John Rawls (February 21, 1921 – November 24, 2002) was anAmerican philosopher and a leading figure inmoral andpolitical philosophy. He held theJames Bryant ConantUniversity Professorship atHarvard. Hismagnum opus,A Theory of Justice (1971), is now regarded as "one of the primary texts in political philosophy."[1] His work in political philosophy, dubbed Rawlsianism,[2] takes as its starting point the argument that "most reasonable principles of justice are those everyone would accept and agree to from a fair position."[1] Rawls employs a number ofthought experiments—including the famousveil of ignorance—to determine what constitutes a fair agreement in which "everyone is impartially situated as equals," in order to determine principles of social justice.[1] He is one of the major thinkers in the tradition ofliberal political philosophy.
Major ideas
Justice as Fairness, which consists of the liberty principle, fair equality of opportunity, and the difference principle.
