjustice increasingly came to dominate his aims in the latter half ofhis career, in working out the position he called political liber-alism. But prior to his nearly exclusive focus on democraticjustice, Rawls was led to political philosophy by a concern formore general questions.

In his junior and senior years at Princeton Rawls became deeplyinterested in theology and its relation to ethics. Rawlss under-graduate honors thesis at Princeton was on the religious problemsof humanitys sinfulness and the possibility of community.1 Hisinterest led to his career plans to attend Divinity School and enterthe Episcopal ministry. But service in World War II intervened.The war and his experience as a soldier caused him to rethink hisreligion and particularly the possibility of human goodness.

8 Rawls

Horrendous evil leads people to have strikingly different convic-tions about humanity and religion. Orthodox Christian doctrine isin many respects built around an assumption of the corruption ofhuman nature, which purportedly explains why there is such greatevil in the world.2 Original sin was not just Adams and EvesFall, but a pronouncement of the original flawed character thatresides in all human beings and motivates their actions. The masscarnage of World War II led Rawls to question these and other reli-gious beliefs. Why would a benevolent God create humans so thatthey were naturally inclined to accept, not to mention engage in,such mass slaughter and destruction of other humans? Rather thaninspiring Rawls to reaffirm Christian doctrine, the horrendous evilof World War II led him to renounce it. He abandoned Christianitybecause the morality of God (as opposed to the morality ofmankind) made no sense to him. In his unpublished remarks onhis religion, Rawls said:

When Lincoln interprets the Civil War as Gods punishment forthe sin of slavery, deserved equally by North and South, God isseen as acting justly. But the Holocaust cant be interpreted inthat way, and all attempts to do so that I have read of arehideous and evil. To interpret history as expressing Gods will,Gods will must accord with the most basic ideas of justice as weknow them. For what else can the most basic justice be? Thus, Isoon came to reject the idea of the supremacy of the divine willas also hideous and evil.

The problem Rawls found with Christianity was not simply thatGod allowed to happen such evils as the Holocaust and the indis-criminate bombing and destruction of German and Japanese citiesand their civilian populations. Rawls questioned how a benevolentGod worthy of veneration could exist who created the humanspecies so that its will was naturally corrupt and predestined tocommit evils, large and small. Rawls also could not make sense ofa God who selectively intervenes in the world in response toprayers, and even then only in response to prayers by Christianbelievers. Surely the prayers of the millions who died in the

Introduction 9

Holocaust should have moved God to do something in response?For these and other reasons the actions of the Christian Godseemed completely arbitrary to Rawls. Such an arbitrary Being wasnot worthy of faith and veneration by us. Rawls said:

These doctrines all became impossible for me to take seriously,not in the sense that the evidence for them was weak or doubtful.Rather, they depict God as a monster moved solely by Gods ownpower and glory. As if such miserable and distorted puppets ashumans were described could glorify anything!

Finally, Rawls believed that Christianity and religion generally hadthe wrong attitude towards morality. The great religions say a godis necessary, not simply to enforce justice and counter humanimmorality, but in order to create morality and the realm of value.But if God were to be conceived as good and worthy of venera-tion, then morality and value must have some original sourceother than Gods will. Surely God must have reasons for the morallaws He issues; and if so then morality and justice must have theirbasis in reasons accessible to rational beings like us. Rawls said inhis unpublished remarks on My Religion:

Reasoning in its most basic forms is invariant with respect to thevarious kinds of beings that exercise it. Hence Gods being, how-ever great the divine powers, does not determine the essentialcanons of reason. Moreover . . . the basic judgments of reason-ableness must be the same, whether made by Gods reason or byours. This invariant content of reasonableness without whichour thought collapses doesnt allow otherwise, however pious itmight seem to attribute everything to the divine will.

Rawls believed that morality had no need for a god to justify it.Instead, if there is to be justified belief in any gods existence itdepends upon the needs of morality. Like Kant, Rawls believedthat, if God were needed for morality, it would be in order toprovide us with the confidence that the realistic utopia of a justsociety and just world are possible. For without the confidence

10 Rawls

that justice can be achieved on earth, reasonable people mightbecome skeptical, lose their sense of justice, and eventuallylapse into cynicism and injustice. For Kant, this possibility ledto the Postulate that God exists in order to guarantee that thehuman good (happiness) is congruent with a persons justiceand moral virtue. Rawls resorted to non-religious argument toshow that justice and the human good were congruent and hencethat a fully just or well-ordered society is a realistic utopia.

