CHAPTER I.

JUSTICE AS FAIRNESS

In this introductory chapter I sketch some of the main ideas of the

theory of justice I wish to develop. The exposition is informal and
intended to prepare the way for the more detailed arguments that
follow. Unavoidably there is some overlap between this and later
discussions. I begin by describing the role of justice in social coop-
eration and with a brief account of the primary subject of justice,
the basic structure of society. I then present the main idea of justice
as fairness, a theory of justice that generalizes and carries to a higher
level of abstraction the traditional conception of the social contract.
The compact of society is replaced by an initial situation that in-
corporates certain procedural constraints on arguments designed to
lead to an original agreement on principles of justice. I also take up,
for purposes of clarification and contrast, the classical utilitarian and
intuitionist conceptions of justice and consider some of the differ-
ences between these views and justice as fairness. My guiding aim is
to work out a theory of justice that is a viable alternative to these
doctrines which have long dominated our philosophical tradition.

1. THE ROLE OF JUSTICE

Justice is the first virtue of social institutions, as truth is of systems of
thought. A theory however elegant and economical must be rejected
or revised if it is untrue; likewise laws and institutions no matter how
efficient and well-arranged must be reformed or abolished if they
are unjust. Each person possesses an inviolability founded on justice
that even the welfare of society as a whole cannot override. For this
reason justice denies that the loss of freedom for some is made right

3
 Justice as Fairness

by a greater good shared by others. It does not allow that the sacri-
fices imposed on a few are outweighed by the larger sum of advan-
tages enjoyed by many. Therefore in a just society the liberties of
equal citizenship are taken as settled; the rights secured by justice are
not subject to political bargaining or to the calculus of social in-
terests. The only thing that permits us to acquiesce in an erroneous
theory is the lack of a better one; analogously, an injustice is tolerable
only when it is necessary to avoid an even greater injustice. Being
first virtues of human activities, truth and justice are uncompro-
mising.
These propositions seem to express our intuitive conviction of the
primacy of justice. No doubt they are expressed too strongly. In any
event I wish to inquire whether these contentions or others similar
to them are sound, and if so how they can be accounted for. To this
end it is necessary to work out a theory of justice in the light of which
these assertions can be interpreted and assessed. I shall begin by con-
sidering the role of the principles of justice. Let us assume, to fix
ideas, that a society is a more or less self-sufficient association of
persons who in their relations to one another recognize certain rules
of conduct as binding and who for the most part act in accordance
with them. Suppose further that these rules specify a system of co-
operation designed to advance the good of those taking part in it.
Then, although a society is a cooperative venture for mutual advan-
tage, it is typically marked by a conflict as well as by an identity of
interests. There is an identity of interests since social cooperation
makes possible a better life for all than any would have if each were
to live solely by his own efforts. There is a conflict of interests since
persons are not indifferent as to how the greater benefits produced by
their collaboration are distributed, for in order to pursue their ends
they each prefer a larger to a lesser share. A set of principles is re-
quired for choosing among the various social arrangements which
determine this division of advantages and for underwriting an agree-
ment on the proper distributive shares. These principles are the
principles of social justice: they provide a way of assigning rights
and duties in the basic institutions of society and they define the
appropriate distribution of the benefits and burdens of social co-
operation.
Now let us say that a society is well-ordered when it is not only

4
 1. The Role of Justice

designed to advance the good of its members but when it is also

effectively regulated by a public conception of justice. That is, it is
a society in which (1) everyone accepts and knows that the others
accept the same principles of justice, and (2) the basic social insti-
tutions generally satisfy and are generally known to satisfy these
principles. In this case while men may put forth excessive demands
on one another, they nevertheless acknowledge a common point of
view from which their claims may be adjudicated. If men's inclina-
tion to self-interest makes their vigilance against one another neces-
sary, their public sense of justice makes their secure association to-
gether possible. Among individuals with disparate aims and purposes
a shared conception of justice establishes the bonds of civic friend-
ship; the general desire for justice limits the pursuit of other ends.
One may think of a public conception of justice as constituting the
fundamental charter of a well-ordered human association.
Existing societies are of course seldom well-ordered in this sense,
for what is just and unjust is usually in dispute. Men disagree about
which principles should define the basic terms of their association.
Yet we may still say, despite this disagreement, that they each have
a conception of justice. That is, they understand the need for, and
they are prepared to affirm, a characteristic set of principles for
assigning basic rights and duties and for determining what they take <

