In ordinary political discourse, the “common good” refersto those facilities—whether material, cultural orinstitutional—that the members of a community provide to allmembers in order to fulfill a relational obligation they all have tocare for certain interests that they have in common. Some canonicalexamples of the common good in a modern liberal democracy include: theroad system; public parks; police protection and public safety; courtsand the judicial system; public schools; museums and culturalinstitutions; public transportation; civil liberties, such as thefreedom of speech and the freedom of association; the system ofproperty; clean air and clean water; and national defense. The termitself may refer either to the interests that members have in commonor to the facilities that serve common interests. For example, peoplemay say, “the new public library will serve the commongood” or “the public library is part of the commongood.” The terms “public good” and “commongood” are sometimes treated as synonyms and at other times themodifier “public” is used to draw attention to the role ofthe state in the authoritative allocation of goods (see Section 2 formore detail)

As a philosophical concept, the common good is best understood as partof an encompassing model for practical reasoning among the members ofa political community. The model takes for granted that citizens standin a “political” or “civic” relationship withone another and that this relationship requires them to create andmaintain certain facilities on the grounds that these facilities servecertain common interests. The relevant facilities and intereststogether constitute the common good and serve as a shared standpointfor political deliberation.^[1] When citizens face various questions about legislation, public policyor social responsibility, they resolve these questions by appeal to aconception of the relevant facilities and the relevant interests. Thatis, they argue about what facilities have a special claim on theirattention, how they should expand, contract or maintain existingfacilities, and what facilities they should design and build in thefuture.

The common good is an important concept in political philosophybecause it plays a central role in philosophical reflection about thepublic and private dimensions of social life. Let’s say that“public life” in a political community consists of ashared effort among members to maintain certain facilities for thesake of common interests. “Private life” consists of eachmember’s pursuit of a distinct set of personal projects. Asmembers of a political community, we are each involved in ourcommunity’s public life and in our own private lives, and thisraises an array of questions about the nature and scope of each ofthese enterprises. For example, when are we supposed to make decisionsbased on the common good? Most of us would agree that we are requiredto do so when we act as legislators or civil servants. But what aboutas journalists, corporate executives or consumers? More fundamentally,why should we care about the common good? What would be wrong with acommunity whose members withdraw from public life and focusexclusively on their own private lives? These are some of thequestions that motivate philosophical discussions of the commongood.

This article reviews the philosophical literature, covering variouspoints of agreement among traditional conceptions of the common good,such as those favored by Plato, Aristotle, John Locke, J.J. Rousseau,Adam Smith, G.W.F. Hegel, John Rawls and Michael Walzer. It alsocovers some important disagreements, especially the disagreementbetween “communal” and “distributive” views.It concludes by considering three important topics in the literature:democracy, communal sharing, and competitive markets. In order tounderstand the issues, it is helpful to start by distinguishing thecommon good from various notions of the good that play a prominentrole in welfare economics and welfare consequentialist accounts ofpolitical morality.

• 1. First Contrast: Welfare Consequentialism
• 2. Second Contrast: Public Goods
• 3. Why Does Political Philosophy Need This Concept? Defects in a “Private Society”
• 4. Central Features of the Common Good
  • 4.1 A Shared Standpoint for Practical Reasoning
  • 4.2 A Set of Common Facilities
  • 4.3 A Privileged Class of Common Interests
  • 4.4 A Solidaristic Concern
• 5. Common Interests (i): Joint Activity
• 6. Common Interests (ii): Private Individuality
• 7. The Common Good Perspective: Communal or Distributive?
• 8. The Common Good in Politics: Democracy and Collective Decision-Making
• 9. The Common Good in Civic Life: Burden Sharing and Resource Pooling
• 10. Markets, Competition and the Invisible Hand
• 11. Social Justice and the Common Good
• 12. Conclusion: Pluralism and the Common Good
• Bibliography
• Academic Tools
• Other Internet Resources
• Related Entries

1. First Contrast: Welfare Consequentialism

The common good belongs to a family of concepts that relate togoodness rather than rightness (Sidgwick 1874). What makes the commongood different from other concepts in this family is that it is anotion of the good that is understood to be internal to therequirements of a social relationship. In any community, the commongood consists of the facilities and interests that members have aspecial obligation to care about in virtue of the fact that they standin a certain relationship with one another. In a family, for instance,the family home is part of the common good because the familial bondrequires members to take care of the home as part of a shared effortto care for one another’s interests in shelter and safety. In auniversity, the climate of academic freedom on campus is part of thecommon good because the special relationship among members of theuniversity community requires them to care for this climate as part ofa shared effort to care for one another’s interests in teaching,learning and inquiring.

The common good differs from the various notions of the good that playa foundational role in welfare consequentialist accounts of politicalmorality. Among the notions in the latter category, we can include:the sum of pleasure over pain, total satisfaction of rational desire,aggregate welfare adjusted for distributive considerations, welfareprioritarianism, equality of welfare (in certain formulations), Paretooptimality, and so on. Unlike the common good, these notions make noessential reference to the requirements of a social relationship. Theyset out fully independent standards for the goodness of actions,motivations and states of affairs, and the independent character ofthese standards allows them to serve as foundational elements in anormative theory that has a consequentialist structure.^[2]

According to classical utilitarianism, for example, the correct courseof action is the optimal course of action as judged from thestandpoint of an impartial concern for the pleasures and pains of allsentient creatures (Sidgwick 1874). Suppose that a relationshipconsists of a set of requirements for how people who stand in therelationship should act towards one another—e.g., parents shouldfeed their children, parents should clothe their children, childrenshould defer to their parents’ judgment, etc. According toclassical utilitarianism, an agent should perform the action thatsatisfies the requirements of a relationship only when her doing sowould result in the greatest sum of pleasure over pain. The notion ofthe good here—i.e., the sum of pleasure over pain—isdefined independently of the requirements of any relationship, so itsets out a criterion for goodness that can tell us, among otherthings, when it would be good for people to comply with any particularrelational requirements.

Some welfare consequentialist notions of the good incorporate adistributive element—e.g., welfare prioritarianism—andthis feature may make it more plausible to see these notions asinternal to the requirements of a relationship. For example, some maythink that welfare prioritarianism could be internal to the familyrelationship, where the relationship is understood to require familymembers to perform the action that is optimal from the standpoint ofthe worst off member of the group. But keep in mind that even moredistributionally sensitive notions of the good, such as welfareprioritarianism, retain other features of a consequentialistunderstanding of goodness that make it difficult to see how thesenotions could be internal to a relationship in the relevant sense.

Take agent neutrality. Insofar as welfare prioritarianism is agenuinely consequentialist notion, it says that the correct course ofaction is the course of action that is optimal as judged from astandpoint that does not change with the position of the agent or therelationships that the agent happens to stand in (Williams 1973; Nagel1986; cf. Sen 1993). Understood in this way, welfare prioritarianismdoes not require an agent to perform the action that is optimal fromthe standpoint of the worst off member ofher own family.Instead, it requires an agent to perform the action that is optimalfrom the agent neutral standpoint of, say, the welfare of the worstoff person in the world or the average welfare of all those in theclass of people who are worst off in their respective families. Ifpeople have reason to pay special attention to the worst off member oftheir own families, on this view, it is because a pattern of reasoningalong these lines leads to the highest level of welfare for the worstoff person in the world or the highest average welfare for those inthe relevant class.

