Colin Macleod

Cet article propose une réponse critique à quelques thèmes du livre de Kyle Johannsen,A Conceptual Investigation of Justice. La discussion se penche sur l’analyse du pluralisme fondamental de la valeur proposée par Johannsen et met en cause cette même analyse. Je soutiens que l’analyse proposée par Johannsen ne parvient pas à expliquer comment des conflits entre des valeurs fondamentales peuvent être résolus et qu’il y a davantage de convergence entre des valeurs fondamentales que ne le reconnaît Johannsen.

This chapter begins with an overview of John Rawls's four‐stage sequence account of how to apply justice as fairness to institutions. It focuses on the facets of institutional design: (i) How should basic democratic institutions and processes be structured so as to realize the fair value of the basic political liberties? (ii) What kinds of educational and health institutions are needed to secure fair equality of opportunity? (iii) How do principles of justice apply to the family? (iv) What implications does the difference principle have for the structure of a market economy? Rawls's extension of the original position via the four‐stage sequence proceeds against the background of three kinds of pluralism. According to Rawls, occupational choice means that there is a diversity of positions open to all citizens, and no one is forced to hold or pursue specific kinds of employment.

Among the novel objects that attracted my attention during my stay in the United States, nothing struck me more forcibly than the general equality of condition among the people. (de Tocqueville 1990, 7)There are significant inequalities in the lives of America's children, including inequalities in the education that these children receive. These educational inequalities include not only disparities in funding per pupil but also in class size, teacher qualification, and resources such as books, labs, libraries, computers, and curriculum, as well as the physical condition of the school and the safety of students within it. While not all schools attended by poor children are bad schools, and not all schools attended by well-off children are good schools, there are clear patterns. Poor children are more likely to attend crowded and poorly equipped schools with less qualified teachers than the children of more affluent families. They are less likely to have computers, books, and advanced placement academic courses. (Satz 2007, 623)

This dissertation examines Ronald Dworkin's liberal theory of political morality. According to Dworkin, liberalism must be conceived as a species of egalitarianism. It provides an interpretation of what is held to be the most fundamental demand of political morality, namely that individuals be regarded as equal moral persons and as entitled consequently to equal concern and respect. I evaluate Dworkin's interpretation of egalitarianism, particularly as this exhibits itself in his theory of equality of resources which provides the framework for the explanation and justification of liberal ideals of distributive justice, individual liberty and state neutrality. At the centre of this theory is the suggestion that the perfectly competitive market of economic theory has an indispensable role to play in the articulation of the constitutive elements of liberalism. Each chapter of my dissertation examines a different aspect of Dworkin's attempt to employ the market in solving central problems of liberal theory. I show that the concern with equality which ultimately animates liberalism is ill-served by sophisticated manipulations of the market model