to be the proper distribution of the benefits and burdens of social

cooperation. Thus it seems natural to think of the concept of justice
as distinct from the various conceptions of justice and as being
specified by the role which these different sets of principles, these
different conceptions, have in common. 1 Those who hold different
conceptions of justice can, then, still agree that institutions are just
when no arbitrary distinctions are made between persons in the
assign;'lg of basic rights and duties and when the rules determine a
proper balance between competing claims to the advantages of social
life. Men can agree to this description of just institutions since the
notions of an arbitrary distinction and of a proper balance, which
are included in the concept of justice, are left open for each to
interpret according to the principles of justice that he accepts. These
principles single out which similarities and differences among per-
l. Here I follow H. L. A. Hart, The Concept of Law (Oxford, The Clarendon
Press, 1961), pp. 155-159.

5
 Justice as Fairness

sons are relevant in determining rights and duties and they specify
which division of advantages is appropriate. Clearly this distinction
between the concept and the various conceptions of justice settles no
important questions. It simply helps to identify the role of the prin-
ciples of social justice.
Some measure of agreement in conceptions of justice is, however,
not the only prerequisite for a viable human community. There are
other fundamental social problems, in particular those of coordina-
tion, efficiency, and stability. Thus the plans of individuals need to
be fitted together so that their activities are compatible with one
another and they can all be carried through without anyone's legiti-
mate expectations being severely disappointed. Moreover, the ex-
ecution of these plans should lead to the achievement of social ends
in ways that are efficient and consistent with justice. And finally, the
scheme of social cooperation must be stable: it must be more or less
regularly complied with and its basic rules willingly acted upon; and
when infractions occur, stabilizing forces should exist that prevent
further violations and tend to restore the arrangement. Now it is
evident that these three problems are connected with that of justice.
In the absence of a certain measure of agreement on what is just and
unjust, it is clearly more difficult for individuals to coordinate their
plans efficiently in order to insure that mutually beneficial arrange-
ments are maintained. Distrust and resentment corrode the ties of
civility, and suspicion and hostility tempt men to act in ways they
would otherwise avoid. So while the distinctive role of conceptions
of justice is to specify basic rights and duties and to determine the
appropriate distributive shares, the way in which a conception does
this is bound to affect the problems of efficiency, coordination, and
stability. We cannot, in general, assess a conception of justice by its
distributive role alone, however useful this role may be in identifying
the concept of justice. We must take into account its wider connec-
tions; for even though justice has a certain priority, being the most
important virtue of institutions, it is still true that, other things equal,
one conception of justice is preferable to another when its broader
consequences are more desirable.

6
 2. The Subject of Justice

2. THE SUBJECT OF JUSTICE

Many different kinds of things are said to be just and unjust: not
only laws, institutions, and social systems, but also particular actions
of many kinds, including decisions, judgments, and imputations. We
also call the attitudes and dispositions of persons, and persons them-
selves, just and unjust. Our topic, however, is that of social justice.
For us the primary subject of justice is the basic structure of society,
or more exactly, the way in which the major social institutions dis-
tribute fundamental rights and duties and determine the division of
advantages from social cooperation. By major institutions I under-
stand the political constitution and the principal economic and social
arrangements. Thus the legal protection of freedom of thought and
liberty of conscience, competitive markets, private property in the
means of production, and the monogamous family are examples of
major social institutions. Taken together as one scheme, the major
institutions define men's rights and duties and influence their life-
prospects, what they can expect to be and how well they can hope
to do. The basic structure is the primary subject of justice because
its effects are so profound and present from the start. The intuitive
notion here is that this structure contains various social positions
and that men born into different positions have different expectations
of life determined, in part, by the political system as well as by
economic and social circumstances. In this way the institutions of
society favor certain starting places over others. These are especially
deep inequalities. Not only are they pervasive, but they affect men's
initial chances in life; yet they cannot possibly be justified by an
appeal to the notions of merit or desert. It is these inequalities, pre-
sumably inevitable in the basic structure of any society, to which
the principles of social justice must in the first instance apply. These
principles, then, regulate the choice of a political constitution and
the main elements of the economic and social system. The justice
of a social scheme depends essentially on how fundamental rights
and duties are assigned and on the economic opportunities and social
conditions in the various sectors of society.
The scope of our inquiry is limited in two ways. First of all, I am
concerned with a special case of the problem of justice. I shall not
consider the justice of institutions and social practices generally, nor

