Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- List of Abbreviations for Rawls’s texts
- Introduction
- A
- B
- C
- D
- E
- F
- G
- H
- I
- J
- K
- L
- M
- N
- O
- P
- 153 Paternalism
- 154 Peoples
- 155 Perfectionism
- 156 Plan of life
- 157 Pogge, Thomas
- 158 Political conception of justice
- 159 Political liberalism, justice as fairness as
- 160 Political liberalisms, family of
- 161 Political obligation
- 162 Political virtues
- 163 Practical reason
- 164 Precepts of justice
- 165 Primary goods, social
- 166 The priority of the right over the good
- 167 Procedural justice
- 168 Promising
- 169 Property-owning democracy
- 170 Public choice theory
- 171 Public political culture
- 172 Public reason
- 173 Publicity
- R
- S
- T
- U
- W
- Bibliography
- Index
166 - The priority of the right over the good
from P
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 05 February 2015
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- List of Abbreviations for Rawls’s texts
- Introduction
- A
- B
- C
- D
- E
- F
- G
- H
- I
- J
- K
- L
- M
- N
- O
- P
- 153 Paternalism
- 154 Peoples
- 155 Perfectionism
- 156 Plan of life
- 157 Pogge, Thomas
- 158 Political conception of justice
- 159 Political liberalism, justice as fairness as
- 160 Political liberalisms, family of
- 161 Political obligation
- 162 Political virtues
- 163 Practical reason
- 164 Precepts of justice
- 165 Primary goods, social
- 166 The priority of the right over the good
- 167 Procedural justice
- 168 Promising
- 169 Property-owning democracy
- 170 Public choice theory
- 171 Public political culture
- 172 Public reason
- 173 Publicity
- R
- S
- T
- U
- W
- Bibliography
- Index
Summary
For Rawls, the priority of right signifies the ways in which justice as fairness (as a conception of right) constrains and regulates how ideas of the good are integrated into justice. He describes two meanings of the priority of right over the good, one general and one particular (PL 209). Each will be described in turn.
In its general meaning, the priority of right requires that any ideas of the good used in justice as fairness be political ideas. No specific, comprehensive or partial conceptions of the good can be relied upon in the conception of justice. In order to be political in the relevant way, a conception of justice must be capable of commanding an overlapping consensus. Thus, any ideas of the good that are used in justice as fairness must be capable of being endorsed from multiple points of view. Rawls identifies five such ideas of the good contained within justice as fairness (PL 176–206, CP 451–470): (1) goodness as rationality, (2) social primary goods as representing a “thin” theory of the good, (3) the idea of permissible comprehensive conceptions of the good, (4) the political virtues expected of citizens, and (5) the good of political society. In the discussion of these five goods that follows, it should become clear that Rawls thinks of the right and the good as complementary. Justice (as part of the right) puts certain limitations on the good, but depends upon political ideas of the good in order to be fully formulated.
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- The Cambridge Rawls Lexicon , pp. 648 - 650Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 2014
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