John Bordley Rawls
John Bordley Rawls (1921–2002) was an American political philosopher whose work fundamentally reshaped modern liberal theory and revived normative political philosophy in the analytic tradition. Educated at Princeton, he served in the U.S. Army during World War II, an experience that deeply influenced his moral sensibilities and later reflections on justice, fairness, and the vulnerability of persons. After early teaching posts, Rawls joined Harvard University, where he spent most of his career and became a formative influence on generations of philosophers. Rawls’s landmark book, "A Theory of Justice" (1971), introduced justice as fairness, a contractarian framework centered on the original position and the veil of ignorance. He argued that free and equal citizens, choosing principles of justice under conditions of impartiality, would endorse equal basic liberties and regulated social and economic inequalities to benefit the least advantaged. In later works, especially "Political Liberalism" and "The Law of Peoples", Rawls refined this project to address reasonable pluralism, stability, and global justice. His ideas continue to frame debates on distributive justice, constitutional democracy, and the moral basis of liberal institutions, making him a central reference point in contemporary political thought.
At a Glance
- Born
- 1921-02-21 — Baltimore, Maryland, United States
- Died
- 2002-11-24 — Lexington, Massachusetts, United StatesCause: Complications following a series of strokes
- Active In
- United States, North America
- Interests
- Political philosophyMoral philosophyLiberalismTheories of justiceConstitutionalismDemocratic theory
John Rawls’s central thesis is that the basic structure of a well‑ordered society should be regulated by principles of justice that free and equal citizens would choose in a fair initial choice situation—the original position—under a veil of ignorance, and that such citizens would endorse (1) an equal scheme of basic liberties for all, and (2) social and economic inequalities arranged to be to the greatest benefit of the least advantaged and attached to positions open to all under fair equality of opportunity; this political conception of justice, articulated as justice as fairness, is designed to secure the stability of a constitutional democracy amid reasonable pluralism through public reason and overlapping consensus.
A Theory of Justice
Composed: 1958–1971
Political Liberalism
Composed: 1981–1993
The Law of Peoples
Composed: 1989–1999
Justice as Fairness: A Restatement
Composed: 1990–2001
Lectures on the History of Moral Philosophy
Composed: 1950s–1970s (delivered), edited and published posthumously 2000
Collected Papers
Composed: 1951–1998 (articles originally published), collected 1999
Justice is the first virtue of social institutions, as truth is of systems of thought.— A Theory of Justice (1971), rev. ed. (1999), §1, p. 3.
Opening statement of his major work, emphasizing the foundational role of justice in evaluating the basic structure of society.
The principles of justice are chosen behind a veil of ignorance.— A Theory of Justice (1971), rev. ed. (1999), §4, p. 118.
Concise formulation of the central device of the original position, designed to model fairness and impartiality in selecting principles of justice.
Each person is to have an equal right to the most extensive total system of equal basic liberties compatible with a similar system of liberty for all.— A Theory of Justice (1971), rev. ed. (1999), §11, p. 220.
Statement of the first principle of justice, giving lexical priority to a scheme of equal basic liberties in a just society.
Social and economic inequalities are to be arranged so that they are to the greatest benefit of the least advantaged.— A Theory of Justice (1971), rev. ed. (1999), §13, p. 266.
Canonical statement of the difference principle, regulating permissible inequalities in wealth and income.
In a constitutional democracy the public conception of justice should be, as far as possible, independent of controversial philosophical and religious doctrines.— Political Liberalism (1993), paperback ed. (1996), Introduction, p. 10.
Expresses the idea of a freestanding political conception of justice suitable for societies marked by reasonable pluralism.
Formative Years and Wartime Experience (1921–1946)
Rawls grew up in a privileged but tragedy-marked family in Baltimore, losing two brothers to diseases he likely transmitted. At Princeton he studied philosophy and was influenced by idealism and theology before military service in the Pacific theater. Witnessing the devastation of war and the bombing of Hiroshima contributed to his loss of Christian faith and deep concern for the moral vulnerability and equal worth of persons.
Early Academic Contractarianism (1946–1960)
After the war, Rawls completed his Ph.D. at Princeton on moral worth and began developing a Kantian, contractarian alternative to utilitarianism. Teaching at Princeton, Cornell, and later MIT, he published influential articles such as "Two Concepts of Rules" (1955) and "Justice as Fairness" (1958), in which he first articulated the idea of a hypothetical original agreement among free and equal persons as the basis of principles of justice.
Systematization in A Theory of Justice (1960–1979)
During the 1960s at Harvard, Rawls refined his ideas into a comprehensive constructivist theory culminating in "A Theory of Justice" (1971). In this phase he elaborated the original position, veil of ignorance, two principles of justice, and the lexical priority of basic liberties. His work offered a powerful alternative to utilitarianism and reoriented political philosophy toward questions of distributive justice and institutional design.
Political Liberalism and Pluralism (1980–1995)
Responding to critics, Rawls reinterpreted justice as fairness as a specifically political conception rather than a full moral or metaphysical doctrine. In "Political Liberalism" (1993) he addressed the problem of reasonable pluralism in democratic societies, developing notions of public reason and overlapping consensus and shifting emphasis from a single comprehensive truth to the stability of fair cooperation among citizens holding diverse worldviews.
Global Justice and Restatement (1995–2002)
In his later years Rawls extended his framework to international relations in "The Law of Peoples" (1999), proposing principles for just relations among liberal and decent hierarchical peoples, and rejecting both global utilitarianism and world-state cosmopolitanism. "Justice as Fairness: A Restatement" (2001) presented a clarified, pedagogical account of his mature view, consolidating revisions in response to decades of critique and debate.
1. Introduction
John Bordley Rawls (1921–2002) is widely regarded as the most influential Anglophone political philosopher of the late 20th century. His central project was to articulate a conception of justice suited to modern constitutional democracies whose citizens regard one another as free and equal yet are divided by enduring moral, religious, and philosophical disagreements.
Rawls’s work is best known for three interconnected ideas. First, he proposed justice as fairness, a liberal-egalitarian account of how the “basic structure” of society—its major political, economic, and social institutions—ought to distribute rights, opportunities, and resources. Second, he developed the original position and veil of ignorance as a hypothetical choice procedure modeling fair agreement among citizens conceived as equals. Third, he reformulated liberal theory to address what he called reasonable pluralism, emphasizing the role of public reason and overlapping consensus in sustaining a stable democratic order.
