ABSTRACT
This chapter discusses the general Rawlsian position that the interpretation of justice is linked with public reasoning. It focuses on has to be, in John Rawls's words, on "a public framework of thought" that provides "an account of agreement in judgment among reasonable agents." Implicit beliefs in the sufficiency or the necessity of a transcendental approach for comparative assessment clearly have had a powerful role in the widespread belief that the transcendental approach is crucial for the entire theory of justice. In a model of arbitration there is likely to be some divergence of voices on a number of issues, especially when the perspectives sought come from far and wide. The importance of public reasoning for dealing with global problems of justice is a subject of importance on its own. The demands of objectivity not only require avoiding "personal slant", but also national parochialism. The institutional preconditions would be particularly hard to meet in dealing with, problems of global justice.
