Social Justice in Europe: An Evaluation of European Regional Policy

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Abstract
WHEN RAWLS FORMULATED HIS VIEWS ON SOCIAL JUSTICE IN the 1950s and 1960s, leading to the publication of ATheory of Justicein 1971, he based his theory on a simple but unconditional assumption, namely, that justice is the first virtue of social institutions. This assumption Rawls considers to be beyond doubt, so much so that in the very first page of his treatise he claims that ‘laws and institutions no matter how efficient and well-arranged must be reformed or abolished if they are unjust’.Largely as a result of Rawls's ATheory of Justice, over the last 25 years questions of social justice have dominated most debates on political theory. And while vast quantities of ink were expended over philosophical discussions on significant but detailed aspects of Rawls's theory, principally on the plausibility of his meta h sical assumptions on individuals and human psychology, it is unfortunate that not enough attention has been paid to Rawls's initial recommendation of adopting normative criteria as a tool for evaluating political institutions.

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