Rawls’s ideas have been taken as a benchmark in discussions of distributive justice, constitutional design, and global order. Proponents see in his work a systematic alternative to utilitarianism that combines robust basic liberties with concern for the least advantaged. Critics, however, question his assumptions about rationality, the scope of the basic structure, the priority of justice over other values, and the limits he places on global duties.
Across his major books—A Theory of Justice (1971), Political Liberalism (1993), The Law of Peoples (1999), and Justice as Fairness: A Restatement (2001)—Rawls revises and extends his view in response to these debates. The resulting body of work forms a unified but evolving attempt to specify what a fair system of cooperation among equals would require in domestic and international contexts.
2. Life and Historical Context
Rawls’s life spanned much of the 20th century, and commentators often relate elements of his theory to the social and political upheavals of that period. He was born in 1921 in Baltimore, Maryland, into a professional, upper-middle-class family, and died in 2002 in Massachusetts after a long academic career primarily at Harvard University. His formative years coincided with the Great Depression, his early adulthood with World War II, and his major philosophical work with the Cold War, decolonization, and the civil rights movement in the United States.
Historical Milieu
Rawls’s mature writing emerged during a period when Anglo-American philosophy had been dominated by logical positivism and metaethics, and many philosophers were skeptical of systematic normative theory. His A Theory of Justice appeared in 1971, in a context marked by:
- the welfare-state settlement after World War II,
- intense debates over civil rights and racial segregation in the United States,
- the Vietnam War and student movements,
- a growing critique of utilitarian and technocratic approaches to policy.
Many interpreters argue that Rawls’s emphasis on basic liberties, fair equality of opportunity, and attention to the worst-off reflects concerns raised by these developments, without being simply a direct response to any particular policy conflict.
Chronology and Institutional Context
| Period | Contextual Features | Relevance to Rawls’s Work |
|---|---|---|
| 1920s–40s | Depression, New Deal, World War II | Early exposure to economic inequality and mass conflict; later linked by some biographers to his focus on fairness and equal respect. |
| 1950s–60s | Post-war prosperity, Cold War liberalism, civil rights struggles | Development of his early contractarian articles; backdrop for his rejection of laissez-faire and his interest in constitutional democracy. |
| 1970s–80s | Oil shocks, rise of neoliberalism, rights revolutions | A Theory of Justice enters debates about welfare states and distributive justice; his framework is contrasted with market-oriented and libertarian views. |
| 1990s–2000s | Globalization, post–Cold War order | Rawls turns to political liberalism and international justice, addressing pluralism within and among societies. |
Scholars differ on how tightly Rawls’s arguments should be read as responses to these contexts. Some interpret his work as a philosophical articulation of mid-20th-century “welfare-state liberalism”; others see it as a more abstract attempt to formulate principles that could apply across varied social conditions, only loosely shaped by his historical environment.
3. Education, Wartime Experience, and Early Career
Rawls’s education and early experiences are often cited as shaping the concerns that later appear in his theory of justice.
Education
Rawls studied at Princeton University, initially focusing on theology and philosophical idealism before turning more fully to moral and political philosophy. He completed his undergraduate degree in 1943 and later returned to Princeton after the war to write a Ph.D. dissertation on moral worth (completed in 1950). His doctoral work, while more narrowly ethical than his later political theory, already wrestled with questions about moral motivation, principles, and the significance of character—issues that re-emerge in his later account of a “sense of justice.”
Wartime Experience
Between his undergraduate and graduate studies, Rawls served in the U.S. Army during World War II, seeing active duty in the Pacific theater and witnessing the aftermath of the bombing of Hiroshima. Accounts based on Rawls’s own later reflections suggest that these experiences contributed to his loss of Christian faith and heightened sensitivity to the vulnerability and equal moral status of persons.
Some scholars argue that his focus on the arbitrariness of fortune—such as where one is born or how war affects individuals—resonates with his later insistence that many social and natural contingencies should not determine citizens’ life prospects. Others are more cautious about drawing direct causal lines, noting that Rawls’s texts rarely dwell on autobiography.
Early Academic Positions
After completing his Ph.D., Rawls began teaching at Princeton, then moved to Cornell University, and later to the Massachusetts Institute of Technology before settling at Harvard in 1962. During this early career phase (late 1940s–1950s), he published key articles such as “Two Concepts of Rules” (1955) and “Justice as Fairness” (1958).
These writings already exhibit several themes that would become central:
- the use of hypothetical agreement as a basis for principles,
- a sustained critique of utilitarianism,
- interest in the structure of rules and institutions rather than only individual actions.
Colleagues and students from this period recall Rawls as methodical and self-critical, traits that partly explain the long gestation of A Theory of Justice, which drew on more than a decade of teaching and revising his ideas before the book’s publication.
4. Intellectual Development and Influences
Rawls’s intellectual development involved sustained engagement with historical figures, contemporary debates in analytic philosophy, and emerging social theory. Commentators typically distinguish several stages, but across them he consistently sought to reconcile a liberal concern for individual freedom with egalitarian commitments.
Philosophical Influences
Rawls himself highlighted certain thinkers as especially important:
| Thinker | Aspect Influential for Rawls |
|---|---|
| Immanuel Kant | Conception of persons as ends in themselves; autonomy; the idea that practical reason can “construct” principles. |
| John Stuart Mill | Liberal commitment to basic freedoms; sophisticated utilitarianism providing Rawls’s main foil. |
| Rousseau | Social contract and the “general will” as expressing citizens’ shared point of view. |
| Hume | Conventions and the role of institutions in coordinating behavior. |
| Sidgwick | Classical utilitarian method, against which Rawls shapes his own contractualism. |
His posthumously published Lectures on the History of Moral Philosophy reveal the depth of these engagements and the interpretive framework through which he read earlier moral theorists.
Analytic and Social-Theoretical Context
Within 20th-century analytic philosophy, Rawls was influenced by and responding to:
- Logical positivism and ordinary language philosophy, which had encouraged skepticism about substantive moral theory. Rawls sought to show that rigorous argument about justice was still possible.
