Justice as Contract: Rawls and Welfare

Abstract

It is a measure of the immense influence of John Rawls that it seems appropriate, when going beyond the formalism of the ‘justice as rights’ approach, to give first consideration to contractual theories of justice. In many respects Rawls’s major work, A Theory of Justice (1971) has set the current agenda of issues to be discussed, and provides the terminology in which much of this discussion proceeds. It is important therefore that both the force and the limitations of Rawlsian contractarianism are appreciated before alternative approaches are examined.