A Theory of Justice (Oxford Paperbacks)

by JohnRawls (Author)

• Used

  Paperback
  1973

  $9.60

  `In a just society', wrote John Rawls, '...the rights secured by justice are not subject to political bargaining or to the calculus of social interests'. Existing societies seldom adhere to this principle, for what is just or unjust is usually in dispute. Professor Rawls sets out the principle of justice that free and rational persons would accept in an initial position of equality. After the first theoretical part of the book, which concludes with a persuasive critique of Utilitarianism, the author sets out to illustrate the content of his two principles of justice. He describes the basic structure that ideally satisfies these principles and examines the duties and obligations to which they give rise. Finally, he connects the theory of justice with a doctrine of the good. This book is intended for general readers with an interest in moral philosophy, the principles of justice. Students (undergraduate and above) of moral philosophy, law, and political philosophy.

• New

  Paperback
  1999

  $39.39

  Since it appeared in 1971, John Rawls's A Theory of Justice has become a classic. The author has now revised the original edition to clear up a number of difficulties he and others have found in the original book. Rawls aims to express an essential part of the common core of the democratic tradition--justice as fairness--and to provide an alternative to utilitarianism, which had dominated the Anglo-Saxon tradition of political thought since the nineteenth century. Rawls substitutes the ideal of the social contract as a more satisfactory account of the basic rights and liberties of citizens as free and equal persons. Each person, writes Rawls, possesses an inviolability founded on justice that even the welfare of society as a whole cannot override. Advancing the ideas of Rousseau, Kant, Emerson, and Lincoln, Rawls's theory is as powerful today as it was when first published.