Rawlss concern for the possibility of achieving justice and itscompatibility with human nature and the human good weredriving influences behind his written work. It explains in largepart his focus in A Theory of Justice on moral psychology and thedevelopment of the sense of justice, as well as the problems of thefeasibility and stability of a conception of justice and whetherjustice is a rational way of life. It also underlies Rawlss subse-quent revisions to justice as fairness and his transition topolitical liberalism. Finally, it is behind his rejection ofcosmopolitanism and a global distribution principle and otherelements of his account of the Law of Peoples. All this will bediscussed in due course. The biographical point deservingemphasis here is that, in rejecting Christian doctrine, Rawls wasrejecting Christianitys pessimism about human nature and itsskepticism of humanitys capacities for justice, to find meaning inthis life, and to redeem itself. Rawls attests to the centrality of thisconcern in the concluding paragraph of his last publication, TheLaw of Peoples:

If a reasonably just Society of Peoples whose members subordinatetheir power to reasonable aims is not possible, and human beingsare largely amoral, if not incurably cynical and self-centered, onemight ask, with Kant, whether it is worthwhile for human beingsto live on the earth.3

(LP, 128)

A fundamental assumption of Rawlss moral psychology is thathumans are not naturally corrupt, amoral, or moved purely byselfish motives but have genuine dispositions to sociability. If

Introduction 11

social cooperation as opposed to efficiently coordinatedbehavior is to be possible, humans must normally have an effec-tive sense of justice, or willingness to abide by fair terms ofcooperation. Rawls believed that humans are capable of regulatingtheir pursuits according to justices requirements and are able towill and to do justice for its own sake even when it imposesdemands that conflict with our most important aims. Justice iscompatible with human nature we are not prone to religious orsecular versions of original sin. Moreover, Rawls long sought toshow how appropriate exercise of our sense of justice is compat-ible with the human good, and how justice is worth realizing for itsown sake. It is difficult to understand Rawls without theseassumptions and aspirations.

HISTORICAL INFLUENCES

Contemporary Influences

Rawlss research agenda was only mildly influenced by thecontemporary discussions in moral and political philosophy. Inthe 1950s and 1960s, moral philosophy was largely focused onmeta-ethical questions regarding the meaning of moral termsand the possibility of true moral statements. Conceptual analysis,largely inspired by Oxford ordinary language philosophy, heldsway in philosophical discussions in moral philosophy. Howevermuch he was influenced early on by Wittgenstein and Oxfordphilosophy in other ways, Rawls believed that the analysis ofmoral concepts, though it could prove useful, by itself reveals littleabout the substance of moral principles. The analysis of moralconcepts and the a priori . . . is too slender a basis, he says, fordeveloping a moral theory (TJ, 51/44 rev.).

Rawls developed the idea of the original position indepen-dently in the early 1950s, starting from an idea in his doctoralthesis, part of which was published as his first paper, Outline fora Decision Procedure in Ethics (1951).4 In this paper Rawlssuggests an account of moral justification of reasonable princi-ples for resolving conflicts of interests. This account is framed in

12 Rawls

terms of a hypothetical reasonable decision procedure in whichcompetent judges, who are reasonable and have sympatheticknowledge of human interests, seek principles of resolution thataccount for their considered moral judgments. Reasonableprinciples are those that are acceptable to all, or nearly all,competent judges (CP, 11). Rawls says in his 1990 interviewwith The Harvard Review of Philosophy that he started collecting notesthat later evolved into A Theory of Justice in Fall 1950, aftercompleting his thesis. During this period he studied economicswith W.J. Baumol, and read closely Paul Samuelson on generalequilibrium theory and welfare economics, J.R. Hickss Value andCapital, Walrass Elements, Frank Knights Ethics of Competition, andVon Neumann and Morgensterns seminal work in game theory.

As a result of all these things, somehow dont ask me how plus the stuff on moral theory which I wrote my thesis on it wasout of that, in 195051, that I got the idea that eventually turnedinto the original position. The idea was to design a constitution ofdiscussion out of which would come reasonable principles of jus-tice. At that time I had a more complicated procedure than what Ifinally came up with.

HRP: Did you publish that original more complicated formula?