Because it is an agent neutral notion, welfare prioritarianism mayrequire parents to harm their own children if circumstances arise suchthat doing so would bring about the best result from the standpoint ofthe welfare of the worst off person in the world or the averagewelfare of those in the relevant class. A parent might be required toact this way, even when lowering the welfare of her own child wouldlead to only a slightly higher level of welfare for the other peopleaffected. These implications are clearly at odds with our ordinaryunderstanding of the agent relative character of relationalrequirements.

The upshot is that welfare consequentialist accounts of politicalmorality are not based, at the most fundamental level, on conceptionsof the common good. They are based instead on notions of the good thatare understood to be prior to and independent of any socialrelationship. Nonetheless, it is worth stressing that a welfareconsequentialist account of political morality may incorporate aconception of the common good as part of a more specific account ofthe ethical obligations of citizens in public life. After all, acertain pattern of agent relative motivation among citizens may be theoptimal pattern as judged from the standpoint of aggregate welfare (orsome other suitably agent neutral perspective). John Stuart Mill setsout a theory along these lines inConsiderations on RepresentativeGovernment (1862). On his view, citizens should take an activeinterest in the public affairs of their community and socialinstitutions should be designed to generate this pattern of motivationamong citizens. The reason for this is that an orientation amongcitizens towards the common affairs of their community is part of thebest political arrangement overall, as judged from the standpoint ofthe principle of utility.^[3]

2. Second Contrast: Public Goods

Another important contrast to draw is between the common good and thetheory of public goods. The term “public goods” can have anarrower or a boarder meaning. In every day speech, public goods areunderstood as collective goods that are provided by the state.According to the public choice school of economics, goods should onlybe provided by the state when the benefits are non-excludable and theenjoyment of the goods is non-rivalrous (Samuelson 1954; Olson 1965).Non-rivalrous means that the enjoyment by one person does not diminishanother person’s ability to enjoy the same good. The term“non-excludable” highlights the fact that it is impossibleto provide a benefit to one person without others gaining access toit. According to public choice theory, state action is justified toprevent free-riding and the under-provision of these types of goods.Clean water and national defense are classic examples. The commongood, by contrast, has a normative character that is absent in thepublic choice approach to public goods.

In both academic and nonacademic discussions, people often confuse thecommon good with a public good or a set of public goods. This is notsurprising since, as Raymond Geuss points out, one of the originalmeanings of the termres publica was “the common goodof all Romans” (2001: 36). Contemporary analytic philosophytries to keep the two ideas distinct. Some of the facilities that makeup the common good resemble public goods because they are oftenfacilities that are supposed to be open and available toeveryone—e.g., a public library. (For further discussion, seethe entry onpublic goods.) The common good, however, is a much broader category that includesnon-universal goods, such as support for universities, arts andculture. While these things may not be in the individual interest ofeach member of society, they may still be understood as necessaryfeatures of collective life that enable mutual understanding andsolidarity. The facilities that make up the common good serve aspecial class of interests that all citizens have in common, i.e., theinterests that are the object of the civic relationship.

3. Why Does Political Philosophy Need This Concept? Defects in a “Private Society”

Why does political philosophy need the concept of the common good?What’s the rationale for having this concept in addition toother concepts, such as welfare, justice, or human rights? Tounderstand the importance of the common good, it is helpful to thinkabout the moral defects in a private society.

Aprivate society is a society whose members care only abouttheir lives as private individuals (Tocqueville 1835–1840; Hegel1821; Rawls 1971; see also Dewey 1927). Members are not necessarilyrational egoists—they may care about their family and friends.What is central is that their motivational horizons do not extendbeyond the people and projects that are the focus of their personal lives.^[4] As an individual in a private society, I might be interested inacquiring a better home for my family or improving the local schoolfor my children and the other children in my neighborhood. I mighteven vote in national elections insofar as the results could affect myhome or my local school. But I take no interest in national electionsinsofar as the results affect citizens I don’t know, those inother states or provinces. And I take no interest in nationalelections insofar as the results affect the basic fairness of mysociety’s laws and institutions. Having withdrawn into privatelife, I care about the common affairs of the community only insofar asthese touch my private world.

Many philosophers believe that there is something morally defectiveabout a private society. One type of defect bears especially on thecase of a private society that consists of rational egoists. As Inoted in the last section, a community of rational egoists will notperform the actions necessary to generate public goods. Since thesegoods are desirable, the absence of public goods may be suboptimal,both from the standpoint of aggregate welfare and from the standpointof each member’s egoistic rationality.^[5] So there are good instrumental reasons for people to create a publicagency—i.e., a state—that can use taxes, subsidies andcoercive threats to draw people into mutually beneficial patterns of cooperation.^[6]

The common good, however, points to a different kind of defect in aprivate society. The defect in this case extends to all forms ofprivate society, not just to a society of rational egoists, and thedefect is noninstrumental. The defect in this case is that the membersof a political community have arelational obligation to careabout their common affairs, so the fact that they are exclusivelyconcerned with their private lives is itself a moral defect in thecommunity, whether or not this pattern of concern leads to asuboptimal outcome.

To appreciate the point, think about the various public roles thatpeople may occupy in a liberal democracy (see Hegel 1821; Dewey 1927;J. Cohen 2010: 54–58). Most obviously, citizens act in a publiccapacity when they occupy positions as legislators, civil servants,judges, prosecutors, jurors, police officers, soldiers,schoolteachers, and so on. They also act in a public capacity whenthey participate in the political process, voting in elections andtaking part in policy discussions in the public sphere (Habermas 1992;Mill 1862; Rawls 1993 [2005]). And many philosophers argue thatcitizens act in a public capacity—or at least in a partly publiccapacity—when they act as executives in large businessenterprises (McMahon 2013; Christiano 2010); as high-ranking officialsin colleges and universities (Scanlon 2003); as journalists, lawyers,and academics (Habermas 1992, e.g., [1996, 373–9]); asprotesters engaged in civil disobedience (Rawls 1971); and as sociallyconscious consumers (Hussain 2012).

When citizens occupy public roles, political morality requires them tothink and act differently than they would if they were acting asprivate individuals. If you are a judge in a criminal trial, you mightstand to benefit personally if the defendant were found guilty. Butpolitical morality does not allow you to decide cases as if you were aprivate individual, looking to advance your own private objectives. Asa judge, you are required to make decisions based on the evidencepresented at trial and the standards set out in the law. These legalstandards themselves are supposed to answer to common interests. So,in effect, political morality directs you to think and act from thestandpoint of a shared concern for common interests.

Citizens who occupy public roles may also be required to make personalsacrifices. Consider an historical example. During the Watergatescandal, President Richard Nixon ordered the Attorney General of theUnited States, Elliot Richardson, to fire the Watergate specialprosecutor in order to stop an investigation into Nixon’s abusesof power. Rather than carry out Nixon’s order, Richardsonresigned his position. Many would argue that Richardson did the rightthing, and that, in fact, he had an obligation to refuse Nixon’sorder, even if this resulted in a significant setback to his career.As Attorney General, Richardson had an obligation to uphold the ruleof law in the United States, a practice that serves common interests,even if this meant significant sacrifices in terms of his careeraspirations.

Now consider the following possibility. Imagine that we are living ina liberal democracy with a full array of social roles in which peopleact in a public capacity. But imagine that our society is a privatesociety: citizens care only about their own private affairs. In orderto ensure that various public roles are filled, our institutionscreate private incentives for people to take on theseresponsibilities. High salaries draw people into positions as judgesand legislators, and mutual surveillance gives these people privateincentives to carry out their duties. Suppose that our institutionsare well structured and private incentives are adequate to fill all ofthe important public positions. Is there anything missing in oursociety? Does our society suffer from a moral defect of some kind?