7
 Justice as Fairness

except in passing the justice of the law of nations and of relations

between states (§ 58). Therefore, if one supposes that the concept
of justice applies whenever there is an allotment of something ra-
tionally regarded as advantageous or disadvantageous, then we are
interested in only one instance of its application. There is no reason
to suppose ahead of time that the principles satisfactory for the basic
structure hold for all cases. These principles may not work for the
rules and practices of private associations or for those of less compre-
hensive social groups. They may be irrelevant for the various in-
formal conventions and customs of everyday life; they may not
elucidate the justice, or perhaps better, the fairness of voluntary
cooperative arrangements or procedures for making contractual
agreements. The conditions for the law of nations may require differ-
ent principles arrived at in a somewhat different way. I shall be
satisfied if it is possible to formulate a reasonable conception of
justice for the basic structure of society conceived for the time being
as a closed system isolated from other societies. The significance of
this special case is obvious and needs no explanation. It is natural to
conjecture that once we have a sound theory for this case, the remain-
ing problems of justice will prove more tractable in the light of it.
With suitable modifications such a theory should provide the key for
some of these other questions.
The other limitation on our discussion is that for the most part I
examine the principles of justice that would regulate a well-ordered
society. Everyone is presumed to act justly and to do his part in up-
holding just institutions. Though justice may be, as Hume remarked,
the cautious, jealous virtue, we can still ask what a perfectly just
society would be like. 2 Thus I consider primarily what I call strict
compliance as opposed to partial compliance theory (§ § 25, 39).
The latter studies the principles that govern how we are to deal with
injustice. It comprises such topics as the theory of punishment, the
doctrine of just war, and the justification of the various ways of
opposing unjust regimes, ranging from civil disobedience and mili-
tant resistance to revolution and rebellion. Also included here are
questions of compensatory justice and of weighing one form of insti-
tutional injustice against another. Obviously the problems of partial
2. An Enquiry Concerning the Principles of Morals, sec. III, pte I, par. 3, ed.
L. A. Selby-Bigge, 2nd edition (Oxford, 1902), p. 184.

8
 2. The Subject of Justice

compliance theory are the pressing and urgent matters. These are
the things that we are faced with in everyday life. The reason for
beginning with ideal theory is that it provides, I believe, the only
basis for the systematic grasp of these more pressing problems. The
discussion of civil disobedience, for example, depends upon it
(§§ 55-59). At least, I shall assume that a deeper understanding
can be gained in no other way, and that the nature and aims of a
perfectly just society is the fundamental part of the theory of justice.
Now admittedly the concept of the basic structure is somewhat
vague. It is not always clear which institutions or features thereof
should be included. But it would be premature to worry about this
matter here. I shall proceed by discussing principles which do apply
to what is certainly a part of the basic structure as intuitively under-
stood; I shall then try to extend the application of these principles so
that they cover what would appear to be the main elements of this
structure. Perhaps these principles will turn out to be perfectly
general, although this is unlikely. It is sufficient that they apply to
the most important cases of social justice. The point to keep in mind
is that a conception of justice for the basic structure is worth having
for its own sake. It should not be dismissed because its principles are
not everywhere satisfactory.
A conception of social justice, then, is to be regarded as providing
in the first instance a standard whereby the distributive aspects of the
basic structure of society are to be assessed. This standard, however,
is not to be confused with the principles defining the other virtues,
for the basic structure, and social arrangements generally, may be
efficient or inefficient, liberal or illiberal, and many other things, as
well as just or unjust. A complete conception defining principles for
all the virtues of the basic structure, together with their respective
weights when they conflict, is more than a conception of justice; it is
a social ideal. The principles of justice are but a part, although per-
haps the most important part, of such a conception. A social ideal in
turn is connected with a conception of society, a vision of the way in
which the aims and purposes of social cooperation are to be under-
stood. The various conceptions of justice are the outgrowth of differ-
ent notions of society against the background of opposing views of
the natural necessities and opportunities of human life. Fully to un-
derstand a conception of justice we must make explicit the concep-