No, I couldnt work it out.5

Rawls was largely self-taught in political philosophy. The onlycourse he had in political philosophy was as an undergraduate atPrinceton, taught by the Wittgenstein student and philosopher oflanguage Norman Malcolm. Rawls nowhere mentions the influ-ence of his thesis supervisor, the Hegel scholar W.T. Stace. For themost part Rawls seems to have learned the great classics in polit-ical and moral philosophy on his own. He sought to engageand critically come to terms with the works of the major moraland political philosophers since Plato and Aristotle. In manyrespects his philosophy is a continuing conversation with them.Rawlss interpretations of the major modern political and moral

Introduction 13

philosophers since Hobbes are available in his published lectures,and a reader can gain invaluable insight into Rawlss works onjustice through these lectures. In moral philosophy these includeextensive lectures on Kant, as well as on Leibnizs perfectionismand Humes utilitarianism, and Hegels philosophy of right, allcollected in Rawlss Lectures on the History of Moral Philosophy, as well aslectures on Joseph Butlers moral psychology in Rawlss Lectures onthe History of Political Philosophy. The latter book contains lectures onthe political and moral philosophy of the social contractariansHobbes, Locke, and Rousseau, the utilitarians Hume, Sidgwick,and J.S. Mill, and on Karl Marx. There is not the space here todwell at length on Rawlss lectures on the great historical figuresthat so profoundly influenced him. At most I can only touch uponsome highlights.

Rawls and the Social Contract Tradition

Rawls says that his aim in Theory is to generalize and carry to ahigher order of abstraction the traditional theory of the socialcontract as represented by Locke, Rousseau, and Kant (TJ, viii/xviii rev.). One of the major philosophical accomplishments ofRawlss work has been to revive this long-moribund but stillworld-historical tradition in political philosophy. Social contractdoctrine once provided the primary justification for the democraticand republican revolutions of the eighteenth century, includingthe American Declaration of Independence and the FrenchDeclaration of the Rights of Man. But since David Humes andJeremy Benthams utilitarian arguments against it, social contractdoctrine was not taken seriously among political and moral philoso-phers, even though the idea of a social contract was celebratedin popular political lore.

The basic idea of this natural rights theory of the socialcontract (as Rawls terms it, see TJ, 32/28 rev.) is that a legitimateconstitution is one that could be agreed to among free and equalpersons from a position of equal right and equal political juris-diction. What primarily distinguishes this natural rights traditionfrom Hobbes and Hobbesian contract views is that natural rights

14 Rawls

theories made certain moral assumptions about individualsrights and duties from the outset, which function as moral condi-tions and constraints upon the social contract and any resultinglaws agreed to. In this tradition rational persons are assumed tobe equally free by natural right (de jure) and to have equal rightsof political jurisdiction to govern themselves, as well as certainpersonal rights (freedom of conscience, for example) which theycannot alienate. Locke assumes that an equal right to naturalfreedom is a Law of Nature, while Kant says that the InnateRight of Freedom is the sole original right that belongs to allpersons by virtue of their humanity, and that this right containswithin itself the Innate Equality of mankind.6 On Rawlss inter-pretation of Lockes social contract, a legitimate constitution isone that could be contracted into by free persons from a positionof equal right and equal political jurisdiction (defined by a stateof nature), without anyone violating anothers, or alienating hisor her own, natural rights, or without anyone having to violateany of the duties owed to God to preserve oneself and the rest ofmankind, or without doing anything irrational that would makeoneself worse off than in a state of nature.7

By contrast Hobbesian contract doctrines assume that rationalpersons are either self-interested, or at most aim to advance onlytheir own interests and conceptions of the good; there are nomoral constraints, such as others moral rights, on their rationalpursuit of their interests prior to the social contract. The Hobbesiansocial contract is a rational compromise among essentiallyconflicting interests, where all parties agree to cooperate byobserving certain reasonable constraints on condition that othersabide by them too, in order that all may effectively pursue theirown interests. In Hobbess account purely rational individuals aremoved to secure their fundamental interests in their own self-preservation, their conjugal affections, and procuring the meansfor commodious living; to do so they agree to authorize oneperson, the Sovereign, to exercise whatever political power theSovereign deems necessary to enforce the Articles of Peace.Hobbess social contract is an Authorization Agreement wherebyone person is authorized by everyone to exercise nearly absolute

Introduction 15

power de jure (and absolute power in fact) to maintain peace andpromote conditions of prosperity.8

Rawlss original position in effect combines elements fromboth the natural right theory and the Hobbesian theory of thesocial contract. Like Hobbesian views, the parties to Rawlss socialcontract the original position make a purely rational choice:they are not morally motivated, but aim only to choose terms ofcooperation that best advance their own particular good and theirfundamental interests (which Rawls defines differently thanHobbes). Still, Rawlss social contract position differs considerablyfrom Hobbesian views in that he denies that moral principles ofjustice are simply the product of a purely rational choice designedto promote individual interest. Like Lockes, Rousseaus, andKants natural rights positions, Rawls structures his social contractso that its parties judgments are constrained by moral conditions,primarily the veil of ignorance and the five formal constraintsof Right. The veil renders Rawlss contractors ignorant of all factsabout themselves and society; thereby they are led to an impartialdecision. As Lockes parties are explicitly prohibited from agreeingto anything that would compromise anyones equal rights tofreedom of conscience, so Rawlss parties are prohibited, in effect,from agreeing to principles of justice that would compromise thisand other basic liberties.