Philosophers in the common good tradition believe that the answer isyes: there is something morally significant that is missing from oursociety. What is missing is agenuine concern for the commongood. No one in our society actually cares about sharedfacilities, such as the rule of law, or the common interests thatthese facilities serve. Citizens fill various public roles simply forthe sake of the private benefits that they get from doing so.According to a common good conception of political morality, this lackof concern for the common good is itself a moral defect in a politicalcommunity, even if private incentives lead people to fill all of therelevant positions.

A central challenge for theorists in the common good tradition is toexplain why a genuine commitment to the common good matters. Whyshould it matter whether citizens actually care about the common good?Some philosophers in the tradition cite a practical problem. Even in awell-designed arrangement, circumstances are likely to arise wheresocial institutions do not provide people with an adequate privateincentive to act in a publicly oriented way. For example, politicalmorality may require public officials to stand up for the rule of law,even in situations where this will damage their careers. Or politicalmorality may require citizens to protest against an unjust law, evenif this means a private risk of being jailed or blacklisted. Politicalmorality may even require citizens to run the risk of losing theirlives in order to defend the constitutional order against a foreignthreat (see Walzer 1970; Rousseau 1762b [1997: 63–4]). In eachof these cases, no matter how well designed institutions are, citizensmay not have an adequate private incentive to do what politicalmorality requires, so a genuine concern for the common good may beessential.

A different explanation—perhaps the most important one in thecommon good tradition—stresses the idea of a socialrelationship. Think of the relationship between parents and theirchildren. This relationship requires not only that the people involvedact in certain ways towards one another, but also that theycare about one another in certain ways. For instance, parentsare required not only to feed and clothe their children, perhaps toavoid getting fined by the Department of Child and Family Services.Parents are also required to care about their children: they must givetheir children’s interests a certain status in their practicalreasoning. Many philosophers argue that our relation to our fellowcitizens has similar features. The political bond requires not onlythat we act in certain ways, but also that we give the interests ofour fellow citizens a certain status in our practical reasoning. Itwould be unacceptable, on this view, for citizens to fulfill certainpublic roles purely for the sake of private incentives. A SupremeCourt justice, for example, must care about the rule of law and thecommon interests that this practice serves. If she were makingconsistent rulings just to cash her paycheck every two weeks, shewould not be responding in the right way to her fellow citizens, whoact for the sake of common interests in doing things such as voting,following the law, and standing ready to defend the constitutional order.^[7]

Many philosophers believe that there is something morally defectiveabout a private society, even one in which private incentives movepeople to fill all of the important public roles. A conception of thecommon good provides us with an account of what is missing from thepractical reasoning of citizens in a private society, and it connectsthis with a wider view about the relational obligations that requirecitizens to reason in these ways.

4. Central Features of the Common Good

According to a common good conception of political morality, membersof a political community stand in a social relationship with oneanother. This relationship is not as intimate as the relationshipamong family members or the members of a church. But it is a genuinesocial relationship nonetheless, and it requires members not only toact in certain ways, but also to give one another’s interests acertain status in their practical reasoning. This basic outlook leadsmost conceptions of the common good to share certain features.

4.1 A Shared Standpoint for Practical Reasoning

The first feature that most conceptions share is that they describe apattern of practical reasoning that is meant to be realized in theactual thought processes of the members of a political community. Aconception of the common good is not just a criterion for correctaction, such that citizens would satisfy the conception so long asthey performed the correct action, regardless of their subjectivereasons for doing so. The point of a conception of the common good isto define a pattern of practical reasoning, a way of thinking andacting that constitutes the appropriate form of mutual concern amongmembers. In order to satisfy the conception, the activities of themembers of the community must be organized, at some level, by thoughtprocesses that embody the relevant pattern.^[8]

4.2 A Set of Common Facilities

Most conceptions of the common good identify a set of facilities thatcitizens have a special obligation to maintain in virtue of the factthat these facilities serve certain common interests. The relevantfacilities may be part of the natural environment (e.g., theatmosphere, a freshwater aquifer, etc.) or human artifacts (e.g.,hospitals, schools, etc.). But the most important facilities in theliterature are social institutions and practices. For example, ascheme of private property exists when members of a community conformto rules that assign individuals certain forms of authority overexternal objects. Private property, as a social institution, serves acommon interest of citizens in being able to assert private controlover their physical environment, and so many conceptions include thisinstitution as part of the common good.

4.3 A Privileged Class of Common Interests

A conception of the common good will define a privileged class ofabstract interests. Citizens are understood to have a relationalobligation to create and maintain certain facilities because thesefacilities serve the relevant interests. The interests in theprivileged class are “common” in the sense that everycitizen is understood to have these interests to a similardegree.^[9] The interests are “abstract” in the sense that they maybe served by a variety of material, cultural or institutionalfacilities. A wide variety of interests figure prominently in theliterature, including: the interest in taking part in the mostchoice-worthy way of life (AristotlePol.1323a14–1325b31); the interest in bodily security and property(e.g., Locke 1698; Rousseau 1762b); the interest in living aresponsible and industrious private life (Smith 1776); the interest ina fully adequate scheme of equal basic liberties (Rawls 1971 and1993); the interest in a fair opportunity to reach the more attractivepositions in society (Rawls 1971); and the interest in security andwelfare, where these interests are understood as socially recognizedneeds that are subject to ongoing political determination (Walzer1983).

4.4 A Solidaristic Concern

Most conceptions of the common good define a form of practicalreasoning that fits the model of solidarity. Many social relationshipsrequire a form of solidarity among those who stand in therelationship. Solidarity here basically involves one person giving acertain subset of the interests of another person a status in herreasoning that is analogous to the status that she gives to her owninterests in her reasoning (see, e.g., AristotleNE1166a1–33). For example, if my friend needs a place to sleeptonight, friendship requires that I should offer him my couch. I haveto do this because friendship requires that I reason about events thataffect my friend’s basic interests as if these events wereaffecting my own basic interests in a similar way. A conception of thecommon good typically requires citizens to maintain certain facilitiesbecause these facilities serve certain common interests. So whencitizens reason as the conception requires, they effectively give theinterests of their fellow citizens a status in their reasoning that isanalogous to the status that they give to their own interests in theirreasoning.

An example will make the idea more intuitive. According to Rousseau, aproperly ordered political community is “a form of associationthat will defend and protect the person and goods of each associatewith the full common force” (1762b [1997: 49]). Citizens in thiscommunity are united by a solidaristic form of mutual concern that isfocused on (among other things) their common interests in physicalsecurity and property. This form of mutual concern requires eachcitizen to respond to an attack on the body or property of a fellowcitizen as if this were an attack on her own body and property. Whenextended over all members, this form of mutual concern requires thewhole community to respond to an attack on any individual member as ifthis were an attack on every member. In this sense, “the fullcommon force” stands behind each person’s physicalsecurity and property. Or, as Rousseau sometimes puts it, “onecannot injure one of the members without attacking the body, and stillless can one injure the body without the members being affected”(1762b [1997: 52]).^[10]

5. Common Interests (i): Joint Activity

Let’s turn now to some of the ways that conceptions of thecommon good differ from each other. One way has to do with how theydefine the privileged class of common interests that are the object ofthe political relationship. We can divide the important views in theliterature into two main categories: (a)joint activityconceptions and (b)private individualityconceptions.