9
 Justice as Fairness

tion of social cooperation from which it derives. But in doing this we

should not lose sight of the special role of the principles of justice or
of the primary subject to which they apply.
In these preliminary remarks I have distinguished the concept
of justice as meaning a proper balance between competing claims
from a conception of justice as a set of related principles for identify-
ing the relevant considerations which determine this balance. I
have also characterized justice as but one part of a social ideal, al-
though the theory I shall propose no doubt extends its everyday
sense. This theory is not offered as a description of ordinary meanings
but as an account of certain distributive principles for the basic
structure of society. I assume that any reasonably complete ethical
theory must include principles for this fundamental problem and
that these principles, whatever they are, constitute its doctrine of
justice. The concept of justice I take to be defined, then, by the role
of its principles in assigning rights and duties and in defining the
appropriate division of social advantages. A conception of justice is
an interpretation of this role.
Now this approach may not seem to tally with tradition. I believe,
though, that it does. The more specific sense that Aristotle gives to
justice, and from which the most familiar formulations derive, is that
of refraining from pleonexia, that is, from gaining some advantage
for oneself by seizing what belongs to another, his property, his re-
ward, his office, and the like, or by denying a person that which is
due to him, the fulfillment of a promise, the repayment of a debt,
the showing of proper respect, and so on. 3 It is evident that this
definition is framed to apply to actions, and persons are thought to
be just insofar as they have, as one of the permanent elements of
their character, a steady and effective desire to act justly. Aristotle's
definition clearly presupposes, however, an account of what properly
belongs to a person and of what is due to him. Now such entitlements
are, I believe, very often derived from social institutions and the
legitimate expectations to which they give rise. There is no reason to
3. Nicomachean Ethics, 1129b-1130b5. I have followed the interpretation of
Gregory Vlastos, "Justice and Happiness in The Republic," in Plato: A Collection
of Critical Essays, edited by Vlastos (Garden City, N.Y., Doubleday and Company,
1971), vol. 2, pp. 70f. For a discussion of Aristotle on justice, see W. F. R. Hardie,
Aristotle's Ethical Theory (Oxford, The Clarendon Press, 1968), ch. X.

10
 3. Main Idea of the Theory

think that Aristotle would disagree with this, and certainly he has a
conception of social justice to account for these claims. The definition
I adopt is designed to apply directly to the most important case, the
justice of the basic structure. There is no conflict with the traditional
notion.

3. THE MAIN IDEA OF THE THEORY OF JUSTICE

My aim is to present a conception of justice which generalizes and
carries to a higher level of abstraction the familiar theory of the
social contract as found, say, in Locke, Rousseau, and Kant. 4 In
order to do this we are not to think of the original contract as one to
enter a particular society or to set up a particular form of govern-
ment. Rather, the guiding idea is that the principles of justice for the
basic structure of society are the object of the original agreement.
They are the principles that free and rational persons concerned to
further their own interests would accept in an initial position of
equality as defining the fundamental terms of their association. These
principles are to regulate all further agreements; they specify the
kinds of social cooperation that can be entered into and the forms
of government that can be established. This way of regarding the
principles of justice I shall call justice as fairness.
Thus we are to imagine that those who engage in social coopera-
tion choose together, in one joint act, the principles which are to
assign basic rights and duties and to determine the division of social
benefits. Men are to decide in advance how they are to regulate
their claims against one another and what is to be the foundation
charter of their society. Just as each person must decide by rational
reflection what constitutes his good, that is, the system of ends which
4. As the text suggests, I shall regard Locke's Second Treatise of Government,
Rousseau's The Social Contract, and Kant's ethical works beginning with The
Foundations of the Metaphysics of Morals as definitive of the contract tradition.
For all of its greatness, Hobbes's Leviathan raises special problems. A general
historical survey is provided by J. W. Gough, The Social Contract, 2nd ed. (Oxford,
The Clarendon Press, 1957), and Otto Gierke, Natural Law and the Theory 0/
Society, trans. with an introduction by Ernest Barker (Cambridge, The University
Press, 1934). A presentation of the contract view as primarily an ethical theory is
to be found in G. R. Grice, The Grounds of Moral Judgment (Cambridge, The
University Press, 1967). See also § 19, note 30.