The hypothetical nature of Rawlss agreement in the originalposition resembles Kants idea of the Original Contract, whichKant says is a hypothetical, and not a real, social contract. OnRawlss reading, all the major proponents of the social contracttradition, from Hobbes through Locke, Rousseau, and down toKant, regard the social contract as a hypothetical thought experi-ment that is designed to show what are the most reasonable termsof cooperation among rational persons who are regarded asequals. It is not essential to the argument of any of the majorproponents of social contract doctrine whether there has been orwill ever be any actual social contract by all (adult) members of asociety. The fact that people actually agree to something, even ifthey do so unanimously, is of no moral import by itself, unlesstheir agreement first satisfies various reasonable (moral) and

16 Rawls

rational (evaluative) conditions, they have adequate knowledge,appreciate relevant facts, reason correctly, and so on.

Consider now Humes and Benthams utilitarian criticism ofsocial contract doctrine. Humes basic criticism of Locke and theWhig doctrine of consent is that the legitimate exercise of polit-ical power, and individuals duties of allegiance to respect it andobey the laws, cannot be justified by peoples consent. For notonly has no such consent ever been given anywhere, but even if ithad sometime in the distant past, we cannot be bound by thepromises of our forebears. And even if people now consent togovernments powers, still we need ask: Why should people beheld to their promises and agreements to respect the laws andobey political authority? For surely there is nothing sacrosanctabout such agreements when they result in great harm to othersor to those who make them. Hume says that the only justificationfor keeping our promises and agreements is that it promotes publicutility, the convenience and necessities of mankind.9 But thelegitimacy of governments, our duty of allegiance, and the duty toobey laws, have the same foundation, in public utility. It is thenan unnecessary shuffle to seek to justify these duties by appeal tothe duty to keep our promises. Social contract doctrine, Humeconcludes, is superficial and unnecessary; it does not represent thetrue reasons for our political duties.

Humes criticism has been generalized and applied to Rawlssand other contemporary contractarian views (such as T.M.Scanlons).10 We will later consider how Rawlss contract doctrinefares in the face of this forceful objection. In Rawlss lectures onHumes Of the Original Contract, Rawls says that Hume misreadsLocke in several respects. To begin with, as a test for the legitimacyof political constitutions, Lockes social contract does not requireactual consent. Even if our forebears had entered into a socialcontract and agreed to the constitution, this is not what makes ourconstitution legitimate now. Instead, Lockes social contractdoctrine says (says Rawls) that no government is legitimate unlessit could have been agreed to by rational individuals, starting from aposition of equal right and equal political jurisdiction, withoutanyones violating their duties to God or mankind, or alienating

Introduction 17

their fundamental moral rights, or agreeing to anything thatwould make them worse off than in a (somewhat benignLockean) state of nature. Whether a constitution passes this test ofconstitutional legitimacy is a philosophical and not a historicalquestion.

By contrast with Lockes contractarian account of political legit-imacy, Lockes account of individuals political obligations, includingtheir duties of allegiance towards particular regimes, does say thatactual express consent is required for anyone to become a perma-nent member of a society. The mere fact that I was born in theU.S. should not make me a citizen; citizenship should dependupon my giving my express consent to join this political societyand undertaking the duties of citizenship that it imposes (fightingits just wars, serving on juries, etc.). Of course, our duty to obeythe laws of a society is something different, and should notrequire our having given our consent, for this would give peopleleeway to disobey the law at will. But contrary to Humes reading,Locke never says that actual consent is required for this duty. ForLocke our duty to obey the laws of a legitimate constitution stemfrom our natural duties to God to preserve ourselves and the restof mankind, which include duties to respect others persons andproperty. But whatever Lockes positions on the duties to obey thelaws and bear allegiance towards particular governments, theyshould not be confused with his social contract thesis. That thesisis a hypothetical test for determining, not these or other duties ofindividuals, but the legitimacy of political constitutions and theduties of governments who are their agents.

