On John Rawls - Suggested Reading

Professor Leif Wenar (King's College, London) has updated his entry on John Rawls in "Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy":

"John Rawls"


Excerpt from "Further Reading":

"Beyond the texts by Rawls cited above, readers may wish to consult Rawls's lectures on Hume, Leibniz, Kant, and Hegel (LHMP) and on Hobbes, Locke, Hume, Mill, Marx, Sidgwick, and Butler (LHPP) to see how Rawls's interpretations of these authors informed his own theorizing. Reath, Herman, and Korsgaard (1997) is a collection of essays by Rawls's students on his work in the history of philosophy.

Students wanting a clear guide to A Theory of Justice may wish to read Lovett (2011), or (more advanced) Mandle (2009). Voice (2011) gives an outline-style summary of Rawls's three main books that is accessible to those with some undergraduate philosophical training. Mandle and Reidy (2014) offers an alphabetized list of short entries, from Abortion to Maximin to Wittgenstein, of important concepts, issues, influences and critics.

Freeman (2007) sets out in a single volume the historical development of Rawls's theories, as well as sympathetic elaborations of many of his central arguments. Pogge (2007) is a rigorous examination of Rawls's domestic theories, which also contains a biographical sketch and brief replies to libertarian and communitarian critics (for which see also Pogge (1989)). Maffettone (2011) and Audard (2007) are critical introductions to Rawls's three major works. Moon (2014) offers an original reinterpretation of the Rawlsian project.

Mandle and Reidy (2013) is the most important recent collection of scholarly essays, spanning a wide range of issues arising from Rawls's work. Freeman (2003) is a collection of mostly friendly articles on major themes in Rawls's domestic theories; it also contains an introductory overview of all of Rawls's work. Young (2016) is a selection of more critical articles.

Historically, the most influential volume of essays on justice as fairness has been Daniels (1975). Brooks and Nussbaum (2015) presents incisive recent articles on Rawls's political liberalism. Older collections on political liberalism include Davion and Wolf (1999), Griffin and Solum (1994) and Lloyd (1994). Martin and Reidy (2006) focuses on the law of peoples. Hinton (2015) is a volume of articles by leading scholars on the original position.

Abbey (2013) is an edited volume on feminist interpretations of Rawls's work. Bailey and Gentile (2014) is an important anthology of articles that explore how extensively religious believers can engage in the political life of a Rawlsian society. Fleming (2004) is a symposium on Rawls and the law. O'Neill and Williamson (2012) contains many significant essays on the institutional design of Rawls's preferred polity, the property-owning democracy.

Readers who can gain access (usually through a library) to Kukathas (2003, 4 volumes) or Richardson and Weithman (1999, 5 volumes) will find many of the most important critical articles on Rawls's work, divided according to specific themes (e.g., maximin reasoning, public reason) and types of criticisms (e.g., conservative critiques, feminist critiques). Readers without access to the Richardson and Weithman volumes can follow the links [volume 1, volume 2, volume 3, volume 4, volume 5] to their tables of contents and can then locate the articles desired in their original places of publication."