- Decision theory and social choice theory, which informed his modeling of rational choice in the original position and his attention to formal constraints like publicity and stability.
- Economics, especially welfare economics, which he engaged critically by emphasizing primary goods and rejecting aggregate utility maximization as the sole criterion of social evaluation.
At the same time, sociological and political developments—such as work on pluralism, organizational structures, and constitutionalism—formed part of the background against which Rawls developed his notion of the basic structure and its primary role in justice.
Development Across Phases
Interpreters often divide Rawls’s thought into:
- an early comprehensive, Kantian phase (up to the 1970s), where he sometimes invoked metaphysical ideas about persons and moral autonomy;
- a later political liberal phase (from the mid-1980s), where he explicitly recasts his theory as “political, not metaphysical” to accommodate reasonable pluralism.
Debate continues over how radical this shift is. Some argue for deep continuity in his Kantian constructivist method and egalitarian commitments; others see a significant change in how he justifies his principles and the scope of claims they make about persons and moral truth.
5. Major Works and Their Reception
Rawls’s reputation rests primarily on a cluster of major works, each of which has generated extensive commentary and criticism.
Principal Works
| Work | Date | Central Focus |
|---|---|---|
| A Theory of Justice | 1971 (rev. 1999) | Comprehensive statement of justice as fairness; original position; two principles of justice. |
| Political Liberalism | 1993 (paperback 1996) | Reformulation of justice as fairness as a “political” conception compatible with reasonable pluralism. |
| The Law of Peoples | 1999 | Extension of the contractual framework to international relations among “peoples.” |
| Justice as Fairness: A Restatement | 2001 | Clarified, pedagogical restatement of his mature domestic theory. |
| Collected Papers | 1999 | Key articles illuminating the development of his views. |
| Lectures on the History of Moral Philosophy | 2000 | Historical context for his own moral and political theory. |
Reception of A Theory of Justice
A Theory of Justice was almost immediately recognized as a landmark. Supporters in political philosophy, law, and economics praised its systematic alternative to utilitarianism and its detailed articulation of liberal egalitarianism. It is often credited with reviving normative political theory after a period of relative neglect.
At the same time, it attracted diverse criticisms:
- Utilitarians questioned Rawls’s rejection of aggregate welfare as the sole standard.
- Libertarians (e.g., Robert Nozick) challenged his views on redistribution and property rights.
- Marxist and radical theorists argued that Rawls underestimated class power, ideology, and structural domination.
- Communitarians (e.g., Michael Sandel, Alasdair MacIntyre, Charles Taylor) contended that his notion of the person was too abstracted from communal and historical identities.
These critiques significantly shaped Rawls’s later work, especially Political Liberalism and the Restatement.
Reception of Later Works
Political Liberalism was generally seen as a major shift, addressing worries about the stability and justification of justice as fairness in a pluralist society. Some readers welcomed its focus on public reason and overlapping consensus; others found the move from a comprehensive to a “freestanding” political conception either inadequate or overly concessive to existing beliefs.
The Law of Peoples generated polarized responses. Some commentators, especially in international relations and law, valued its attempt to extend Rawlsian ideas beyond the nation-state while recognizing non-liberal “decent” peoples. Cosmopolitan critics, by contrast, argued that Rawls’s focus on peoples rather than individuals weakened his earlier egalitarian commitments.
Justice as Fairness: A Restatement has often been used pedagogically and as a guide to Rawls’s mature view. It is cited both by admirers, who see it as clarifying ambiguities, and by critics, who regard it as codifying aspects of his theory they find problematic.
6. Justice as Fairness and the Original Position
Justice as Fairness
“Justice as fairness” is Rawls’s name for his overall conception of justice for the basic structure of a democratic society. It has two central features:
- It treats society as a fair system of cooperation over time among free and equal citizens.
- It specifies principles of justice that would be chosen under fair conditions of agreement.
The subject of justice is the basic structure—the main political, social, and economic institutions and how they fit together. Rawls argues that because these institutions profoundly shape individuals’ life chances, their design is the primary locus of justice.
Justice as fairness is intended to be:
- Liberal, in affirming equal basic liberties.
- Egalitarian, in limiting permissible inequalities.
- Contractualist, in grounding principles in hypothetical agreement.
- Public, in that its principles can be publicly understood and used to assess institutions.
The Original Position
The original position is the central device through which Rawls models fair agreement on principles of justice. Parties in the original position are:
- representatives of citizens, each concerned to advance that citizen’s interests,
- rational and mutually disinterested,
- symmetrically situated so that no one has bargaining advantages.
Most distinctively, they choose under a veil of ignorance, lacking knowledge of:
- their own social class, race, gender, and native talents,
- their particular conception of the good life,
- their generation in the history of their society.
They do, however, know general facts about human psychology, economics, and social life, and they know that citizens will have conceptions of the good and a capacity for a sense of justice.
Rawls argues that this setup embodies the idea of fairness: by abstracting from morally arbitrary contingencies, it ensures that chosen principles do not favor any particular position in society.
Role and Status of the Device
Philosophers disagree on how to interpret the original position:
- Some read it as a decision-theoretic model of rational choice under uncertainty that yields the two principles.
- Others see it as a heuristic representation of deeper moral ideas—equal respect, impartiality, and reciprocity.
- Critics question whether the information restrictions are plausible or whether alternative hypothetical agreements would yield different principles.
Rawls presents the original position as a constructivist procedure: the correctness of principles is tied to their being the outcome of this suitably described, fair choice situation.
7. The Two Principles of Justice and the Difference Principle
Within justice as fairness, the outcome of the original position is, according to Rawls, a pair of lexically ordered principles. Although Rawls’s formulations change slightly over time, their core structure remains consistent.
The Two Principles
A canonical later formulation (from Justice as Fairness: A Restatement) is:
-
First Principle (Equal Basic Liberties)
Each person has an equal claim to a fully adequate scheme of equal basic liberties, which is compatible with the same scheme for all. -
Second Principle (Social and Economic Inequalities)
Social and economic inequalities are to satisfy two conditions:
(a) they are to be attached to offices and positions open to all under conditions of fair equality of opportunity;
(b) they are to be to the greatest benefit of the least advantaged members of society (the difference principle).
