This book continues and revises the ideas of justice as fairness that John Rawls presented in A Theory of Justice but changes its philosophical interpretation in a fundamental way. That previous work assumed what Rawls calls a "well-ordered society," one that is stable and relatively homogenous in its basic moral beliefs and in which there is broad agreement about what constitutes the good life. Yet in modern democratic society a plurality of incompatible and irreconcilable doctrines -- religious, philosophical, and moral -- coexist within the framework of democratic institutions. Recognizing this as a permanent condition of democracy, Rawls asks how a stable and just society of free and equal citizens can live in concord when divided by reasonable but incompatible doctrines?
This edition includes the essay "The Idea of Public Reason Revisited," which outlines Rawls' plans to revise Political Liberalism, which were cut short by his death.
"An extraordinary well-reasoned commentary on A Theory of Justice...a decisive turn towards political philosophy."
-- Times Literary Supplement
Über den Autor John Rawls
![]()
John Borden Rawls wurde am 21. Februar 1921 in Baltimore, USA geboren und starb am 24. November 2002 in Lexington. Er schloss die berühmte episkopalischen Privatschule in Kent im Jahr 1939 ab und machte vier Jahre später seinen Bachelor of Arts an der Princeton University. Darauf folgte die Promotion in Philosophie und seine Lehrzeit in Princeton. Von 1952 bis 1953 erhielt er ein Fulbright Stipendium für die Universität Oxford in England. Danach arbeitete er als assistant- und associate-Professor an der Cornell-Universität in Ithaca, New York, bevor er ab 1962 dort ordentlicher Professor wurde. Von 1970 bis 1972 war er Präsident der 'American Association of Political and Social Philosophers'. In dieser Zeit entsteht sein Hauptwerk A Theory of Justice . 1974 wird er Präsident der 'Eastern Division of the American Philosophical Association'. Ab 1979 lehrt er Philosophie an der Harvard Universität in Cambridge. Sein Werk Political Liberalism entsteht 1993.