A joint activity conception defines the privileged class of commoninterests as interests that members have in taking part in a complexactivity that involves all or most members of the community. Amongthose who endorse this kind of view are ancient philosophers, such asPlato (Republic) and Aristotle (Politics), secularnatural law theorists such as John Finnis (1980), and most natural lawtheorists in the Catholic tradition. Aspects of the joint activityview are also important in the work of communitarian thinkers such asCharles Taylor (1984) and, to a lesser extent, Michael Sandel (2009).The most important and influential view is Aristotle’s.

Aristotle holds that members of a political community are not justinvolved in a military alliance or an especially dense network ofcontractual agreements (Pol. 1280b29–33). Members arealso involved in a relationship that he describes as a form offriendship (NE 1159b25–35). This friendship consists incitizens wishing one another well, their being aware of the fact thattheir fellow citizens wish them well, and their taking part in ashared life that answers to this mutual concern (Pol.1280b29–1281a3). In caring about one another and wishing oneanother well, what citizens care about in particular is that they andtheir fellow citizens live well, that is, live the most choiceworthy life.^[11]

The most choiceworthy life, on Aristotle’s view, is a pattern ofactivity that fully engages and expresses the rational parts of humannature. This pattern of activity is a pattern ofjointactivity because, like a play, it has various interdependent partsthat can only be realized by the members of a group together. Thepattern is centered on an array of leisured activities that arevaluable in themselves, including philosophy, mathematics, art andmusic. But the pattern also includes the activity of coordinating thesocial effort to engage in leisured activities (i.e., statesmanship)and various supporting activities, such as the education of citizensand the management of resources.

On Aristotle’s view, a properly ordered society will have anarray of shared material, cultural and institutional facilities thatanswer to the common interest of citizens in living the mostchoiceworthy life. These facilities form an environment in whichcitizens can engage in leisured activities and in which they canperform the various coordinating and supporting activities. Somefacilities that figure into Aristotle’s account include: commonmess halls and communal meals, which provide occasions for leisuredactivities (Pol. 1330a1–10; 1331a19–25); acommunal system of education (Pol. 1337a20–30); commonland (Pol. 1330a9–14); commonly owned slaves to workthe land (Pol. 1330a30–3); a shared set of politicaloffices (Pol. 1276a40–3; 1321b12–a10) andadministrative buildings (Pol. 1331b5–11); sharedweapons and fortifications (Pol. 1328b6–11;1331a9–18); and an official system of priests, temples andpublic sacrifices (Pol. 1322b17–28).

Aristotle’s account may seem distant from modern sensibilities,but a good analogy for what he has in mind is the form of communitythat we associate today with certain universities. Members of theuniversity community are bound together in a social relationshipmarked by a certain form of mutual concern: members care that they andtheir fellow members live well, where living well is understood interms of taking part in a flourishing university life. This way oflife is organized around intellectual, cultural and athleticactivities, such as physics, art history, lacrosse, and so on. Memberswork together to maintain an array of facilities that serve theircommon interest in taking part in this joint activity (e.g.,libraries, computer labs, dorm rooms, football fields, etc.). And wecan think of public life in the university community in terms of aform of shared practical reasoning that most members engage in, whichfocuses on maintaining common facilities for the sake of their common interest.^[12]

6. Common Interests (ii): Private Individuality

Private individuality conceptions offer a different account of theprivileged class of common interests. According to these views,members of a political community have a relational obligation to careabout their common interest in being able to lead lives as privateindividuals. Citizens each have an interest in being able to shapetheir lives through their own private choices about what activities topursue and what associations to form. Choices are“private” in the relevant sense when citizens are notrequired to consult with anyone in making these choices and they arenot required to reach a decision through any form of shared deliberation.^[13] Among the philosophers who endorse this kind of view are manyimportant thinkers in the liberal tradition, including John Locke(1698), J.J. Rousseau (1762b), Adam Smith (1776), and G.W.F. Hegel(1821). More recent figures who endorse this kind of view include JohnRawls (1971) and Michael Walzer (1983).

A sophisticated example of a private individuality conception isRawls’s. On Rawls’s view, members of a political communityhave a relational obligation to care for the interests attached to the“position of equal citizenship” which all citizens share(1971 [1999: 82–83]). These interests are (a) the interest in afully adequate scheme of equal basic liberties and (b) the interest ina fair opportunity to reach the more attractive positions in society.Rawls uses the term “the common good” to refer to the sumtotal of social conditions that answer to the interests attached tothe position of equal citizenship (1971 [1999: 217]). Understood inthis way, the common good consists,inter alia, of: a legalorder that provides citizens with the liberty of expression, theliberty of conscience and the other liberal freedoms; a democraticsystem of government that provides citizens with political liberties,such as the liberty to vote, hold office and participate in collectiverule-making; a system of courts to enforce the rule of law; as well aspolice protection and national defense to protect the basic liberties.The common good also consists of legal protections for free choice ofoccupation; mass media mechanisms that gather and disperse informationabout job possibilities; a transportation system to give people accessto work; and a system of education (whether public or private) thatensures conditions in which people with similar talents andmotivations have similar prospects, regardless of their class orfamily background.

Rawls’s conception has the core features of a privateindividuality view. The facilities that answer to the common interestin equal liberty and fair opportunity put citizens in a position tojoin or withdraw from various activities and associations as privatepersons who can make their own independent choices. For example, theliberty of conscience gives citizens the legal right to join or leavea religious association based on their own private beliefs. They neednot consult with other citizens about these choices or make thesechoices as part of a wider deliberative process that involves othercitizens.

Rawls’s view takes the common good to consist partly in a systemof bodily security, private property and civil liberty. In this way,his view resembles Rousseau’s, which also focuses on thesecommon interests. Where Rawls’s view differs fromRousseau’s is that it extends the privileged class of commoninterests to include an interest in a wider set of basic liberties andan interest in a fair opportunity to reach the more attractivepositions in society. These interests involve a more extensive arrayof institutions and social conditions, especially when it comes toeducation, communication, and economic redistribution. But it is worthemphasizing that neither Rawls nor Rousseau incorporates a fullaccount of distributive justice into their conceptions of the common good.^[14] I will say more about this in the next section.

7. The Common Good Perspective: Communal or Distributive?

One of the most important differences among different conceptions ofthe common good has to do with how they take private and sectionalinterests to factor into determining the relational obligations ofcitizens. Here we can distinguish two main types of views: (a)communal conceptions of the common good and (b)distributive conceptions of the common good.

Members of a political community have a relational obligation to carefor certain interests that they have in common. A“communal” conception of the common good takes theseinterests to be interests that citizens haveas citizens,where the status of being a citizen and the interests attached to thisstatus are both understood to beprior to the variousstatuses and interests that make up each member’s identity as aprivate individual. When citizens engage in social deliberation abouttheir laws and institutions, a communal conception typically directsthem to abstract away from their private interests and the sectionalinterests they may have as members of one subgroup or another and tofocus instead on their common interests as citizens.

