The Discussion About The Theoretical Foundation And The Problems Of Rawls' Theory Of Justice

Contemporary political philosophy boomed from Rawls'Theory of Justice pressed in 1971. Inheriting the ideal of traditional liberalism, Rawls turns the topic of political philosophy from liberty to equality. And because of that, Rawls founds new liberalism. This paper discussed the new social contract doctrine which is the basis of Rawls'theory. And we can find how the new social contract doctrine transcends the traditional one. However, Rawls'theory about which many doctrines dispute isn't a perfect theory. This paper discussed the difficulties about the theory of justice, and tried to seek a proper way to well-ordered society which is validly adjusted by the principles of justice.This paper has five parts. The first part focused on the principles of justice which are the core of Rawls'theory. The conception of justice is mainly about the basic social structure which determines people's initial position and the social primary goods. Principles of justice require that liberties and rights, power and opportunities, income and wealth must be distributed equally, unless the justified inequalities can benefit the least advantaged class. The values of liberty, equality and fraternity are expressed in Rawls'principles of justice. Rawls solves the problem that the traditional liberalism didn't fully express the value of equality.The second part focused on the new contract doctrine which transcends the traditional one. The traditional one considers the contract doctrine as the crucial role in founding a country arising from the state of nature. But Rawls'new contract doctrine aims to construct principles of justice through the hypothetical and nonhistorical original position. The original position has some limitations on...