Liberalism And Social Justice

An original and compelling vision of a just society“A ‘new view’ of the theoretical foundations of liberalism that will ‘challenge us to clarify our own implicit notions of liberal democracy.’ ”—The New York Times Book ReviewWinner of a Certificate of Merit for the American Bar Association's 1981 Gavel Award for outstanding public serviceFirst published in 1980 and continuously in print ever since, Bruce Ackerman's classic Social Justice in the Liberal State offers a new foundation for liberal political theory— a world in which each of us may live his or her own life in his or her own way, without denying the same right to others. Full of provocative discussions of issues ranging from education to abortion, it makes fascinating reading for anyone concerned with the future of the liberal democratic state. “Professor Ackerman has tackled age-old problems of social justice with the refreshing technique of a series of dialogues in which the proponent of a position must either confront his opponent with an answer, constrained by the three principles of rationality, consistency, and neutrality, or submit to a checkmate. The author’s ability to combine earthiness with extreme subtlety in framing the dialogues has produced a novel, mind-stretching book.”—Henry J. Friendly, Senior Judge, U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit“What limits should we place on genetic manipulation? How many children should we have? How should we regulate abortions and adoptions? What rights does the community have, what rights do parents have in the education of children? What rights do children have? What resources must we leave to future generations? To see all these as questions of distributive justice is to connect them in a new way (and to make) a significant contribution.”—Michael Walzer, The New Republic “The breadth of the attack on the fundamental issues of man and society is impressive.”—Foreign Affairs

This title was first published in 2000: Bringing oes liberalism have either the theoretical capacity or the political durability to provide for social justice, particularly given the challenges of the new millennium? From a diverse array of disciplinary, cultural and critical perspectives, the contributors to this timely and incisive collection of essays cover ground ranging from the philosophical adequacy of liberalism’s central tenets, to the treatment of minority and alternative cultures in contemporary Europe, to the future of welfare provision, to the continued tenability of traditional ideological distinctions and labels amid the social conditions and demands of the new millennium. The book will be of particular interest to philosophers, political scientists and social and legal theorists - and to anyone with a general interest in the present and future horizons of social justice in theory and practice.

This text argues, from a liberal perspective, for a radical re- interpretation of existing ideas concerning social justice. Since the 1980s there has been debate between liberals and their critics, Concerning The Use Of Impartiality As A Notion On Which To Base Social theories of justice. In introducing an impartial standard of the right, the implications are often sexist, anthropocentric, capitalistic and oppressive. Wissenberg argues that this does not mean we should abandon the ideal of impartiality and defends the thesis that impartiality and the liberal project can be saved.; The book explores a liberal theory of Justice That Takes The Core Notion Of Impartiality Seriously; That Takes account of moral pluralism without trying to downgrade it or reduce it to the rank of a secondary problem; that argues for principles of justice Respecting Individual Notions Of The Good Life Rather Than Reformulating them in terms of one universal measure of the good or the right; that cherishes plurality, diversity and tolerance instead of uniformity and moral indifference.

Certain to become the most important work in political theory since John Rawls's A Theory of Justice, this book presents a brilliantly original, compelling vision of a just society-a world in which each of us may live his own life in his own way without denying the same right to others. Full of provocative discussions of issues ranging from education to abortion, it makes fascinating reading for anyone concerned with the future of the liberal democratic state.

An examination of liberal philosophy in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries that demonstrates how to construct a responsible liberalism based on freedom and social justice.

Liberal regimes shape the ethical outlooks of their citizens, relentlessly influencing their most personal commitments over time. On such issues as abortion, homosexuality, and women's rights, many religious Americans feel pulled between their personal beliefs and their need, as good citizens, to support individual rights. These circumstances, argues John Tomasi, raise new and pressing questions: Is liberalism as successful as it hopes in avoiding the imposition of a single ethical doctrine on all of society? If liberals cannot prevent the spillover of public values into nonpublic domains, how accommodating of diversity can a liberal regime actually be? To what degree can a liberal society be a home even to the people whose viewpoints it was formally designed to include? To meet these questions, Tomasi argues, the boundaries of political liberal theorizing must be redrawn. Political liberalism involves more than an account of justified state coercion and the norms of democratic deliberation. Political liberalism also implies a distinctive account of nonpublic social life, one in which successful human lives must be built across the interface of personal and public values. Tomasi proposes a theory of liberal nonpublic life. To live up to their own deepest commitments to toleration and mutual respect, liberals, he insists, must now rethink their conceptions of social justice, civic education, and citizenship itself. The result is a fresh look at liberal theory and what it means for a liberal society to function well.

Samuel Freeman is a leading political philosopher and one of the foremost authorities on the works of John Rawls. Liberalism and Distributive Justice offers a series of Freeman's essays in contemporary political philosophy on three different forms of liberalism-classical liberalism, libertarianism, and the high liberal tradition--and their relation to capitalism, the welfare state, and economic justice.

A former U.S. Assistant Secretary of State and currently Acting Senior Vice President for Research at The Heritage Foundation, Kim R. Holmes surveys the state of liberalism in America today and finds that it is becoming its opposite—illiberalism—abandoning the precepts of open-mindedness and respect for individual rights, liberties, and the rule of law upon which the country was founded, and becoming instead an intolerant, rigidly dogmatic ideology that abhors dissent and stifles free speech. Tracing the new illiberalism historically to the radical Enlightenment, a movement that rejected the classic liberal ideas of the moderate Enlightenment that were prominent in the American Founding, Holmes argues that today’s liberalism has forsaken its American roots, incorporating instead the authoritarian, anti-clerical, and anti-capitalist prejudices of the radical and largely European Left. The result is a closing of the American liberal mind. Where once freedom of speech and expression were sacrosanct, today liberalism employs speech codes, trigger warnings, boycotts, and shaming rituals to stifle freedom of thought, expression, and action. It is no longer appropriate to call it liberalism at all, but illiberalism—a set of ideas in politics, government, and popular culture that increasingly reflects authoritarian and even anti-democratic values, and which is devising new strategies of exclusiveness to eliminate certain ideas and people from the political process. Although illiberalism has always been a temptation for American liberals, lurking in the radical fringes of the Left, it is today the dominant ideology of progressive liberal circles. This makes it a new danger not only to the once venerable tradition of liberalism, but to the American nation itself, which needs a viable liberal tradition that pursues social and economic equality while respecting individual liberties.