For example, imagine that citizens are considering changes to traderules in their society. They may be inclined to assess proposals interms of how attractive these are from the standpoint of theirsectional interests as members of a certain profession or participantsin a certain industry. But a communal conception of the common gooddirects citizens to set these interests aside and assess proposals interms of how well they answer to common civic interests, such as theinterest in national security or the interest in a productive economy.^[15]

A “distributive” conception of the common good differsfrom a “communal” conception in that it does not directcitizens to abstract away from their private and sectional interestsin the same way. A distributive conception starts with the idea thatcitizens belong to various groups with distinct sectional interests.These interests make partly competing claims on the material, culturaland institutional facilities in a community. The distributiveconception incorporates a distributive principle that determines howsocial facilities should answer to these sectional interests, and theconception says that members have a relational obligation to maintaina set of facilities that answers to everyone’s sectionalinterests in the way that the distributive principle prescribes.

As an example of a distributive view, consider the view held by manyphilosophers, which defines the common good in terms of Rawls’sdifference principle (see, e.g., J. Cohen 1996 [2009: 169–170];see alsosection 8 below). According to this view, we can think of citizens as belongingto various subgroups, each consisting of all those born into a certain“starting position” in social life. Citizens in each groupshare certain choice-independent characteristics, such as their classposition at birth and their level of innate talent. Group members havesectional interests in better life prospects (as measured in terms ofprimary goods), where these interests make partly competing claims onthe basic structure of society. The difference principle says thatsocial institutions should answer to the interests of each groupequally, with the caveat that institutions should incorporate whateverinequalities would serve to maximize the prospects of the leastadvantaged group. Citizens are then understood to have a relationalobligation to maintain a scheme of institutions that attends toeveryone’s sectional interests in the way that the differenceprinciple prescribes.

The disagreement between communal and distributive conceptions of thecommon good is perhaps the most important disagreement among differentconceptions, and it raises two important issues about the nature ofthe political relationship.

The first has to do with the moral underpinnings of the communal view.It is helpful to think of communal accounts of the common good asappealing to a certain conception social life (e.g., Rousseau 1762b;Hegel 1821; Walzer 1983). According to this conception, citizens formtheir various private and sectional interests within the framework ofa more fundamental effort to maintain certain social conditionstogether. The political bond is prior to their private interests in acertain way, so the political relationship may sometimes requirecitizens to set their private interests aside in order to actcollectively to maintain the relevant social conditions. Perhaps theclearest example of this is national defense (seesection 9 below). When defending the constitutional order against a foreignthreat, political morality requires citizens to act collectively indefense of common interests, without organizing their efforts in a waythat answers specifically to their competing private interests indifferent levels of protection.

An analogy may help here. Members of a family each have distinctinterests as private individuals—e.g., in developing theirtalents, pursuing relationships, cultivating career prospects, and soon. At some level, the household must be organized in a way thatanswers to these private interests. But there are some matters wherethe familial relationship requires members to act together in a waythat sets their competing private interests aside. If the family homeis on fire, members are required to save the home, without specialregard for how resources are being deployed in ways that are morelikely to save one member’s room rather than another’s. Incertain domains, members are supposed to act from a communal point ofview that focuses on common interests that are essential to theirsocial bond, rather than their distinct and potentially competinginterests as private individuals. Communal conceptions of the commongood see the political relationship as having a similarcharacter.^[16]

The second point is that—surprisingly—Rawls himselffavours a substantially communal rather than distributive conceptionof the common good. InA Theory of Justice, he does notdefine the common good in terms of his full conception of socialjustice. He defines it instead in terms of the “principle ofcommon interest”. This principle assesses social institutionsfrom the position of equal citizenship. As he says, “as far aspossible, the basic structure should be appraised from the position ofequal citizenship” where this position “is defined by therights and liberties required by the principle of equal liberty andthe principle of fair equality of opportunity” (1971 [1999:82–83]). Rawls thinks that a wide variety of policy questionscan be settled by appeal to the principle of common interest,including “reasonable regulations to maintain publicorder”, “efficient measures for public health andsafety”, and “collective efforts for national defense in ajust war” (1971 [1999: 83]).^[17]

Social deliberation, on Rawls’s view, should unfold, as far aspossible, within a framework of reasoning that focuses on intereststhat are common to all citizens, where the difference principle entersthe discussion mainly when the appeal to common interests alone couldnot properly decide an issue. But why should political deliberationunfold in this way? Why does Rawls think that, “as far aspossible, the basic structure should be appraised from the position ofequal citizenship”?

One possible rationale has to do with the kind of solidarity thatcitizens realize through their shared status as“citizens”. When members of a society reason in terms ofthe principle of common interest, they set their private and sectionalinterests aside whenever possible in order to focus on their commoninterests as citizens. Setting their sectional interests aside (e.g.,as members of the least advantaged group, the second least advantagedgroup, the third least advantaged group, etc.), citizens treat theirshared interests as “citizens” as being more fundamentalthan their distinct and potentially competing interests as privateindividuals. Each citizen effectively tells her fellow citizens,“What unites us is more important than what divides us”.Bringing the status of “citizen” to the center of howcitizens relate to one another in public life is particularlyimportant for Rawls because mutual recognition on the basis of thisshared status is important to his account of how a just social orderwill prevent envy and prevent positional competition from underminingthe basic liberties (1971 [1999: 476–9]).

A closely related idea has to do with mutuality (section4.4 above). When members of society reason in terms of their commoninterests in liberty and opportunity, they assess policies from astandpoint that does not distinguish between one citizen and another.They each accord the interests of their fellow citizens the very samestatus in their reasoning that they accord to their own interests.When citizens do their parts in a social arrangement that answers tocommon interests, and they do so on the grounds that the arrangementserves common interests, citizens realize a form of solidarity that isperfectly mutual: each citizen works for the interests of each herfellow citizens in exactly the same way that each of her fellowcitizens works for her interests.

Social cooperation on the basis of the difference principle does notembody the same kind of mutuality. Imagine that citizens are reasoningabout their institutions. Starting with an arrangement that createsequal prospects for those born into every starting position, theyconsider different arrangements that would yield Pareto improvementsover the egalitarian scheme.^[18] Citizens must now choose between different possibilities: onearrangement would maximize the prospects for the least advantagedgroup; another would maximize the prospects for the second leastadvantaged group; a third would maximize the prospects for the thirdleast advantaged group; and so on. Given these possibilities, thedifference principle requires citizens to choose the arrangement thatis best from the standpoint of one group in particular—i.e.,those in the least advantaged position.

Imagine now that we live in a social order that satisfies thedifference principle. There are certain facilities insociety—say, certain educational facilities—that answerdistinctively to the interests of those in the least advantaged group.The resources involved could have been deployed in ways that wouldhave been better for those in the second least advantaged group, orthe third least advantaged group, etc., so the arrangement as a wholeis tilted in favour of one group in particular. Because it is tiltedin this way, the pattern of interaction lacks the property of perfectmutuality: each citizen does not work for the interests of each of herfellow citizens in exactly the same way each of her fellow citizensworks for her interests. Everyone works in a way that is distinctivelyoriented towards the interests of the least advantaged.

Of course, citizens realize a form of solidarity insofar as socialcooperation is organized in light of the difference principle; thepoint is just that citizens realize a distinctive form of solidarityinsofar as social cooperation is organized in light of the principleof common interest. In the latter case, they realize a morecommunal form of solidarity, as citizens set their privateinterests aside to focus on common interests and citizens attach nospecial significance to the distinctions between different groups. Amore communal form of solidarity answers better to the socialdimension of the political relationship and this may be one reason whyRawls favors a form of public reasoning in which the principle ofcommon interest governs “matters which concern the interests ofeveryone and in regard to which distributive effects are immaterial orirrelevant” (1971 [1999, 82–83]).