These principles are lexically ordered: the first principle has priority over the second, and within the second, fair equality of opportunity has priority over the difference principle.
Fair Equality of Opportunity
Rawls distinguishes fair equality of opportunity from merely formal equality of opportunity. Formal equality prohibits explicit discrimination but allows social background to play a large role in determining prospects. Fair equality of opportunity requires that individuals with the same native talents and motivation have similar chances of attaining positions, regardless of their social origins. This implies institutional measures such as education policy and anti-discrimination enforcement.
The Difference Principle
The difference principle governs the distribution of social and economic advantages. Rawls states:
Social and economic inequalities are to be arranged so that they are to the greatest benefit of the least advantaged.
Proponents interpret this as a maximin rule applied to the worst-off social position, within the constraints of liberty and opportunity. It permits inequalities (e.g., higher incomes for certain positions) only if they improve the situation of those least advantaged compared with alternative institutional schemes.
Supporters argue that the principle:
- expresses a form of reciprocity, as gains for the better-off must contribute to the condition of the worst-off;
- treats natural and social contingencies as common assets, the benefits of which should be shared;
- provides a more demanding standard than utilitarianism or laissez-faire equality of opportunity.
Interpretations and Criticisms
Interpretations diverge on:
- how to specify the “least advantaged” (in terms of primary goods, income, or broader social position),
- whether the difference principle is meant as an ideal theory guideline or directly applicable to policy.
Critics have argued that:
- it may discourage incentives for productivity,
- it is too egalitarian (e.g., libertarian critiques) or not egalitarian enough (e.g., some Marxist and egalitarian critiques),
- alternative principles such as sufficientarian or prioritarian rules better capture moral intuitions.
Rawls responds by emphasizing the difference principle’s place within a holistic scheme that prioritizes basic liberties and fair opportunity, rather than as a stand-alone maxim.
8. Political Liberalism, Public Reason, and Overlapping Consensus
In Political Liberalism, Rawls revises justice as fairness to address what he calls the fact of reasonable pluralism: in a free society, citizens will endorse diverse, often incompatible, comprehensive doctrines (religious, philosophical, or moral). He asks how a democratic regime can be stable and legitimate under these conditions.
From Comprehensive to Political Liberalism
Rawls now presents justice as fairness as a political conception: it is
- freestanding, not derived from any one comprehensive doctrine,
- framed in terms of political values (e.g., freedom, equality, fairness) appropriate to the basic structure,
- intended for application to constitutional essentials and matters of basic justice, not all aspects of life.
This reframing aims to show how citizens with diverse worldviews can endorse the same political principles for different reasons.
Overlapping Consensus
An overlapping consensus exists when citizens who hold different reasonable comprehensive doctrines nonetheless each affirm the same political conception of justice from within their own moral or religious perspectives.
| Feature | Description |
|---|---|
| Parties | Citizens with diverse, reasonable comprehensive doctrines. |
| Object | A political conception of justice (e.g., justice as fairness). |
| Basis | Each doctrine, for its own reasons, supports the political principles. |
| Function | Provides stability grounded in citizens’ considered convictions. |
Proponents see overlapping consensus as more robust than a mere modus vivendi (a pragmatic compromise), because it involves principled endorsement rather than contingent balance of power.
Public Reason
Public reason is the form of reasoning Rawls deems appropriate when citizens and officials debate constitutional essentials and basic questions of justice. It involves:
- justifying political decisions in terms of shared political values,
- appealing to reasons that all reasonable citizens could accept, at least in principle,
- recognizing the burdens of judgment—the many sources of reasonable disagreement.
Rawls does not require citizens to forgo their comprehensive doctrines; rather, he proposes a “duty of civility” to present public justifications in political terms when deciding fundamental questions.
Assessments and Debates
Supporters argue that political liberalism:
- better reflects the realities of modern democracies,
- preserves liberal commitments without assuming a single moral or metaphysical truth,
- clarifies the role of citizens’ own convictions in supporting liberal institutions.
Critics contend that:
- the line between political and comprehensive values is blurry,
- public reason may unduly restrict religious or moral expression in politics,
- the notion of “reasonableness” risks excluding some citizens’ views.
Discussions continue about whether Rawls’s political liberalism can accommodate deep disagreements while ensuring sufficient common ground for stable, just institutions.
9. International Justice and The Law of Peoples
The Law of Peoples extends Rawls’s contractual framework to the international domain, asking what principles should govern a “society of peoples.” Unlike cosmopolitan theories that treat individuals as the primary units of global justice, Rawls here centers peoples—organized political societies with their own institutions and cultures.
The Society of Peoples
Rawls distinguishes several types of societies:
- Liberal peoples: roughly just constitutional democracies.
- Decent hierarchical peoples: non-liberal but respectful of basic human rights and possessing a consultative political structure.
- Outlaw states: aggressive or rights-violating regimes.
- Burdened societies: peoples whose historical and social conditions impede the establishment of just or decent institutions.
The aim is to define principles that liberal and decent peoples could reasonably accept to regulate their mutual relations.
Principles of the Law of Peoples
Rawls proposes a set of principles analogous to, but distinct from, the domestic two principles. These include:
- respect for peoples’ independence and equality,
- adherence to treaties and non-aggression,
- observance of basic human rights,
- restrictions on the conduct of war,
- a duty of assistance to burdened societies to help them achieve just or decent institutions.
He explicitly rejects both a world state and strong forms of global egalitarianism that would apply the domestic difference principle worldwide. Instead, he advocates a “realistic utopia” of reasonably just relations among distinct peoples.
Reception and Controversies
The Law of Peoples has generated extensive debate, especially regarding its relationship to Rawls’s earlier egalitarianism.
Supporters argue that:
- the focus on peoples respects collective self-determination and cultural diversity,
- a more limited set of global duties is realistic and more likely to gain broad acceptance,
- the duty of assistance reflects concern for the worst-off societies without erasing political boundaries.
Cosmopolitan critics respond that:
- individuals, not peoples, are the ultimate subjects of justice,
- failing to extend the difference principle globally is inconsistent with Rawls’s arguments against arbitrary inequalities,
- the permissive stance toward “decent hierarchical peoples” tolerates significant internal inequalities and restrictions on liberty.
