Justice in John Rawls: Intersections and Ranges of Some Philosophical Paradigms

This project critically examines John Rawls theory of justice as fairness through other philosophical paradigms of justice. While it is common for researchers to evaluate Rawls theory of justice as fairness in order to highlight its merits or demerits, pit it against another theory of justice or apply it to a particular context, there seems to be no study which evaluate Rawls in light of thinkers of justice across centuries. This project evaluates Rawls theory of justice as fairness against formulations of justice in Plato, Aristotle, Hobbes, Mill, Pogge and African conception of justice. Rawls developed his idea of justice as fairness due to what he considered to be a problem with other theories of justice – majorly utilitarianism – which he heavily criticised. He argued that the theories for justice advocated by prior philosophers and thinkers were lacking in their methods and approaches to the question of justice and hence presented his argument of the “original Position and the veil of ignorance” as necessary conditions for ensuring the manifestation of justice in society. However, Rawls theory of justice as fairness may not presents itself as immediately practicable approach to solving the problems of injustice. This problem may more likely be seen when his theory of justice is viewed through some other formulations and conceptions of justice before and after him. To achieve the goal of this project, the method of critical analysis is adopted. The project holds the promise of enlarging the understanding of conceptions of justice more generally.