8. The Common Good in Politics: Democracy and Collective Decision-Making

In the vast literature on the common good, several topics stand out asimportant subjects of concern. One important topic is democracy.Democracy figures prominently in philosophical reflection about thecommon good because there is broad agreement amongphilosophers—though by no means universal agreement!—thata private society would be defective in terms of the way that membersmake collective decisions. Collective decision-making in a politicalcommunity must unfold in its public life, that is, in the sphere ofinteraction in which citizens transcend their own private concerns andreason from the standpoint of the common good.

On some accounts of democracy, citizens are not required to take upthe perspective of the common good. According to pluralism, forexample, democracy is best understood as a collective decision-makingprocess that disperses power and influence among many different groupsin society (see Dahl 1956 and 1989). Citizens each have their ownprivate interests and groups of citizens with similar interestsadvance these interests in various rule-making forums. The overallprocess is essentially a form of bargaining, where each groupstrategically trades concessions with other groups in order tomaximize the satisfaction of their policy preferences. A properlyordered democratic regime will maintain fair bargaining conditions,where all important groups are able to exercise a meaningful degree ofinfluence on the collective decisions that affect their interests. Buton the pluralist view no one needs to take an interest in the commonaffairs of the community: each citizen may care only about her ownprivate affairs, entering the public forum to advance her privateinterests against the interests of others.

Many philosophers criticize pluralism and other similarly privatizedviews of democratic reasoning because these views fail to capture animportant aspect of political life. As Jeremy Waldron notes, citizensoften vote on the basis of something other than their own privateinterests:

People often vote on the basis of what they think is the general goodof society. They are concerned about the deficit, or about abortion,or about Eastern Europe, in a way that reflects nothing more abouttheir own personal interests than that they have a stake in theissues. Similarly, the way they vote will usually take into accounttheir conception of the special importance of certain interests andliberties (Waldron 1990 [1993: 408]).

Many critics also contend that pluralism does not distinguish properlybetween the form of practical reasoning appropriate to democraticdecision-making and the form that is appropriate in market contexts.Managers in a firm may justify one business strategy over another onthe grounds that this strategy will improve the bottom line for thefirm, taking no account of how the strategy might harm competitors orother groups. But citizens in a democratic process are not supposed toreason this way:

…it is a political convention of a democratic society to appealto the common interest. No political party publicly admits to pressingfor legislation to the disadvantage of any recognized social group.(Rawls 1971 [1999, 280])

If a privatized approach to democratic decision-making is morallydefective, what exactly is the problem? What is wrong with citizensassessing laws and voting on laws based on how well these will servetheir private interests?

One prominent line of reasoning in democratic theory appeals to anepistemic conception of democracy (e.g., Rousseau 1762b; J.Cohen 1986). According to this view, there is an independent standardof correctness for legislation, which says that laws must serve commoninterests. Democratic decision-making is a requirement of politicalmorality because the legislative process is more likely to generatelaws that meet the standard when the process is democratic. Moreover,a democratic process is more likely to generate laws that meet thestandard when those taking part in the process are actually trying toidentify laws that meet the standard. So citizens taking part in thedemocratic process should assess legislative proposals in terms of howwell these proposals serve common interests because this is the bestway to identify and enact laws that are justified.

The other main line of reasoning in democratic theory appeals to adeliberative conception of democracy (J. Cohen 1996, 2009;Habermas 1992; Gutman & Thompson 1996). According to JoshuaCohen’s deliberative conception, political morality requirescitizens to make binding collective decisions through a process ofpublic reasoning in which citizens recognize one another as equalmembers of the political community (J. Cohen 1989, 1996). The processof public reasoning requires that each citizen should offer reasons toconvince others to adopt a legislative proposal, where these reasonsare reasons that she could properly expect others to accept, given thefacts of reasonable pluralism.

Cohen argues that the ideal of deliberative democracy, as heunderstands it, provides a compelling account of the common goodorientation of democratic decision-making (1996 [2009,168–170]). No citizen could reasonably expect others to accept alegislative proposal simply because it serves her own interests, sothere is a basic requirement that any legislative proposal must beresponsive to the interests of all citizens. Furthermore, thebackground idea that citizens are equal members of the politicalcommunity imposes an additional requirement. Citizens

can reject, as a reason within [the] process, that some are worth lessthan others or that the interests of one group are to count less thanthe interests of other groups (1996 [2009, 169]).

This constraint on acceptable reasons leads to a substantiverequirement that legislation must be consistent with a publicunderstanding of the common good that treats people as equals in therelevant sense.

Cohen cites Rawls’s difference principle as one example of apublic understanding of the common good that satisfies the relevantrequirement.

Treating equality as a baseline, [the difference principle] requiresthat inequalities established or sanctioned by state action must workto the maximal advantage of the least advantaged. That baseline [i.e.,equality] is a natural expression of the constraints on reasons thatemerge from the background equal standing of citizens: it will notcount as a reason for a system of policy that that system benefits themembers of a particular group singled out by social class or nativetalent or any other feature that distinguishes among equal citizens.[…In addition, the principle] insists, roughly speaking, thatno one be left less well off than anyone needs to be—which isitself a natural expression of the deliberative conception (J. Cohen1996 [2009, 169–170]).

Note that Cohen argues here for a “distributive” ratherthan a “communal” conception of the common good (seesection 7 above). On Cohen’s view, members of a political community havea relational obligation to provide one another with a set offacilities that answers to everyone’s sectional interests in theway that a certain distributive principle prescribes (i.e. thedifference principle). This differs from a communal conception, whichdoes not conceive of the relational obligation of citizens in terms ofa distributive principle.

Cohen is probably right that the difference principle is a naturalexpression of the deliberative ideal against the background of anassumption that all citizens are equal members of the politicalcommunity. But defenders of a communal conception might argue that thepolitical relationship among citizens has a social dimension that goesbeyond equal membership in the political community. Like therelationship among friends or among members of a sports team, thepolitical relationship must be understood to impose obligations onpeople that embody relational ideals such as solidarity and mutuality.This means that the political relationship may require citizens toreason with each other in ways that embody these values. For instance,the political relationship may require citizens to set their privateand sectional interests aside in certain deliberative contexts inorder to focus on their common interests as citizens. An implicitconcern for social ideals such as solidarity and mutuality may be onereason why Rawls identifies the common good with the principle ofcommon interest and gives this principle a special role to play inpolitical reasoning.

9. The Common Good in Civic Life: Burden Sharing and Resource Pooling

Many philosophers agree that citizens must transcend their privateconcerns when they take part in the political process. But somephilosophers believe that there are other aspects of social life inwhich citizens have a relational obligation to transcend their privateconcerns. Two especially prominent examples in the literature involveburden sharing and resource pooling. Michael Walzer’s discussionof conscription and national defense highlights several importantissues (1983: 64–71, 78–91, 97–9, and 168–70;see also Walzer 1970).

When a foreign power threatens the constitutional order in a liberaldemocracy, political morality seems to direct citizens to defend theorder in a particular way. Citizens must approach national defense asa communal enterprise in which they organize themselves to achieve acertain common level of security together through various forms ofburden sharing and resource pooling. Burden sharing, in this case,requires every member of the community to participate in some way incarrying the collective burden of fighting the threat. Some citizenswill do the actual fighting, but others will contribute by treatingthe wounded, developing weapons, taking care of children, sending carepackages to soldiers, rationing essential resources, and so on.

