Comprehensive or political liberalism? The impartial spectator and the justification of political principles

Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

Abstract

John Rawls raises three challenges - to which one can add a fourth challenge - to an impartial spectator account: (a) the impartial spectator is a utility-maximizing device that does not take seriously the distinction between persons; (b) the account does not guarantee that the principles of justice will be derived from it; (c) the notion of impartiality in the account is the wrong one, since it does not define impartiality from the standpoint of the litigants themselves; (d) the account would offer a comprehensive, rather than a political, form of liberalism. The narrow aim of the article is to demonstrate that Adam Smith's impartial spectator account can rise to Rawls's challenges. The broader aim is to demonstrate that the impartial spectator account offers the basis for a novel and alternative framework for developing principles of justice, and does so in the context of a political form of liberalism.

Original languageEnglish (US)
Pages (from-to)253-269
Number of pages17
JournalUtilitas
Volume33
Issue number3
Early online dateJan 7 2021
DOIs
StatePublished - Sep 2021

ASJC Scopus subject areas

  • Philosophy
  • Sociology and Political Science

Fingerprint

Dive into the research topics of 'Comprehensive or political liberalism? The impartial spectator and the justification of political principles'. Together they form a unique fingerprint.

Cite this