The Philosophy of John Rawls
That John Rawls was the most important moral and political philosopher in the English-speaking world, and perhaps in the world, was a common opinion of philosophers in the late twentieth century. We shall read closely Rawls' most important writing to see if this view can be sustained. We'll begin with his attempt to reformulate the Social Contract tradition for moral and political theory in A Theory of Justice, a book that had an enormous impact upon its publication and that underwent some changes in subsequent editions. We'll then read his Political Liberalism, a book that has been interpreted as representing a major change in his fundamental view. We'll conclude our reading of Rawls with The Law of Peoples in which he extends his view to international law. We'll conclude with a consideration of some post-Rawlsian moral philosophers who have attempted to continue and extend his version of Kantian moral theory. (One course in philosophy, or PSCI 0101, PSCI 0317, or PSCI 0318)