RAWLS AND THE STATUS OF POLITICAL LIBERTY

Abstract:  In his late work, Rawls makes strong claims about the status of political liberty. These claims, if accepted, would have significant implications for the content of justice as fairness. I discuss the nature of these claims, clarifying Rawls's fair value guarantee of the political liberties and critically discussing the arguments that he and others have given for assigning special importance to the political liberties. I conclude that justice as fairness, properly understood, is not a deeply democratic conception of justice.