Others question Rawls’s assumptions about global economic structures, suggesting that they understate the impact of international trade, finance, and institutions on domestic justice. The resulting debates have fueled a large literature in global justice, with Rawls’s position often serving as a central reference point—either to be defended, modified, or rejected.
10. Methodology: Kantian Constructivism and Analytic Style
Rawls’s work is notable not only for its substantive claims but also for its methodological approach. He sought to show how a rigorous, systematic theory of justice could be developed within the analytic tradition.
Kantian Constructivism
Rawls describes his approach as Kantian constructivism in moral and political philosophy. The key idea is that principles of justice are not discovered as independent moral facts but are constructed as the outcome of a suitable rational procedure—the original position—subject to constraints that reflect our considered moral ideas.
Features of this constructivism include:
- Procedural objectivity: the justification of principles depends on their being the result of a fair procedure, not on correspondence to an independent moral reality.
- Modeling persons as free and equal: the conditions of the original position are chosen to embody these ideas.
- Reflective equilibrium: principles are tested against considered judgments about particular cases and adjusted along with background theories to achieve coherence.
“We can see the original position as a procedural interpretation of Kant’s conception of autonomy and the categorical imperative.”
— Rawls, A Theory of Justice
Reflective Equilibrium
Rawls popularized the method of reflective equilibrium, where:
- We start from considered moral judgments.
- We formulate candidate principles and background theories.
- We revise both judgments and principles to achieve mutual fit.
This method aims to capture the way actual moral reasoning adjusts both intuitions and theories rather than treating either as infallible.
Analytic Style
Rawls’s style is characteristically analytic:
- extensive use of definitions and distinctions (e.g., between formal and fair equality of opportunity),
- reliance on simplified models (the original position, the representative citizen),
- engagement with decision theory and social choice concepts,
- careful attention to the logical structure of arguments and to objections.
Supporters praise this style for clarity, rigor, and argumentative transparency. Critics sometimes regard it as overly abstract, idealized, or detached from empirical realities and social practices. Others question whether constructivism can avoid either collapsing into conventionalism or presupposing substantive moral truths it purports to construct.
Debates over Rawls’s methodology explore issues such as:
- whether reflective equilibrium can provide genuine justification,
- how idealized the original position should be,
- the relationship between empirical social science and normative theory in his work.
11. Moral Psychology, Stability, and the Sense of Justice
Rawls devotes significant attention to moral psychology and the conditions under which a just society can be stable—that is, stably supported by citizens’ sense of justice over time.
The Sense of Justice
In A Theory of Justice, Rawls introduces the idea of a sense of justice: a normally effective desire to act in accordance with principles that specify fair terms of cooperation. He argues that:
- people are capable of acquiring such a sense through socialization in just institutions,
- this sense of justice can become a stable part of their character,
- a just basic structure can generate its own support by fostering these dispositions.
His account draws on developmental psychology (including work by Piaget and Kohlberg) to outline stages through which individuals move from obedience to authority, to mutual trust, to principled morality.
Stability for the Right Reasons
Rawls differentiates stability for the right reasons from mere stability based on fear or manipulation. A just society is stably just when citizens:
- endorse its principles as fair,
- are motivated by their sense of justice, not merely self-interest,
- view others’ compliance as reasonable and trustworthy.
He argues that justice as fairness is more likely to achieve such stability than utilitarianism, because it treats citizens as equals and provides a publicly recognizable standard of fairness.
From A Theory of Justice to Political Liberalism
In Political Liberalism, the question of stability is reframed given reasonable pluralism. Rawls now asks whether a liberal conception of justice can be stably affirmed by citizens with diverse comprehensive doctrines.
The mechanisms of stability emphasize:
- overlapping consensus: different doctrines support the same political conception,
- public reason: citizens see political decisions as justifiable by shared political values,
- the psychological plausibility of citizens integrating their political commitments with their broader beliefs.
Debates and Critiques
Some commentators see Rawls’s moral psychology as optimistic about human motivation and about the capacity of institutions to shape citizens’ sense of justice. Others argue that:
- his model underestimates conflicting passions, identities, or structural inequalities,
- the account is too tied to certain Western liberal assumptions about the self,
- empirical research in psychology and sociology may challenge some of his claims about moral development and motivation.
Nevertheless, his integration of psychological considerations into a theory of justice has been influential in debates about civic education, political legitimacy, and the role of moral character in sustaining democratic institutions.
12. Critiques, Revisions, and Justice as Fairness: A Restatement
Rawls’s work prompted extensive critique across philosophical traditions, and he responded by revising and clarifying elements of his theory. Justice as Fairness: A Restatement (2001) provides a concise presentation of his mature position.
Major Lines of Critique
Several prominent families of criticism emerged:
| Critical Tradition | Main Concerns |
|---|---|
| Utilitarian and consequentialist | Rejection of aggregate welfare as sole criterion; alleged neglect of overall well-being; skepticism about lexical priorities. |
| Libertarian | Opposition to redistributive measures and patterned principles; defense of strong property rights and voluntary exchanges. |
| Communitarian | Claim that Rawls’s conception of the person is too abstract, ignoring communal ties and traditions; concern about the priority of right over conceptions of the good. |
| Marxist and radical | View that Rawls accepts capitalist structures and underestimates class domination, ideology, and systemic exploitation. |
| Feminist | Argument that focusing on the basic structure and public sphere neglects gendered power relations within the family and caregiving; questions about assumptions embedded in the original position. |
| Multicultural and critical race | Concerns that the theory insufficiently addresses structural racism, colonialism, and cultural domination. |
Rawls engaged with some of these critiques directly, especially communitarian and feminist concerns about the family and the self, and stability-based objections that influenced Political Liberalism.
Revisions and Clarifications
Across later works and the Restatement, Rawls made several adjustments:
- Political, not metaphysical: he recast justice as fairness as a political conception (discussed in Section 8).
- Emphasis on basic structure: he clarified the scope of his theory and the kinds of institutions it primarily addresses.
- Refined account of primary goods and the least advantaged: to respond to interpretive and technical questions.