If this is a fair response to Hume, then, as Rawls contends,Humes substantive criticism that Lockes social contract is anunnecessary shuffle can only be assessed by applying both Humesprinciple of utility and Lockes social contract to see whether theyidentify the very same types of government as legitimate and ille-gitimate. Only if they do is Humes argument against Lockesuccessful. The problem is that it is difficult to see why the consti-tutions that could be agreed to from a position of equal right (Lockesstandard) should exactly correspond with the constitutions thatbest promote public utility (Humes standard). Hume himself had

18 Rawls

reservations about resistance to absolute monarchies, the veryform of government Locke condemns via his social contracttheory. Unless it can be shown that Humes test of public utilityjustifies the very same constitutions justified by Lockes socialcontract doctrine, then Humes criticism that Lockes doctrine isredundant fails. One begins to suspect that the traditional utili-tarian argument against social contract doctrines is based uponmisunderstanding the point.

Rousseau

While Lockes contract doctrine is among the most significantphilosophical defenses of liberalism, Rousseaus contract doctrineis one of the most impassioned, brilliant, and yet enigmatic philo-sophical defenses of democracy. There are at least three importantaspects of Rousseaus position that have parallels in Rawls.

First, there is Rousseaus doctrine of natural goodness, includinghis rejection of the Christian doctrine of original sin and theHobbesian account of human nature as purely self-interested andnaturally indifferent to others fates.11 Rawls largely accepted theRousseauian position that the kind of person we are is partiallydetermined by the social and political institutions we create andmaintain. Humans, like all creatures, are motivated by self-loveand a concern for their own good, but this is not our only motiva-tion. Humans also have natural social inclinations, including anatural capacity for sympathy and compassion with their fellowbeings, which can be either encouraged or extinguished by theirsocial circumstances. Moreover, humans are capable of justice andunder normal circumstances of social life they develop a sense ofjustice directed towards those with whom they stand in cooperativerelations. Rawls mentions the account of moral learning inRousseaus Emile as the beginning of a tradition in moral psychologythat profoundly influenced his account of the stages of moraldevelopment and the sense of justice (TJ, 45960/4023 rev.).

Second, Rawls affirms Rousseaus idea that equal rights of politicalparticipation are central to individual freedom. In Lockes socialcontract it is envisioned that the large majority of people will

Introduction 19

alienate their natural political rights in order to gain the benefitsof political society. Equal political rights are then not among theinalienable liberties; Locke was a liberal but not a democrat. Rawlsaccepts Rousseaus position that to alienate ones political libertiesis to give up a large part of ones freedom, including the primarybases for individual self-respect (proper amour propre). Rawls didnot endorse Rousseaus romantic conception of direct democracy,requiring that citizens actively take part in legislating the laws.Except for citizens direct participation in local government affairs(town meetings, etc.), it is impractical for most purposes inmodern societies. But like Rousseau, Rawls regarded the realiza-tion of ones status as an equal citizen of fundamental significanceand essential to a persons good. Democratic engagement andparticipation is the primary activity for development and exerciseof the capacity for the sense of justice.

Third, Rousseaus doctrine of the General Will influenced Rawlssaccount of voting and also his account of public reason. ForRousseau it is citizens and legislators duty to vote, not theirparticular will or personal preferences of a majority, but insteadtheir conscientious and informed judgments regarding the commongood. The common good for Rousseau is justice, which consistsin the measures needed to achieve the freedom and equality ofcitizens. To vote the general will is then to vote what is requiredby justice. Rawls endorses this position in his account of democ-racy. Legislators are to vote their considered judgments regardingthe laws mandated by the principles of justice (TJ, sect. 54). Thelegislative discussion must be conceived not as a contest betweeninterests, but as an attempt to find the best policy as defined bythe principles of justice. . . . An impartial legislators only desire isto make the correct decision in this regard . . . (TJ, 357/314 rev.).Rawlss account of democracy has stimulated much of the currentdiscussions on deliberative democracy.12 Connected with delib-erative democracy is Rawlss idea of public reason, an idea alsofound initially in Rousseau and then Kant.13 For Rawls, publicreasons are the considerations that citizens and legislators shouldrely upon in coming to a decision on laws and public policies. Weshould not vote on the basis of what Rousseau calls our private

20 Rawls

reasons, but only the balance of public reasons. One role of a liberalconception of justice is to provide the content of public reason.

Kant

Rawlss lengthy lectures on Kant (nearly 200 pages in LHMP) indi-cate that Kant is the philosopher who most profoundly influencedhim. From the idea of the priority of right over the good andthe Kantian interpretation of justice as fairness in A Theory of Justice,to Kantian (and later Political) Constructivism and theIndependence of Moral Theory, then the conception of moralpersonality and the distinction between the Reasonable and theRational in Political Liberalism, and finally the rejection of a worldstate and the idea of a realistic utopia in Rawlss Law of Peoples,one can discern that many of Rawlss main ideas were deeplyinfluenced by his understanding of Kant.

