JOHN RAWLS AND THE ORIGINAL POSITION Name: Akshay Shetty Class: TYBA Roll No: 321 Subject: Political Thinkers Course Code: 5.02 Title: John Rawls and the Original Position INDEX No. Topic Page No. 1. Introduction 3 2. John Rawls: A Life Sketch 4 3. The Original Position 6 4. The Original Position and the Social Contract 7 5. Nature of the Original Position 9 6. The veil of ignorance 11 7. Rationality in the original position 13 8. The maximin principle 15
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Rawls then introduces the concept of the difference principle‚ and connects it with democratic equality. Rawls explains that the theory behind the difference principle is that distributions in society are primarily based upon “social contingencies” and “natural fortunes.” Rawls indicates that‚ determining the distribution of goods‚ viz.‚ wealth and income‚ is morally arbitrary. Hence‚ if you happen to be born to a wealthy family‚ your prospects of living “well” are higher than if you were born
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The original position is a central feature of John Rawls’s social contract account of justice‚ “justice as fairness‚” set forth in A Theory of Justice (TJ). It is designed to be a fair and impartial point of view that is to be adopted in our reasoning about fundamental principles of justice. In taking up this point of view‚ we are to imagine ourselves in the position of free and equal persons who jointly agree upon and commit themselves to principles of social and political justice. The main distinguishing
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Justice as Fairness Rawls first begins with discussing how we are lead to the original position. The original position is a hypothetical argument that considers a society where people do not decide what is right or wrong based on a higher power or emotion‚ but rather on common sense. These ideas establish justice or fairness simply based on the community’s beliefs that they create. However‚ these agreements cannot be made without the “veil of ignorance.” This means that all instances that
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Rawls’ Maximin Principle: Is It Really The Most Rational Solution? Political philosophy aims to reflect the normative and conceptual dimensions of political life. American philosopher John Rawls is widely recognized as one of the leading political philosophers of the twentieth century. His A Theory of Justice (1971) is one of the primary texts in political philosophy and proposes two principles of justice. The first‚ the liberty principle‚ defines basic liberties and the second‚ the difference
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outcomes. Rawls states that social justice is a type of fairness‚ where the social cooperation appropriately distributes the burdens and benefits of society (1999: 4). Rawls aims to do this using the theoretical device of the Original Position. The intention of the thought experiment is to establish rules for the basic structure of society that would create a fairer society and advance the interests of the mutually disinterested parties involved. The conclusion about social justice that Rawls comes to
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John Rawls and Utilitarianism Heath C. Hoculock The social contract theory of John Rawls challenges utilitarianism by pointing out the impracticality of the theory. Mainly‚ in a society of utilitarians‚ a citizens rights could be completely ignored if injustice to this one citizen would benefit the rest of society. Rawls believes that a social contract theory‚ similar those proposed by Hobbes‚ Locke‚ and Rousseau‚ would be a more logical solution to the question of fairness in any government
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Regarding justice in a society‚ both John Rawls and Robert Nozick express differing opinions on the best way to reach this. Both philosophers illustrate what they feel justice to be and offer support for their ideas in their efforts to put forth the best argument. Before being able to decide on which argument is the strongest‚ it is best to understand the ideas each philosopher possesses in order to compare and contrast them. John Rawls argues that the principles of justice that govern the basic
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1.John Rawls promotes a system of justice based on welfare liberalism (argumentatively discuss). The two most significant philosophers on the principles of society structure are John Rawls and Robert Nozick. John Rawls’ ideas of a fair and just society are based on two main principles. These two principles make up his system of justice and incorporate welfare liberalism. In the first place there is Rawls Liberty principle. This principle can be explained as each individual
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John Rawls bases his Theory of Justice on the intuitive conviction that justice as fairness is the first virtue of social institutions. He argues that in order to ensure fair distributions of advantages in society‚ a workable set of principles are required in order to determine how institutions ought to distribute rights and duties and to establish a clear way to address competing claims to social advantages. The second principle that Rawls develops stipulates that economic and social inequalities
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