Reflections on Rawls An Assessment of his Legacy

The late John Rawls was one of the most inspiring, provocative and influential political philosophers of the twentieth century. In this collection a panel of distinguished political philosophers critically explore the intellectual legacy of Rawls. The essays herein engage Rawls's political theorizing from his earliest published writings in the 1950s to his final publication in 2001, Justice as Fairness: A Restatement and explore a diversity of issues related to his arguments, such as the attractiveness of his methodology/methodologies, and the normative coherence and empirical validity of his claims. In turn, the effectiveness both of his arguments and those of various supporters and critics are evaluated from the perspective of a variety of analytical approaches, including cosmopolitanism, communitarianism, perfectionism, liberalism, and legal theory. This book is an edifying and engaging dialogue with ideas and arguments that have provided the theoretical framework for much of contemporary political philosophy, and a thoughtful assessment of their continuing significance and place within the pantheon of political philosophy.

Introduction, Shaun P. Young; Chapter 1 Rawls’s Public Reason and American society, George Klosko; Chapter 2 Primary Goods versus Capabilities: Defending the Good against the Equally Good?, Harry Brighouse, Elaine Unterhalter; Chapter 3 Rawls’s Commitment to Fair Equality of Opportunity: Rethinking His Arguments for Democratic Equality Four Decades Later, Lesley A. Jacobs; Chapter 4 John Rawls’s Genealogy of Liberalism, Ronald Beiner; Chapter 5 Rawls’s Social Contract: Not Really, Jan Narveson; Chapter 6 Realism and Moralism in Political Theory: The Legacies of John Rawls, William A. Galston; Chapter 7 John Rawls: Liberalism at the Limits of Intolerance, Glen Newey; Chapter 8 Is Political Liberalism Hostile to Religion?, Patrick Neal; Chapter 9 Political Toleration and Coercive Intervention in the International Sphere, Rex Martin; Chapter 10 Rawls’s Priority of Rights: Quandaries and Implications for International Relations and the Issue of Intervention, David P. Shugarman;

Shaun P. Young is an External Fellow of McLaughlin College, and an External Associate at the York Centre for Practical Ethics, both at York University, Canada.