The moral importance of burden sharing comes out most clearly when weconsider certain highly privatized ways of organizing nationaldefense. Consider, for example, a market based approach. A politicalcommunity might allow entrepreneurs to set up “protectionagencies” that would act as firms, hiring mercenaries, buyingweapons, and selling varying levels of protection to individualcitizens based on their preferences and their ability to pay (seeNozick 1974). Even if it were possible to defend people’sconstitutional liberties through a mechanism of this kind,^[19] political morality seems to rule it out. One reason is that themarket scheme would allow citizens who are wealthy enough to buyprotection services for themselves, but then leave it to others toface the actual dangers of combat. This would violate the communalideal that all citizens must share in some way in carrying thecollective burden of defending the community (see Walzer 1983:98–9 and 169).

Another problem with a highly privatized approach to national defencehas to do with the injured. When soldiers get injured in combat, theirinjuries have a different moral status as compared to the injuriesthat they might suffer if they decide to do things as privateindividuals like ride a motorcycle or work in a circus. The differenceis that combat injuries are notprivate injuries thatcitizens must bear as private persons. Even in the case where soldiersvolunteer for combat, they perform a public service and we treat theirinjuries as part of a collective burden that the community as a wholemust bear, e.g., by providing medical care and rehabilitation servicesto the wounded free of charge.

The communal ideal of public service and burden sharing might extendbeyond national defence to other forms of socially necessary work thatis difficult or dangerous.

Miners today are free citizens, but we might think of them…ascitizens in the service of the nation. And then we might treat them asif they were conscripts, not sharing their risks, but sharing thecosts of the remedy: research into mine safety, health care designedfor their immediate needs, early retirement, decent pensions, and soon (Walzer 1983: 170).

A more extensive application of the communal ideal might requirecitizens to treat the burdens associated with other occupations asparts of a shared social burden, including the burdens faced by policeofficers, firefighters, teachers, day care workers, nurses, nursinghome workers, and so on (cf. Brennan & Jaworski 2015).

Besides burden sharing, resource pooling is another way that citizensmay organize their activities in light of the common good. Manyfacilities in a modern liberal democracy serve common interests,including the armed forces, public health services, and the educationsystem. These facilities require material resources, and this raisesan array of questions about how to generate these resources andincorporate them into the pool of assets that serve commoninterests.

Aristotle favors an approach that works through private ownership. InPlato’sRepublic, almost all of the resources held bythe guardians are held as collective assets that the guardians may usefor the sake of the common interest of the community.^[20] Importantly, because the guardians hold almost nothing as privateproperty, they do nothing that is analogous to the choices that agroup of friends might make on a camping trip to voluntarily pooltheir resources for the sake of common interests. In other words, theguardians do not express their concern for the members of thecommunity through gifts, donations or other forms of privatecontribution. Partly for this reason, Aristotle favors an arrangementin which citizens have private ownership and control over assets and acivic obligation to pool these assets for the sake of common interests(see Kraut 2002, 327–56). For example, if the community faces anaval threat, wealthy citizens in Aristotle’s ideal communitywould be responsible for building warships and contributing theseships to the war effort.

Aristotle’s view draws attention to an important set ofquestions in contemporary market societies. The civic obligation hehas in mind comes closest to our notion of private philanthropy. Butis private philanthropy really the right way for a community tomaintain common facilities for the sake of common interests? In 2015,Mark Zuckerberg, the billionaire founder of Facebook, announced thathe would donate 99% of his shares in the company to charitable causes,including public education (Kelly 2015). From Aristotle’s pointof view, this reflects well on our society: our institutions putwealth in private hands, thereby allowing citizens to make meaningfulchoices to pool their wealth for common interests. But many wouldargue that our arrangements are seriouslydefective insofaras they put some individuals in a position to control a privatefortune worth over $45 billion, even if these individuals willeventually devote these resources to common interests. Plato is on tosomething when he says that political solidarity requires that socialinstitutions channel some wealth directly into the public domain. ButPlato seems to go too far in the other direction, and this leaves uswith an important set of questions about when society should poolresources through the state and when society should pool resourcesthrough private philanthropy.

10. Markets, Competition and the Invisible Hand

A third important topic in philosophical reflection about the commongood is the market. Citizens have a relational obligation to careabout certain common interests, and social coordination throughmarkets can draw citizens into a pattern of production activity andconsumption activity that answers to these interests. For example,markets can lead citizens to make better use of land and labor insociety, thereby generating more resources for everyone to use inpursuing their various ends. The problem is that market coordinationinvolves a privatized form of reasoning, and the proper functioning ofthe market may require citizensnot to reason from thestandpoint of the common good.

To illustrate, suppose that a society uses markets to coordinate theeducation of citizens (see Friedman 1962). A system of for-profitschools would operate as firms, hiring teachers, buying computers, andselling education services to the public. Parents, in turn, would actas consumers, buying the best education for their children at thelowest cost. Each citizen in this arrangement would reason from thestandpoint of her own private concerns: as school managers, citizenswould aim to maximize profits, and as parents, citizens would aim toget the best education for their children at the lowest cost. No onewould act out of a concern for the education system as a sharedfacility that serves common interests. In fact, the market may requirecitizens to avoid this perspective. After all, to lower costseffectively, school managers must not show too much concern for theeducation of their students. And in order to improve the education oftheir own children, parents must not show too much concern for theeducation of other people’s children.

We can divide the philosophical debate into two camps. The first campsays that market society—i.e., a social order that reliesextensively on markets to coordinate social life—is compatiblewith the requirements of the political relationship. Theorists in thiscamp include Adam Smith (1776), G.W.F. Hegel (1821), John Rawls(1971), Michael Sandel (2009) and perhaps Michael Walzer (1983). Wemight also include deliberative democrats such as Jürgen Habermas(1992) and Joshua Cohen (Cohen & Sabel 1997).^[21]

As an example of someone in the first camp, consider Hegel (1821) andhis view of the market. Hegel follows Adam Smith in thinking that themarket draws citizens into a pattern of specialization that servescommon interests. The market does this through prices. Each citizenfinds that she can do better for herself by developing her talents andselling her labor at the going rate, then buying the goods that sheneeds from others. But following price signals involves a form ofreasoning that is focused only on private interests, not the commongood. As a result, it is essential, on Hegel’s view, that therealm of market activity must be integrated into a wider politicalcommunity. As members of a political community, citizens (or at leastsome citizens) discuss their common interests in the public sphere,vote in elections, and find their views represented in legislativedeliberations that shape an official conception of the common good.This official conception shapes the laws and guides the government inmanaging the economy. So even if citizens do not reason from thestandpoint of the common good as market actors, their lives as a wholeare organized by a form of reasoning that is focused on maintainingshared facilities for the sake of common interests.

The other camp in the disagreement says that market society is notcompatible with the requirements of the political relationship.Theorists in this camp include Aristotle (seePol.1256b39–1258a17), Rousseau (1762b), Marx (1844, 1867), and G.A.Cohen (2009). Marx’s view provides an interesting contrast toHegel’s.

Marx agrees with Hegel that members of a political community mustorganize their activities in light of a conception of the common good.But he does not think that members live up to the ideal if most ofthem never actually reason from this standpoint. A political communitymust be “radically democratic” in the sense that ordinarycitizens participate directly in the collective effort to organizesocial life by appeal to a conception of the common good (Marx 1844).What makes social coordination through markets problematic is thatmarket actors are drawn into certain patterns of activity throughprices, which means that they never actually reason with each other interms of the common good. On Marx’s view, a properly orderedpolitical community would move beyond this opaque form of socialcoordination:

The life-process of society, which is based on the process of materialproduction, does not strip off its mystical veil until it is treatedas production by freely associated men, and is consciously regulatedby them in accordance with a settled plan. (Marx 1867 [1967, 84]).