- Clarifications on the family: acknowledging the need for just family structures to support fair equality of opportunity and the development of a sense of justice.
The Restatement arranges these refinements systematically, presenting what Rawls considered his most careful account of justice as fairness.
Justice as Fairness: A Restatement
The Restatement:
- offers a streamlined exposition of the original position, the two principles, and institutional implications,
- incorporates revisions from Political Liberalism while still focusing on the domestic justice of a closed society,
- addresses misunderstandings from earlier debates, for example concerning maximin reasoning and the role of ideal theory.
Scholars differ on how far these revisions answer earlier criticisms. Some see them as successfully clarifying and strengthening the theory; others maintain that fundamental concerns—about idealization, global justice, or the nature of persons and communities—remain unaddressed. Nonetheless, the Restatement is widely used as the canonical statement of Rawls’s final domestic view.
13. Rawls’s Place in Liberal Egalitarianism and Contract Theory
Rawls is centrally positioned in both liberal egalitarianism and social contract theory, shaping how these traditions are understood and developed.
Liberal Egalitarianism
Liberal egalitarianism seeks to combine strong protection for individual liberties with concern for distributive fairness. Within this family:
- Rawls’s justice as fairness is often taken as the paradigm example, with its emphasis on basic liberties, fair equality of opportunity, and the difference principle.
- Other theorists, such as Ronald Dworkin, Amartya Sen, and Thomas Scanlon, have developed alternative liberal egalitarian frameworks, sometimes explicitly in dialogue with Rawls.
Comparisons often focus on:
| Aspect | Rawls | Other Liberal Egalitarians (illustrative) |
|---|---|---|
| Metric of advantage | Primary goods | Resources (Dworkin), capabilities (Sen), reasons/permissions (Scanlon) |
| Pattern of distribution | Difference principle (maximizing the least advantaged) | Equality of resources, capability thresholds, prioritarianism, sufficientarian standards |
| Scope | Basic structure of a society of citizens | Some extend to global justice or broader domains (e.g., personal morality, associations) |
These contrasts highlight both Rawls’s centrality and the diversity within liberal egalitarian thought.
Contract Theory and Contractualism
Rawls also revitalized contract theory, giving it a distinctive Kantian and constructivist twist. His original position stands alongside earlier social contract models (Hobbes, Locke, Rousseau) as a major reference point.
Later contract and contractualist theorists have:
- adopted similar hypothetical agreement frameworks (e.g., T. M. Scanlon’s “what we owe to each other”),
- criticized or modified Rawls’s modeling of rationality, information, or agreement (e.g., G. A. Cohen, David Gauthier),
- debated whether contract devices should represent mutual advantage (bargaining) or mutual recognition (respect among equals).
Some see Rawls as shifting contractualism from justifying political authority to justifying principles of distributive justice and institutional structure. Others interpret his work as integrating both functions: legitimating state power and specifying fair background conditions for social cooperation.
Discussions continue about:
- whether contract theory should focus on ideal conditions or incorporate strategic behavior and noncompliance,
- how inclusive the contracting parties should be (e.g., non-citizens, future generations),
- the relationship between contractual justification and other moral foundations (e.g., rights, capabilities, care).
In these debates, Rawls’s framework is often used as the primary point of comparison, even by those who reject or significantly revise his conclusions.
14. Influence on Law, Economics, and Public Policy
Rawls’s ideas have had substantial impact beyond philosophy, particularly in law, economics, and public policy, where they serve as reference points for debates about rights, welfare, and institutional design.
Law and Constitutional Theory
In legal scholarship, Rawls’s emphasis on basic liberties and public reason has influenced theories of constitutional interpretation and adjudication.
- Constitutional theorists have used his framework to argue for strong protections of political liberties, freedom of conscience, and equal citizenship.
- The concept of public reason has been invoked in debates about judicial reasoning, suggesting that courts should justify decisions on constitutional essentials using political values accessible to all citizens.
- In legal education, Rawls’s work is widely taught in courses on constitutional law, jurisprudence, and legal philosophy.
Some legal scholars embrace Rawls as providing a normative foundation for liberal constitutionalism; others criticize the approach as insufficiently attentive to historical injustices, institutional behavior, or democratic contestation.
Economics and Welfare Analysis
In economics, Rawls’s alternative to utilitarian welfare evaluation has been influential:
- The difference principle and focus on the least advantaged have inspired models that evaluate policies by their impact on the worst-off, rather than solely on aggregate welfare.
- His concept of primary goods has parallels with, and has been contrasted to, Amartya Sen’s capabilities approach in development economics and social policy.
- Social choice theorists have examined Rawlsian maximin criteria in relation to other distributive rules.
Some economists view Rawlsian criteria as too demanding or insufficiently sensitive to efficiency; others incorporate Rawlsian constraints into broader cost–benefit frameworks.
Public Policy and Political Practice
Rawls’s framework has informed policy debates in areas such as:
- Taxation and redistribution: arguments for progressive taxation and social insurance often reference Rawlsian ideas about sharing the benefits of social cooperation and protecting the least advantaged.
- Education and opportunity: the notion of fair equality of opportunity is frequently invoked in discussions of school funding, affirmative action, and anti-discrimination measures.
- Social welfare and health care: Rawlsian principles have been used to justify safety nets and universal access to essential services.
Policy theorists and practitioners differ, however, on how directly Rawls’s ideal theory should translate into real-world policy. Some see it as offering concrete guidance for institutional reform; others treat it more as a regulative ideal or a standard for evaluating existing institutions, requiring significant adaptation when applied to non-ideal conditions.
Overall, Rawls’s concepts—basic structure, equality of basic liberties, fair opportunity, and priority to the worst-off—have become part of the standard vocabulary in normative discussions of law and public policy, even among those who do not accept his full theory.
15. Legacy and Historical Significance
Rawls’s legacy is multifaceted, encompassing his impact on philosophical method, political theory, and broader public discourse.
Revival of Normative Political Philosophy
Many commentators credit Rawls with reviving normative political philosophy in the analytic tradition. Before A Theory of Justice, much Anglophone work focused on metaethics, language, or empirically oriented social science. Rawls demonstrated that detailed, systematic theorizing about justice could be conducted with analytic rigor, influencing subsequent generations of philosophers.