11
 Justice as Fairness

it is rational for him to pursue, so a group of persons must decide

once and for all what is to count among them as just and unjust. The
choice which rational men would make in this hypothetical situation
of equal liberty, assuming for the present that this choice problem
has a solution, determines the principles of justice.
In justice as fairness the original position of equality corresponds
to the state of nature in the traditional theory of the social contract.
This original position is not, of course, thought of as an actual his-
torical state of affairs, much less as a primitive condition of culture.
It is understood as a purely hypothetical situation characterized so
as to lead to a certain conception of justice. 5 Among the essential
features of this situation is that no one knows his place in society,
his class position or social status, nor does anyone know his fortune
in the distribution of natural assets and abilities, his intelligence,
strength, and the like. I shall even assume that the parties do not
know their conceptions of the good or their special psychological
propensities. The principles of justice are chosen behind a veil of
ignorance. This ensures that no one is advantaged or disadvantaged
in the choice of principles by the outcome of natural chance or the
contingency of social circumstances. Since all are similarly situated
and no one is able to design principles to favor his particular condi-
tion, the principles of justice are the result of a fair agreement or
bargain. For given the circumstances of the original position, the
symmetry of everyone's relations to each other, this initial situation
is fair between individuals as moral persons, that is, as rational be-
ings with their own ends and capable, I shall assume, of a sense of
justice. The original position is, one might say, the appropriate initial
status quo, and thus the fundamental agreements reached in it are
fair. This explains the propriety of the name "justice as fairness": it
conveys the idea that the principles of justice are agreed to in an
initial situation that is fair. The name does not mean that the con-
5. Kant is clear that the original agreement is hypothetical. See The Meta-
physics of Morals, pt. I (Rechtslehre), especially §§ 47, 52; and pte II of the essay
"Concerning the Common Saying: This May Be True in Theory but It Does Not
Apply in Practice," in Kant's Political Writings, ed. Hans Reiss and trans. by H. B.
Nisbet (Cambridge, The University Press, 1970), pp. 73-87. See Georges Vlachos,
La Pensee pOlitique de Kant (Paris, Presses Universitaires de France, 1962), pp.
326-335; and J. G. Murphy, Kant: The Philosophy of Right (London, Macmillan,
1970), pp. 109-112, 133--136, for a further discussion.

