A Theory of Justice_ Revised Edition (Belknap)

'There are three significant problems with Rawls' _Theory of Justice_. First, the theory fails to take account of the difference between community and society. Second, the theory creates a conflict between private virtue and public virtue. And third, the theory, although it purports to be a secular basis for justice, surreptitiously adopts certain assumptions that have their origin in, and are only tenable in, a religious view of man and society. In conclusion, I argue that Rawls' Theory, although it has the form of a rationalist account, in reality merely abstracts from the prevalent prejudices of our society without ever subjecting them to rational scrutiny. It amounts to an abandonment of rationalism in the investigation of justice. 1. Community and society Ferdinand Tönnies makes a distinction between a community (Gemeinschaft), in which men and women share a common will and work together toward a shared goal, and society (Gesellschaft) in which each person has an interest distinct from that of others and forms only temporary and expedient alliances with others. A Gemeinschaft is formed by ties of kinship, physical proximity, or friendship. Within it men share material goods and have sufficient sympathy for one another to imagine themselves in the place of others and alter their behavior accordingly. A Gesellschaft is formed by ties of commerce. Within it men trade material goods. Their sympathy for strangers is rarely sufficient to require anything more than to avoid harming them. Rawlsian liberalism is paradoxical because it demands that men trade material goods with one another as in a Gesellschaft, and yet it also demands that men have sufficient sympathy with one another to imagine themselves in the place of another as in a Gemeinschaft. In other words, Rawlsian liberalism supposes that a society that is in fact composed of distinct families is somehow obligated to form its conception of justice as if it were one big family. It demands that we form a conception of justice that takes no account of our