His work helped establish:
- distributive justice as a central topic in political theory,
- the legitimacy of ideal theory and hypothetical models,
- a shared vocabulary—original position, basic structure, public reason—that continues to structure debates.
Ongoing Debates and Schools of Thought
Rawls’s ideas have generated extensive secondary literatures and distinctive “post-Rawlsian” projects. Entire schools of thought—communitarianism, luck egalitarianism, political liberalism, cosmopolitanism—have defined themselves partly in relation to his framework, either as developments, correctives, or critiques.
Universities frequently organize courses, conferences, and research programs around Rawlsian themes, and his works remain standard texts in political philosophy, political theory, and related disciplines.
Cross-Disciplinary and Public Influence
Beyond philosophy, Rawls has shaped conversations in law, economics, political science, and public policy, as noted in Section 14. His central ideas—particularly the notion that justice is the first virtue of social institutions—have penetrated public discourse to some extent, though often in simplified or adapted forms.
Historical Position
Historians of philosophy often place Rawls alongside earlier canonical figures in the social contract tradition (Hobbes, Locke, Rousseau) and compare his role in 20th-century liberal thought to that of John Stuart Mill in the 19th century. Some see him as articulating the most systematic defense of a welfare-state or social democratic liberalism; others view his work as an attempt to reconcile liberal ideals with the realities of postwar capitalism and pluralist democracy.
Debate continues over how future developments—both empirical (e.g., globalization, new forms of inequality) and theoretical (e.g., capabilities, care ethics, critical race theory)—will alter assessments of Rawls’s significance. However, his centrality to contemporary discussions of justice, legitimacy, and democracy is widely acknowledged, and his work is expected to remain a major point of reference in political philosophy for the foreseeable future.
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@online{philopedia_john_bordley_rawls,
title = {John Bordley Rawls},
author = {Philopedia},
year = {2025},
url = {https://philopedia.com/philosophers/john-bordley-rawls/},
urldate = {December 10, 2025}
}Note: This entry was last updated on 2025-12-08. For the most current version, always check the online entry.
Study Guide
intermediateThe entry assumes some comfort with abstract political and moral concepts and moves between biography, historical context, and dense theoretical ideas (original position, public reason, global justice). It is accessible to dedicated beginners but best suited to students who have already encountered basic political philosophy.
- Basic concepts in modern democratic politics (e.g., constitution, civil liberties, welfare state) — Rawls’s theory is explicitly designed for constitutional democracies and repeatedly refers to basic liberties, constitutional essentials, and welfare-state institutions.
- Introductory moral philosophy (e.g., utilitarianism vs. rights-based views) — Much of Rawls’s work is framed as an alternative to utilitarianism and as a theory of justice; understanding these contrasts clarifies his motivations.
- 20th‑century historical context (Great Depression, World War II, Cold War, civil rights movement) — The biography and the development of Rawls’s ideas are connected to these events, which shaped his concerns about war, inequality, and constitutional democracy.
- Familiarity with basic analytic philosophy methods (argument, conceptual analysis, thought experiments) — Rawls works in the analytic tradition, using idealized models like the original position and careful distinctions that assume comfort with abstract argument.
- Immanuel Kant — Rawls explicitly describes his view as Kantian constructivism; basic familiarity with Kant’s ideas about autonomy and treating persons as ends helps in understanding Rawls’s methodology.
- John Stuart Mill — Mill’s liberal utilitarianism is a central foil for Rawls’s critique of utilitarianism and his defense of basic liberties.
- The Social Contract Tradition (Hobbes, Locke, Rousseau) — Rawls reworks the social contract framework through the original position; knowing earlier contract theories highlights what is distinctive in his approach.
- 1
Get an overview of Rawls’s life, aims, and central ideas.
Resource: Section 1. Introduction and the short biography summary in the entry data.
⏱ 30–40 minutes
- 2
Understand how Rawls’s historical and personal context relate to his philosophical project.
Resource: Sections 2–4 (Life and Historical Context; Education, Wartime Experience, and Early Career; Intellectual Development and Influences).
⏱ 45–60 minutes
- 3
Study Rawls’s core theory of justice for domestic society.
Resource: Sections 5–7 (Major Works; Justice as Fairness and the Original Position; The Two Principles of Justice and the Difference Principle). Refer to the glossary for key terms (justice as fairness, original position, veil of ignorance, basic structure, primary goods).
⏱ 90–120 minutes
- 4
Explore Rawls’s later shifts: political liberalism, public reason, and moral psychology.
Resource: Sections 8, 10, and 11 (Political Liberalism, Public Reason, and Overlapping Consensus; Methodology; Moral Psychology, Stability, and the Sense of Justice).
⏱ 90 minutes
- 5
Extend your understanding to international justice and to Rawls’s revisions in response to critics.
Resource: Sections 9 and 12 (International Justice and The Law of Peoples; Critiques, Revisions, and Justice as Fairness: A Restatement).
⏱ 60–90 minutes
- 6
Place Rawls in the broader landscape and reflect on his legacy and influence.
Resource: Sections 13–15 (Rawls’s Place in Liberal Egalitarianism and Contract Theory; Influence on Law, Economics, and Public Policy; Legacy and Historical Significance). Revisit the essential quotes and glossary to consolidate key ideas.
⏱ 60 minutes
Justice as fairness
Rawls’s political conception of justice for the basic structure of a democratic society, grounded in fair agreement among free and equal citizens and articulated through the original position and two principles of justice.
Why essential: It is the unifying label for Rawls’s entire project; understanding it clarifies how his biography, methodology, and specific principles fit together.
Original position
A hypothetical choice situation in which rational representatives of citizens, modeled as free and equal, choose principles of justice under conditions that ensure fairness, especially the veil of ignorance.
Why essential: This device is central to Rawls’s Kantian constructivism and to how he justifies his two principles of justice over alternatives like utilitarianism.
Veil of ignorance
A restriction in the original position that denies parties knowledge of their social status, talents, or conception of the good, while allowing knowledge of general facts about society and human psychology.
Why essential: It operationalizes impartiality in Rawls’s framework and models how to choose principles without bias toward one’s actual position in society.
