John Rawls Summary[Pitogo]

Pitogo, Elloani Ross A. BS CpE-5

October 6, 2017

Summary on “John Rawl’s Theory of Justice: Notes for Theories of Justice, CHAPTER ONE” CHAPTER ONE John Rawls proposed different theories to support what he believe what justice is. He aims to develop intuitionism which will be more superior to utilitarianism. This intuitionism is also called as the “No Theory” theory where one could derive a conclusion on what should be done given enough information and statement of the principles without further evaluation. In times of having conflicting values a priority problem occurs and this could be solved by having priority ranking. Rawls also proposed to revise the social contract of tradition into the idea of justice as fairness where j ustice is what free and equal persons should agree to. John Rawls defined the basic structure of society as the way in which the major social institutions distribute fundamental rights and duties. It is in the basic structure that makes a difference into our lives. People born into different social position will have inequalities and Rawls believe it is in these deep inequalities that social justice is developed among people. Utilitarianism contradicts Rawls theory. Rawls said that each person has their own sense of justice that even the welfare of the society as a whole can’t be override. A violation of a person’s own beliefs in exchange for other people’s safety should not count positively in determination of a just socie ty. Utilitarianism, according to Rawls, does not take seriously the individual’s own sense of justice. The conflict of deciding on following our own personal beliefs or the general principles could be answered by the reflective equilibrium. Reflective equilibrium is a position in which our own personal  judgements can be derived from the general principles that we follow. CHAPTER TWO According to Rawls, Good is subjective, what makes something good for you depends on your desire and every people have different desires. Even if we don’t agree on what is good, we may agree about general purpose means that will be useful in evaluating our actions which are called primary goals. These primary goals are basis of interpersonal comparisons for some theor ies of justice. Two principles of justice of Rawls are equal liberty and social inequality. Equal liberty is where each person has an equal right to the basic liberties (e.g. political, freedom of speech). Social inequality is where social and economic inequalities are corrupted to the greatest benefit of the least advantage. It is also called the difference principle. Fair equality of opportunity demands fair distribution of opportunities to become qualified for social competition.

http://philosophyfaculty.ucsd.edu/faculty/rarneson/Rawlscha culty/rarneson/Rawlschaps1and2.pdf  ps1and2.pdf  Article source: http://philosophyfaculty.ucsd.edu/fa