RESUMO O artigo examina se há alguma incompatibilidade entre práticas de discriminação privada e as duas partes do segundo princípio da justiça de Rawls, o princípio da equitativa igualdade de oportunidades e o princípio da diferença. Argumento que a discriminação no trabalho e em outras áreas importantes para o desenvolvimento das aptidões inatas somente atenta contra o PEIO quando tem como efeito geral o de tornar substancialmente desiguais as chances de cidadãos com similares aptidões inatas e motivação exercerem determinadas ocupações. (...) Comento também algumas dificuldades para considerar vedados pelo PEIO dois casos comuns de discriminação, a discriminação baseada em qualidade de reação e a discriminação por indicadores. Em relação ao PD, defendo que a proibição à discriminação privada se relaciona ao bem primário das bases sociais do autorrespeito e está circunscrita aos casos de discriminação degradante, como tal entendida, de acordo com Hellman, aquela cujo sentido expressivo é o de negar o igual status moral das pessoas pertencentes a um certo grupo. ABSTRACT This paper investigates the incompatibility between practices of private discrimination and the two parts of Rawls' second principle of justice, the fair equality of opportunity and the difference principle. I submit that discrimination at workplace and other sectors that are crucial for the development of natural talents only violates FEO when possessing the general effect of rendering substantially unequal the occupational chances of citizens with similar innate talents and motivation. I also point to some difficulties in proscribing, according to FEO, two common instances of discrimination, reaction qualification and proxy discrimination. Regarding the DP, my main statement is that a ban on private discrimination is related to the primary good of the social bases of self-respect and is circumscribed to instances of demeaning discrimination, defined, according to Hellman, as discrimination whose expressive meaning is denying people belonging to a given group their equal moral status. (shrink)

O artigo discorre sobre a relação entre o direito contratual e os princípios da teoria da justiça de Rawls, com especial atenção para o princípio da diferença. Parte-se da premissa de que as atitudes dos cidadãos se sujeitam à influência das instituições. Todo o restante sendo igual, portanto, o princípio da diferença requer instituições que fomentem um etos social o mais igualitário possível. Conclui-se daí que o papel do direito contratual em uma sociedade ideal rawlsiana pode não ser o de (...) promover a eficiência, mas colaborar para um etos social menos propenso à desigualdade. Afirma-se que o direito contratual pode cumprir esse desiderato de duas maneiras: descritivamente, ao abrir mão da presunção de que os contratantes atuam unicamente para maximizar a própria utilidade, e valorativamente, ao enaltecer comportamentos moderadamente altruístas. (shrink)

In this article, I reply to eight critics of my book Speech Matters: On Lying, Morality, and the Law. The topics include lying, promising, reciprocity, free speech, and the testimonial duties of institutions.

This article discusses the adequacy of Rawls’ theory of justice as a tool for racial justice. It is argued that critics like Charles W Mills fail to appreciate both the insights and limits of the Rawlsian framework. The article has two main parts spread out over several different sections. The first is concerned with whether the Rawlsian framework suffices to prevent racial injustice. It is argued that there are reasons to doubt whether it does. The second part is concerned with (...) whether a Rawlsian framework has the resources to rectify past racial injustice. It is argued that it has more resources to do this than Mills allows. This second part of the article centers on two Rawlsian ideas: ideal theory and the fair equality of opportunity principle. It is argued that ideal theory is essential for the kind of rectificatory work that Mills wants nonideal theory to do, and that where there is a socioeconomic legacy of past injustice, it is hard to see how FEO could be implemented if it did no rectificatory work, a result which means that there is less need to turn to nonideal theory at all. (shrink)

This article traces John Rawls’s debt to Frank Knight’s critique of the ‘just deserts’ rationale for laissez-faire in order to defend justice as fairness against some prominent contemporary criticisms, but also to argue that desert can find a place within a Rawlsian theory of justice when desert is grounded in reciprocity. The first lesson Rawls took from Knight was that inheritance of talent and wealth are on a moral par. Knight highlighted the inconsistency of objecting to the inheritance of wealth (...) while taking for granted the legitimacy of unequal reward based on differential productive capacity. Rawls agreed that there was an inconsistency, but claimed that it should be resolved by rejecting both kinds of inequality, except to the extent they benefitted the worst off. The second lesson Rawls learned from Knight was that the size of one’s marginal product depends on supply and demand, which depend on institutional decisions that cannot themselves be made on the basis of the principle of rewarding marginal productivity. The article claims that this argument about background justice overstates its conclusion, because the dependence of contribution on institutional setup is not total. Proposals for an unconditional basic income may therefore have a strike against them, as far as a reciprocity-based conception of desert is concerned. If we follow Knight’s analysis of the competitive system, however, so too does the alternative of leaving determination of income up to the market. (shrink)

Extreme inequality of opportunity leads to a number of social tensions, inefficiencies and injustices. One issue of increasing concern is the effect inequality is having on people’s fair chances of attaining meaningful work, thus limiting opportunities to make a significant positive contribution to society and reducing the chances of living a flourishing life and developing their potential. On a global scale we can observe an increasingly uneven provision of meaningful work, raising a series of ethical concerns that need detailed examination. (...) The aim of this article is to explore the potential of a normative framework based upon the idea of contributive justice to defend a fairer provision of meaningful work. (shrink)