Two principles of justice (including the difference principle)
A pair of lexically ordered principles: (1) guaranteeing an equal scheme of basic liberties for all; and (2) regulating social and economic inequalities so that they satisfy fair equality of opportunity and work to the greatest benefit of the least advantaged (the difference principle).
Why essential: These are the substantive outcome of the original position and define Rawls’s distinctive form of liberal egalitarianism.
Basic structure
The main political, economic, and social institutions of a society and how they fit together; for Rawls, this is the primary subject of justice because it shapes citizens’ life prospects.
Why essential: It explains why Rawls focuses on constitutional rules, markets, education systems, and families rather than only on individual actions or virtues.
Public reason
The mode of reasoning appropriate for citizens and officials when discussing constitutional essentials and basic matters of justice, using political values that all reasonable citizens can accept.
Why essential: In Rawls’s later work, this is key to explaining how a just society can remain stable amid reasonable pluralism, connecting his theory to real democratic practice.
Overlapping consensus and reasonable pluralism
Overlapping consensus: a condition where citizens with diverse reasonable comprehensive doctrines endorse the same political conception of justice from within their own views. Reasonable pluralism: the idea that enduring, reasonable disagreement about comprehensive doctrines is inevitable under free institutions.
Why essential: These notions explain Rawls’s shift from a comprehensive to a political liberalism and his account of stability “for the right reasons.”
Kantian constructivism and reflective equilibrium
Kantian constructivism: the view that principles of justice are constructed as the outcome of a suitably described rational procedure (the original position), rather than discovered as independent moral facts. Reflective equilibrium: a method of justification that seeks coherence between general principles and considered moral judgments through mutual adjustment.
Why essential: They capture Rawls’s methodological contribution and show how his theory is justified, not just what its conclusions are.
Rawls’s original position is meant to describe an actual historical contract or real-world negotiation.
The original position is a purely hypothetical device—a thought experiment modeling fair agreement. Rawls does not claim that such a contract actually occurred; rather, he asks what principles would be chosen under fair conditions.
Source of confusion: Students sometimes conflate social contract theories with historical narratives about state formation, overlooking Rawls’s emphasis on idealization and constructivism.
The difference principle requires strict equality of income and wealth.
The difference principle allows inequalities as long as they benefit the least advantaged compared to other feasible institutional schemes. It is not a demand for strict leveling but for justified, mutually beneficial inequality.
Source of confusion: The term “egalitarianism” can suggest simple equal shares, and summaries of Rawls sometimes oversimplify his nuanced account of permissible inequalities.
Political liberalism abandons Rawls’s earlier commitments to justice as fairness.
Political liberalism reframes justice as fairness as a political, not metaphysical, conception but retains its core commitments: equal basic liberties, fair equality of opportunity, and the difference principle. The change concerns justification and stability under pluralism, not the basic principles.
Source of confusion: The language of a “shift” or “turn” in Rawls’s work can be misread as a wholesale rejection rather than a reinterpretation and refinement.
Rawls’s focus on the basic structure ignores families, gender, and race.
Rawls does prioritize the basic structure, but he acknowledges that families and socialization must themselves be just (e.g., in supporting fair equality of opportunity and a sense of justice). Critics argue he does too little on gender and race, but it is inaccurate to say he simply ignores these domains.
Source of confusion: Feminist and critical race critiques rightly highlight gaps, which can be overstated into the claim that these issues are wholly absent from his framework.
The Law of Peoples straightforwardly applies the difference principle to global society.
In The Law of Peoples, Rawls explicitly rejects extending the domestic difference principle globally. Instead, he proposes separate principles for a society of peoples, including human rights and a duty of assistance, but not global egalitarian redistribution of the Rawlsian domestic sort.
Source of confusion: Because Rawls is strongly egalitarian domestically, readers often assume he must endorse a similar global egalitarianism; the text instead marks a deliberate departure.
How do Rawls’s wartime experiences and the mid‑20th‑century historical context help explain his emphasis on the vulnerability and equal moral worth of persons in A Theory of Justice?
Hints: Review Sections 2 and 3 on his service in World War II and the civil rights and Cold War contexts; ask how these might inform his focus on basic liberties, fair opportunity, and the arbitrariness of fortune.
In what ways does the original position, with its veil of ignorance, embody Rawls’s idea of treating citizens as free and equal? Could alternative information restrictions lead to different principles of justice?
Hints: Connect the description in Section 6 to Kantian constructivism (Section 10). Consider what knowledge is excluded, what is allowed, and how changes (e.g., allowing knowledge of social class) might affect chosen principles.
Compare Rawls’s two principles of justice with a utilitarian standard that maximizes overall welfare. In what respects does Rawls think his principles offer a fairer basis for social cooperation?
Hints: Use Sections 6 and 7 plus the discussion of influences and critiques in Sections 4, 5, and 12. Think about lexical priority, the status of basic liberties, and the treatment of the least advantaged.
Why does Rawls shift to a ‘political, not metaphysical’ presentation of justice as fairness in Political Liberalism, and how do the ideas of reasonable pluralism and overlapping consensus support this shift?
Hints: Focus on Section 8 and the biography’s account of intellectual development in Section 4. Ask how stability ‘for the right reasons’ requires a conception that diverse reasonable doctrines can endorse.
Is Rawls’s focus on the basic structure of society an adequate way to address deep injustices related to gender, race, and class, or does it miss important forms of domination and ideology?
Hints: Draw on Section 7 (fair equality of opportunity), Section 11 (moral psychology and socialization), and Section 12 (feminist and radical critiques). Consider whether regulation of institutions alone can transform private and cultural relations.
How does The Law of Peoples modify or limit the egalitarian commitments of justice as fairness when Rawls turns to international relations?
Hints: Use Section 9 and note the shift from individuals to peoples, the categories of societies, and the rejection of a global difference principle. Ask whether this is coherent with his earlier arguments against arbitrary inequalities.
To what extent does Rawls’s method of reflective equilibrium provide a convincing form of justification for principles of justice, as opposed to merely systematizing our existing moral intuitions?
Hints: Review Section 10 on Kantian constructivism and reflective equilibrium. Consider the role of background theories, the possibility of bias in our ‘considered judgments,’ and whether any independent moral constraints are needed.