12
 3. Main Idea of the Theory

cepts of justice and fairness are the same, any more than the phrase
"poetry as metaphor" means that the concepts of poetry and meta-
phor are the same.
Justice as fairness begins, as I have said, with one of the most
general of all choices which persons might make together, namely,
with the choice of the first principles of a conception of justice which
is to regulate all subsequent criticism and reform of institutions.
Then, having chosen a conception of justice, we can suppose that
they are to choose a constitution and a legislature to enact laws, and
so on, all in accordance with the principles of justice initially agreed
upon. Our social situation is just if it is such that by this sequence of
hypothetical agreements we would have contracted into the general
system of rules which defines it. Moreover, assuming that the original
position does determine a set of principles (that is, that a particular
conception of justice would be chosen), it will then be true that
whenever social institutions satisfy these principles those engaged in
them can say to one another that they are cooperating on terms to
which they would agree if they were free and equal persons whose
relations with respect to one another were fair. They could all view
their arrangements as meeting the stipulations which they would
acknowledge in an initial situation that embodies widely accepted
and reasonable constraints on the choice of principles. The general
recognition of this fact would provide the basis for a public accept-
ance of the corresponding principles of justice. No society can, of
course, be a scheme of cooperation which men enter voluntarily in a
literal sense; each person finds himself placed at birth in some par-
ticular position in some particular society, and the nature of this
position materially affects his life prospects. Yet a society satisfying
the principles of justice as fairness comes as close as a society can to
being a voluntary scheme, for it meets the principles which free and
equal persons would assent to under circumstances that are fair. In
this sense its members are autonomous and the obligations they
recognize self-imposed.
One feature of justice as fairness is to think of the parties in the
initial situation as rational and mutually disinterested. This does not
mean that the parties are egoists, that is, individuals with only cer-
tain kinds of interests, say in wealth, prestige, and domination. But
they are conceived as not taking an interest in one another's interests.

13
 Justice as Fairness

They are to presume that even their spiritual aims may be opposed,
in the way that the aims of those of different religions may be op-
posed. Moreover, the concept of rationality must be interpreted as
far as possible in the narrow sense, standard in economic theory, of
taking the most effective means to given ends. I shall modify this
concept to some extent, as explained later (§ 25), but one must try
to avoid introducing into it any controversial ethical elements. The
initial situation must be characterized by stipulations that are widely
accepted.
In working out the conception of justice as fairness one main task
clearly is to determine which principles of justice would be chosen
in the original position. To do this we must describe this situation
in some detail and formulate with care the problem of choice which
it presents. These matters I shall take up in the immediately succeed-
ing chapters. It may be observed, however, that once the principles
of justice are thought of as arising from an original agreement in a
situation of equality, it is an open question whether the principle of
utility would be acknowledged. Offhand it hardly seems likely that
persons who view themselves as equals, entitled to press their claims
upon one another, would agree to a principle which may require
lesser life prospects for some simply for the sake of a greater sum
of advantages enjoyed by others. Since each desires to protect his
interests, his capacity to advance his conception of the good, no one
has a reason to acquiesce in an enduring loss for himself in order to
bring about a greater net balance of satisfaction. In the absence of
strong and lasting benevolent impulses, a rational man would not
accept a basic structure merely because it maximized the algebraic
sum of advantages irrespective of its permanent effects on his own
basic rights and interests. Thus it seems that the principle of utility
is incompatible with the conception of social cooperation among
equals for mutual advantage. It appears to be inconsistent with the
idea of reciprocity implicit in the notion of a well-ordered society.
Or, at any rate, so I shall argue.
I shall maintain instead that the persons in the initial situation
would choose two rather different principles: the first requires
equality in the assignment of basic rights and duties, while the second
holds that social and economic inequalities, for example inequalities
of wealth and authority, are just only if they result in compensating

14
 3. Main Idea of the Theory

benefits for everyone, and in particular for the least advantaged

members of society. These principles rule out justifying institutions
on the grounds that the hardships of some are offset by a greater
good in the aggregate. It may be expedient but it is not just that some
should have less in order that others may prosper. But there is no
injustice in the greater benefits earned by a few provided that the
situation of persons not so fortunate is thereby improved. The intui-
tive idea is that since everyone's well-being depends upon a scheme of
cooperation without which no one could have a satisfactory life, the
division of advantages should be such as to draw forth the willing
cooperation of everyone taking part in it, including those less well
situated. Yet this can be expected only if reasonable terms are pro-
posed. The two principles mentioned seem to be a fair agreement on
the basis of which those better endowed, or more fortunate in their
social position, neither of which we can be said to deserve, could
expect the willing cooperation of others when some workable scheme
is a necessary condition of the welfare of all. 6 Once we decide to look
for a conception of justice that nullifies the accidents of natural en-
dowment and the contingencies of social circumstance as counters
in quest for political and economic advantage, we are led to these
principles. They express the result of leaving aside those aspects of
the social world that seem arbitrary from a moral point of view.
The problem of the choice of principles, however, is extremely
difficult. I do not expect the answer I shall suggest to be convincing
to everyone. It is, therefore, worth noting from the outset that justice
as fairness, like other contract views, consists of two parts: (1) an
interpretation of the initial situation and of the problem of choice
posed there, and (2) a set of principles which, it is argued, would
be agreed to. One may accept the first part of the theory (or some
variant thereof), but not the other, and conversely. The concept of
the initial contractual situation may seem reasonable although the
particular principles proposed are rejected. To be sure, I want to
maintain that the most appropriate conception of this situation does
lead to principles of justice contrary to utilitarianism and perfec-
tionism, and therefore that the contract doctrine provides an alterna-
tive to these views. Still, one may dispute this contention even though
6. For the formulation of this intuitive idea I am indebted to Allan Gibbard.

