On The Civil Disobedience Theory Of Rawls

The civil disobedience theory of Rawls is deeply rooted in the western natural law tradition. He systematically analyses the civil disobedience theory of narrow sense, proving the two principles of justice and a good moral means to cure the western democracy constitutional system.This thesis tries to justify and interpret the civil disobedience theory of Rawls by reviewing the tradition of the western natural law thoughts, and discussing the relation between the moral and law. The thesis is divided into three parts:Chapter 1 looks back the western natural law thoughts and explains the good and bad law. It mainly introduces the natural law thoughts of Aquinas, Hobbes and lays the foundation for the renaissance of the new natural law thoughts of Rawls. Chapter 2 discusses two kinds of attitudes towards the bad law and tries to account that the civil disobedience theory of Rawls actually looks for a balance between them. Chapter 3 analyses the civil disobedience theory of Rawls , including the definition, justification and functions and tries to evaluate it.