Rawls is often interpreted as grounding his conception ofjustice in an interpretation of Kants idea of respect for persons.But here again, Rawls insists that it is a mistake to think that amoral conception can be arrived at by analyzing or interpretingthe ideas of respect or of the inherent worth of persons (or anyother fundamental ideas). It is precisely these ideas that call forinterpretation (TJ, 586/513 rev.). It might be said that Rawlsswork elucidates the idea of respect for persons as free and equalmoral persons who are both reasonable and rational. But eventhis does not say much until one begins to fill in Rawlss defini-tions of these obscure concepts and the principles that areassociated with these and other central ideas in his theory. Just asKant thought that to respect humanity as an end-in-itself requiresthat we abide by the categorical imperative, for Rawls to respectpersons fully as free, equal, reasonable, and rational requires thatwe cooperate with them on terms specified by the principles ofjustice. So far as we aim to uncover the meaning of respect forpersons for Rawls, it is explicated by justice as fairness.

Kant had little direct influence on Rawlss initial drafts of A Theoryof Justice in the 1950s and 1960s (most of the first six chapters andchapter 8 on the sense of justice). The Kantian interpretation of

Introduction 21

justice as fairness (TJ, sect. 40) was written relatively late and wasincorporated into A Theory of Justice primarily to show how justice asfairness is congruent with the good (TJ, sect. 86). After TheoryRawls increasingly came to be influenced by Kant. Only in Rawlssfinal works did he seek to distance himself from Kant, to avoidcontroversial foundations for political liberalism (LP, 8687).

Kants moral philosophy, not so much his political philosophy,influenced Rawls. Most of what he regarded as important in Kantspolitical philosophy he attributed to Locke and Rousseau, andinvolved Kants development of their views (e.g., the innate rightof freedom, the original contract, the general will, and so on).The exception is Kants writings on international justice, whichinfluenced Rawlss The Law of Peoples. Compare the concluding para-graph of The Law of Peoples (set forth at the end of the third sectionabove) with Rawlss explanation of Kants idea of reasonablefaith: Reasonable political faith . . . is the faith that such apeaceful international society of peoples is possible and favored byforces of nature. To abandon this faith is to give up on peace anddemocracy; and that we can never do as long as we affirm boththe moral law and human freedom (LHMP, 321). The parallelbetween Kants idea of the Kingdom (or Realm) of Ends andRawlss idea of a well-ordered society deserves mention. As Kantsrealm of ends is a social world in which everyone accepts andcomplies with the categorical imperative, Rawlss well-orderedsociety is a social world where all accept and normally satisfy theprinciples of justice. Moreover, as conscientious moral agentsapply the categorical imperative by reasoning about maxims thatare generally acceptable in a realm of ends, Rawlss parties in theoriginal position choose principles of justice that will be generallyacceptable among members of a well-ordered society (TJ, 45354/39798 rev.).

Utilitarianism: Hume, Sidgwick, and Mill

Humes account of the convention of justice was one of the firstmajor historical influences upon Rawls. Rawlss second article,Two Concepts of Rules, attempts to make sense of utilitarianism

22 Rawls

largely along lines that Hume suggests, defending it against commonobjections to utilitarianism. Rawls suggests that we should conceiveof justice in terms of the rules of a social practice, or convention,as Hume says. With Hume, Rawls contends that promising andcontractual agreements, property, punishment, and politicalconstitutions are all social practices that can be designed in differentways, and which can only be understood by reference to the rulesconstituting these practices. To justify actions within such a prac-tice for example, a decision whether or not to keep onespromise one appeals to the rules of the practice and what itforbids or allows: appealing to these rules is what is involved ingiving a moral justification of the action. By contrast, to justify thepractice itself, or changes to the rules of the practice, one is toappeal to some more abstract principle. Rawls suggests, followingHume, that this is how to understand the role of the principle ofutility. It misunderstands utilitarianism as a social doctrine to regardit as appropriate to appeal to the principle of utility in decidingwhether to follow the rules of a practice or how to act within thepractice. The principle of utility is not best conceived as a rule fordirectly guiding individual choices in particular actions. It issensibly applied only indirectly to actions, via its role in determiningand justifying the social rules individuals ought to follow andappeal to in the normal course of daily life.