15
 Justice as Fairness

one grants that the contractarian method is a useful way of studying

ethical theories and of setting forth their underlying assumptions.
Justice as fairness is an example of what I have called a contract
theory. Now there may be an objection to the term "contract" and
related expressions, but I think it will serve reasonably well. Many
words have misleading connotations which at first are likely to
confuse. The terms "utility" and "utilitarianism" are surely no ex-
ception. They too have unfortunate suggestions which hostile critics
have been willing to exploit; yet they are clear enough for those
prepared to study utilitarian doctrine. The same should be true of
the term "contract" applied to moral theories. As I have mentioned,
to understand it one has to keep in mind that it implies a certain
level of abstraction. In particular, the content of the relevant agree-
ment is not to enter a given society or to adopt a given form of
government, but to accept certain moral principles. Moreover, the
undertakings referred to are purely hypothetical: a contract view
holds that certain principles would be accepted in a well-defined
initial situation.
The merit of the contract terminology is that it conveys the idea
that principles of justice may be conceived as principles that would
be chosen by rational persons, and that in this way conceptions of
justice may be explained and justified. The theory of justice is a
part, perhaps the most significant part, of the theory of rational
choice. Furthermore, principles of justice deal with conflicting
claims upon the advantages won by social cooperation; they apply
to the relations among several persons or groups. The word "contract"
suggests this plurality as well as the condition that the appropriate
division of advantages must be in accordance with principles ac-
ceptable to all parties. The condition of publicity for principles of
justice is also connoted by the contract phraseology. Thus, if these
principles are the outcome of an agreement, citizens have a knowl-
edge of the principles that others follow. It is characteristic of con-
tract theories to stress the public nature of political principles. Finally
there is the long tradition of the contract doctrine. Expressing the tie
with this line of thought helps to define ideas and accords with
natural piety. There are then several advantages in the use of the
term "contract." With due precautions taken, it should not be mis-
leading.

16
 4. The Original Position

A final remark. Justice as fairness is not a complete contract

theory. For it is clear that the contractarian idea can be extended
to the choice of more or less an entire ethical system, that is, to a
system including principles for all the virtues and not only for justice.
Now for the most part I shall consider only principles of justice and
others closely related to them; I make no attempt to discuss the
virtues in a systematic way. Obviously if justice as fairness succeeds
reasonably well, a next step would be to study the more general
view suggested by the name "rightness as fairness." But even this
wider theory fails to embrace all moral relationships, since it would
seem to include only our relations with other persons and to leave
out of account how we are to conduct ourselves toward animals and
the rest of nature. I do not contend that the contract notion offers
a way to approach these questions which are certainly of the first
importance; and I shall have to put them aside. We must recognize
the limited scope of justice as fairness and of the general type of
view that it exemplifies. How far its conclusions must be revised
once these other matters are understood cannot be decided in ad-
vance.