In a properly ordered political community, members will transcend theauthoritarian mysticism of price coordination and organize theirproduction and consumption activities through an open and transparentprocess of reasoning that makes explicit to everyone how theiractivities serve common interests.

Many contemporary issues in political philosophy revolve aroundquestions about the market and the standpoint of the common good. Mosttheorists today hold views that fall somewhere between the two camps Ijust described: they argue for some more nuanced view about whencitizens are supposed to adopt a privatized perspective and when theymust reason from the standpoint of the common good.

When it comes to corporations and corporate executives, for example,Thomas Christiano (2010) argues for a certain kind of sociallyconscious orientation: corporate leaders must reason from thestandpoint of the common good at least in limiting their strategicpursuit of private objectives in a way that is consistent with thebroader social objectives established by democratic majorities.^[22] Joseph Heath (2014) argues for a more limited view, such that marketactors must not take a purely privatized perspective in cases whereexternalities and other market failures would prevent the marketprocess from generating attractive results. A great deal of workremains to be done when it comes to other aspects of market life thatmay require citizens to reason from a more socially consciousperspective, particularly when it comes to labor rights, politicalliberties and climate change.

Another important set of contemporary issues has to do withcompetition. Market coordination typically works through a process inwhich citizens compete with one another for important goods. In theUnited States, for instance, labor market participants compete forjobs that substantially determine who gets access to different levelsof income, and by extension, different levels of health care, policeprotection, consideration in the justice system, and politicalinfluence. As citizens square off against each other, each one strivesto secure important goods for herself, knowing that her activitieswill—if successful—effectively deprive some other citizenof these same goods. In this way, labor market competition requirescitizens to act with an extreme form of disregard for how theiractions affect one another’s basic interests.

Many philosophers believe that the antagonistic structure of marketcompetition is inconsistent with the relational obligation thatmembers of a political community have to care about certain commoninterests. G.A. Cohen (2009, 34–45) articulates the problem interms of a “socialist principle of community” that rulesout social arrangements that require people to view one another simplyas obstacles that must be overcome. Hussain (forthcoming) takes a moremoderate view, arguing that there is a difference between a“friendly competition” and a “life or deathstruggle”. The political relationship allows for a certaindegree of competition among citizens, but it limits how severelyinstitutions can pit citizens against each other when it comes togoods that are part of the common good, e.g., health care, education,and the social bases of self-respect.

11. Social Justice and the Common Good

The concept of the common good is related to social justice, but itgoes beyond the requirements of justice because (1) it describes apattern of inner motivation, not just a pattern of outer conduct, and(2) it may incorporate facilities and interests that are not generalrequirements of justice.

Consider the case of friendship. Friendship is a social relationshipthat requires those who stand in the relationship to think and act inways that embody a particular form of mutual concern. The relevantform of concern incorporates the basic requirements ofmorality—i.e., what Scanlon (1998) calls “the morality ofright and wrong”—as friends must not lie to each other,assault each other, or take unfair advantage of each other. But evenstrangers are required to conform to these basic moral standards. Whatdistinguishes friendship is that the form of mutual concern itinvolves goes beyond basic morality and requires friends to maintaincertain patterns of conduct on the grounds that these patterns servecertain common interests.

Members of a political community stand in a social relationship, andthis relationship also requires them to think and act in ways thatembody a certain form of mutual concern. The common good defines thisform of concern. The common good incorporates certain basicrequirements of social justice, as citizens must provide one anotherwith basic rights and freedoms and they must not exploit each other.But the common good goes beyond the basic requirements of justicebecause it requires citizens to maintain certain patterns of conducton the grounds that these patterns serve certain common interests.

The analogy with friendship should make it clear that the common goodis distinct from, but still closely related to social justice.According to most of the major traditional views, the facilities andinterests that members of a political community have a relationalobligation to care about are partly defined in terms of socialjustice. For instance, Rousseau (1762b), Hegel (1821) and Rawls (1971)all hold that a basic system of private property is both a requirementof justice and an element of the common good.

Another tradition that has emphasized the common good is Catholicsocial thought. Since the Middle Ages, when St. Thomas Aquinasincorporated Aristotle’s account of the common good, the concepthas supported the view that society should promote the conditions ofsocial life that enable individual members and groups to flourish.Building on this idea, the French philosopher Jacques Maritain arguedthat human rights are grounded in natural law but realized through anorientation to the common good. This orientation entails a commitmentto pluralism, universal dignity, and the rights of minorities, whoseideas and interests might otherwise be overlooked (see the entry onJaques Maritain). Similarly, inNatural Law and Natural Rights, Finnis holdsthat respect for human rights is a requirement of justice and that“the maintenance of human rights is a fundamental component ofthe common good” (1980, 218).

12. Conclusion: Pluralism and the Common Good

The prominence of the concept has diminished as social scientists andphilosophers have suggested that a single conception of the commongood is incompatible with the pluralism of modern societies(Mansbridge and Boot 2022). Without a shared theological ormetaphysical foundation, it is challenging to justify moralobligations. In response to this concern, theorists have suggestedthat the common good could be productively conceived as an ideal thatis the subject of deliberation, contestation and critique. From thisperspective, the uncertainty and disagreement about its meaning ispart of an on-going social learning process that unfolds as groupmembers try to interpret and advance the common good (Sluga 2014: 2).Understood in this way, the common good can avoid a totalizingtendency while still playing an important role in challenging theneo-liberal imaginary that has encouraged citizens to take up aprivatized perspective. In a similar vein, Michael Sandel describedthe civic conception of the common good as a process of reflecting oncitizens’ preferences and improving them through deliberationwith fellow citizens. According to Sandel, a civic culture is one thatprovides spaces that cultivate civic virtue and opportunities toreason together about the kind of political community we want tocreate (Sandel 2020: 236).

All of this leaves us with some important questions. Many contemporarysocial issues turn on disagreements about when citizens may take up aprivatized perspective and when they must reason from the standpointof the common good. Social justice is often silent on these issuesbecause people could, in principle, act as justice requires, whetherthey are moved by a scheme of private incentives or by a concern forcommon interests. These social issues are best understood as turningon disagreements about the nature of the political relationship andthe form of mutual concern that it requires. Philosophical reflectionhas an important role to play in shedding light on this relationshipand what it requires of us beyond what we owe to each other as amatter of justice.

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• The Concept of the Common Good, working paper by Maximilian Jaede (University of Edinburgh), at theBritish Academy project.
• The Common Good, Section II of Article 2, from Part Three, Section One, Chapter Two ofCatechism of the Catholic Church, maintained by the Vatican.(Contains an important religious statement about the commongood.)
• Catechism Commentary: The Common Good, post by David Cloutier (Theology, Catholic University of America) atCatholic Moral Theology website.
• Economy for the Common Good, a volunteer organization that advocates a model for a market economyorganized around the idea of the common good.
• The Economy for the Common Good, paper by Christian Felber (Vienna University of Economics andBusiness) and Gus Hagelberg (Coordinator for International Expansionof the Economy for the Common Good), at the Next System Projectwebsite.
• Government And The Common Good, a resolution by the American Federation of Teachers.

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