Humes account of justice, joined with Wittgensteins idea of apractice, influenced Rawlss later account of social institutions, aswell as Rawlss idea that principles of justice apply in the firstinstance, not directly to determine individual actions, but to therules of institutions constituting the basic structure of society. AsHume regarded a just person as one who regularly complied withthe rules of the conventions of justice, for Rawls, to act justly is tocomply with the rules of basic institutions that conform to princi-ples of justice. Here too Humes account of the sense of justice, asa disposition to comply with rules of justice, also influencedRawlss account of that moral sentiment.

Henry Sidgwicks Methods of Ethics (7th ed., 1907) was for Rawlsthe major statement and defense of the classical utilitarian tradition.It provides the canonical statement of classical utilitarianism

Introduction 23

against which Rawls argues in A Theory of Justice. Sidgwick alsosubstantially influenced two other important features of Rawlssposition. First, there is Sidgwicks methodology, which involvedthe comparative study of the major traditions in moral philosophyin order to determine which position best met the criteria of arational method of ethics. Like Sidgwicks criteria for a rationalmethod, the original position is designed to incorporate all therelevant requirements of practical reason, (PL, 90) so that it mayserve as a method of selection to decide upon the most reason-able conception of justice from among an array of alternatives.Rawls also follows Sidgwick in regarding Intuitionism andPerfectionism as among the methods of ethics that are to becompared with utilitarianism. Unlike Sidgwick, Rawls did notsee Rational Egoism as a moral conception at all. Sidgwicksaccount of rational individual choice provided Rawls with manyelements for his account of a persons good, as well as suggestingto Rawls the point of view of deliberative rationality fromwhich a person is to reflect upon and determine his or her ownrational plan of life.

At the same time, Rawls adamantly rejects Sidgwicks hedonismand his view that pleasurable experiences are the final aim of allrational desire; Rawls argues instead for a plurality of intrinsichuman goods. The semi-perfectionist account of the human goodimplicit in Rawlss account of the Aristotelian Principle is influ-enced by Mills rejection of hedonism and his argument that thehigher pleasures are qualitatively superior in kind to the lowerpleasures. Like Mill, Rawls contends that it is a fact of humannature that, when people take advantage of opportunities todevelop and educate their natural abilities, they normally preferways of life that involve the development and exercise of theirhigher capacities. From the point of view of deliberative ratio-nality Rawls contends that it is rational for a person to incorporatethe realization of certain higher activities into his or her plan oflife. As in Mills account of individuality, for Rawls a condition ofrealizing ones rational good is that the plan of life that a personleads be one that is freely chosen by that person. This explains hiscurious claim that, in spite of the Aristotelian Principle, still it is

24 Rawls

possible that a persons rational good involves living a life plandevoting enormous time and energy to counting blades of grass.However wasteful and irrational such a life might otherwise seemfor perfectionists, it could be rational for a person to live thatlife so long as it is a fully informed life plan that is freely chosenand affirmed in deliberative rationality. It is for this reason that Icall Rawls a semi-perfectionist in his account of a personsgood: autonomous choice of a life plan is a necessary condition ofliving a good life, even if ones life is otherwise wasted in trivial,indeed worthless, activity. But this, as I understand him, is alsoMills view.

Finally, J.S. Mills principle of liberty bears obvious resemblancesto Rawlss first principle of justice. This becomes especiallyapparent in Rawlss lectures on Mill, where he interprets Millsprinciple of liberty as protecting, not liberty as such, but roughlythe same basic liberties that are part of Rawlss first principle. AlsoMills defense of representative democracy influenced Rawlssjustification of political rights of participation in A Theory of Justice(TJ, 23334/20406 rev.). Two main arguments Rawls gives fordemocracy are based in Mills contention that equal political rightsenable persons to politically defend their basic rights and liberties,and also that democratic participation requires that people takeinto account interests that are not their own, and therebybroadens their sympathies and educates their moral sentiments.Rawls later relies upon the latter argument as one of the mainreasons for equal political rights, to emphasize the central role ofparticipation in democratic public life in the development andexercise of the sense of justice.

Hegel and Marx

Hegel had little direct influence on Rawlss initial working out ofthe main ideas of A Theory of Justice. He is mentioned three times,and each time he is said to hold a position that Rawls rejects.14 Butafter Theory Rawls emphasized certain parallels between his posi-tion and Hegels, in contrast with Kants view.15 First, like Hegel,Rawls says he rejects the dualisms implicit in Kants transcendental

Introduction 25

philosophy (CP, 3034) between the analytic and synthetic, apriori vs. a posteriori, and reason in its pure vs. empirical uses,for example.16 This is most evident in Rawlss position thatnatural facts and regularities are highly relevant to justifyingfirst principles of justice. Rawls calls upon the findings ofpsychology, economics, sociology, biology, history, and otherempirical inquiries to justify his principles of justice. It was impor-tant for him to set forth principles of justice that are attuned to therequirements and limitations of human nature and the possibili-ties of social life. As we shall see, this is due, among otherreasons, to Rawlss concern that justice be compatible with thehuman good.