4. THE ORIGINAL POSITION AND JUSTIFICATION

I have said that the original position is the appropriate initial status
quo which insures that the fundamental agreements reached in it are
fair. This fact yields the name "justice as fairness." It is clear, then,
that I want to say that one conception of justice is more reasonable
than another, or justifiable with respect to it, if rational persons in
the initial situation would choose its principles over those of the
other for the role of justice. Conceptions of justice are to be ranked
by their acceptability to persons so circumstanced. Understood in
this way the question of justification is settled by working out a prob-
lem of deliberation: we have to ascertain which principles it would
be rational to adopt given the contractual situation. This connects
the theory of justice with the theory of rational choice.
If this view of the problem of justification is to succeed, we must,
of course, describe in some detail the nature of this choice problem.
A problem of rational decision has a definite answer only if we know

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 Justice as Fairness

the beliefs and interests of the parties, their relations with respect to
one another, the alternatives between which they are to choose, the
procedure whereby they make up their minds, and so on. As the
circumstances are presented in different ways, correspondingly differ-
ent principles are accepted. The concept of the original position, as I
shall refer to it, is that of the most philosophically favored interpre-
tation of this initial choice situation for the purposes of a theory of
justice.
But how are we to decide what is the most favored interpretation?
I assume, for one thing, that there is a broad measure of agreement
that principles of justice should be chosen under certain conditions.
To justify a particular description of the initial situation one shows
that it incorporates these commonly shared presumptions. One
argues from widely accepted but weak premises to more specific
conclusions. Each of the presumptions should by itself be natural and
plausible; some of them may seem innocuous or even trivial. The
aim of the contract approach is to establish that taken together they
impose significant bounds on acceptable principles of justice. The
ideal outcome would be that these conditions determine a unique
set of principles; but I shall be satisfied if they suffice to rank the
main traditional conceptions of social justice.
One should not be misled, then, by the somewhat unusual con-
ditions which characterize the original position. The idea here is
simply to make vivid to ourselves the restrictions that it seems
reasonable to impose on arguments for principles of justice, and
therefore on these principles themselves. Thus it seems reasonable
and generally acceptable that no one should be advantaged or disad-
vantaged by natural fortune or social circumstances in the choice of
principles. It also seems widely agreed that it should be impossible to
tailor principles to the circumstances of one's own case. We should
insure further that particular inclinations and aspirations, and per-
sons' conceptions of their good do not affect the principles adopted.
The aim is to rule out those principles that it would be rational to
propose for acceptance, however little the chance of success, only
if one knew certain things that are irrelevant from the standpoint of
justice. For example, if a man knew that he was wealthy, he might
find it rational to advance the principle that various taxes for wel-

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 4. The Original Position

fare measures be counted unjust; if he knew that he was poor, he

would most likely propose the contrary principle. To represent the
desired restrictions one imagines a situation in which everyone is
deprived of this sort of information. One excludes the knowledge of
those contingencies which sets men at odds and allows them to be
guided by their prejudices. In this manner the veil of ignorance is
arrived at in a natural way. This concept should cause no difficulty
if we keep in mind the constraints on arguments that it is meant to
express. At any time we can enter the original position, so to speak,
simply by following a certain procedure, namely, by arguing for
principles of justice in accordance with these restrictions.
It seems reasonable to suppose that the parties in the original
position are equal. That is, all have the same rights in the procedure
for choosing principles; each can make proposals, submit reasons
for their acceptance, and so on. Obviously the purpose of these con-
ditions is to represent equality between human beings as moral per-
sons, as creatures having a conception of their good and capable of
a sense of justice. The basis of equality is taken to be similarity in
these two respects. Systems of ends are not ranked in value; and each
man is presumed to have the requisite ability to understand and to
act upon whatever principles are adopted. Together with the veil of
ignorance, these conditions define the principles of justice as those
which rational persons concerned to advance their interests would
consent to as equals when none are known to be advantaged or dis-
advantaged by social and natural contingencies.
There is, however, another side to justifying a particular descrip-
tion of the original position. This is to see if the principles which
would be chosen match our considered convictions of justice or ex-
tend them in an acceptable way. We can note whether applying
these principles would lead us to make the same judgments about
the basic structure of society which we now make intuitively and in
which we have the greatest confidence; or whether, in cases where
our present judgments are in doubt and given with hesitation, these
principles offer a resolution which we can affirm on reflection. There
are questions which we feel sure must be answered in a certain way.
For example, we are confident that religious intolerance and racial
discrimination are unjust. We think that we have examined these

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