Rawls also resembles Hegel and departs from Kant in empha-sizing the social bases of moral principles of justice. One ofHegels great contributions, Rawls says, is to discern the deepsocial rootedness of people within an established framework oftheir political and social institutions . . . A Theory of Justice followsHegel in this respect when it takes the basic structure of societyas the first subject of justice.17 Like Hegel too, Rawlss positionimplies that moral and political autonomy can only be achievedwithin an appropriate social framework. He says of Hegel, It isonly within a rational (reasonable) social world, one that by thestructure of its institutions guarantees our freedom, that we canlead lives that are fully rational and good.18 A similar position isimplicit in Rawlss argument for the congruence of the rightand the good in A Theory of Justice: It is only within a well-ordered society of justice as fairness that free and equal individualscan achieve their full autonomy as reasonable and rational beings.

Related to the social bases of justice and individuals freedom,Rawls finds parallels in Hegels idea of justification with his(Rawlss) own emphasis upon the social and public role of a politicalconception of justice in providing a public basis for justification (seeCP, 426, 426n.). The idea of the social role of a conception of justicebears some resemblance to Hegels idea of philosophy as reconcilia-tion. Hegel says: What it [the truth about right or justice] needs isto be comprehended so that the content which is already rational[vernnftig, which Rawls translates as reasonable] in itself may also

26 Rawls

gain a rational [reasonable] form and thereby appear justified to freethinking. Of this passage Rawls says:

To become reconciled to our social world does not mean tobecome resigned to it. . . . Rather, reconciliation means that wehave come to see our social world as a form of life in political andsocial institutions that realizes our essence that is, the basis ofour dignity as persons who are free. It will thereby appear justi-fied to free thinking.

(LHMP, 331)

Rawlss accounts of moral and political autonomy both require(like Hegel, and Rawls says like Marx too) that people publiclyknow and accept the bases of their political and social relations,which in turn realize their status as free persons (CP, 326). Beingin this position is a precondition of freedom; it means thatnothing is or need be hidden (ibid.). For Rawls (unlike Hegel)such reconciliation cannot take place in the current social worldas it now is, but only in a well-ordered society of justice as fair-ness where reasonable persons generally publicly accept thisliberal egalitarian conception of justice.

In A Theory of Justice and later works Rawls was acutely aware ofMarxs and other socialists criticisims of liberalism, constitutionaldemocracy, and of capitalism and markets. I just mentionedRawlss later emphasis on the requirement of the full publicityof a societys conception of justice, which is partly a response toMarxs account of ideology, or false consciousness, and the role ofconceptions of justice in obscuring the true nature of social relations.In addition, Rawlss focus on the background justice of thebasic structure of society is in part responsive to Marxs critiqueof capitalism and the structure of property relations (TJ 259, 309n./229, 2712n. rev.). Moreover, Rawls distinguishes between theallocative and distributive function of markets (TJ, 27074/23942rev.). The former refers to the crucial role of markets in allocatingfactors of production efficiently in order to promote greaterproductivity and minimize waste of resources. Any rational andjust economic system, Rawls believes, should endorse the allocative

Introduction 27

role of markets and prices. But this does not entail markets distribu-tive role, or relying on markets and the price system for the thedistribution of income and wealth. The injustice of capitalism inlarge part consists in its nearly exclusive reliance on markets andprices for distribution of income and wealth, thereby excessivelyrewarding those with property in means of production at theexpense of workers who labor to produce wealth. Finally, Rawlsin later works argues that distributive justice requires either aproperty-owning democracy or a liberal socialist system, both ofwhich eliminate the wage-relationship with capitalist owners andprovide workers with real opportunities to control their workenvironment and their means of production. (See below, Chapter5 on property-owning democracy.)

Conclusion

I have sought to convey in this section Rawlss connections with themajor historical predecessors that influenced his work. Thoughraised within the Anglo-American analytic tradition in philosophy,Rawls is mainly responding to problems set forth by the major moraland political philosophers since Hobbes. For this reason, Rawlsslectures on the history of moral and political philosophy providevaluable insight into Rawlss own work, in addition to being amongthe best summaries available of the works of these important histor-ical fi