ABSTRACT
In this chapter, the authors concentrate on contemporary theories of justice, in which private property rights are often regarded as problematic – although one of the several theories discussed is a contemporary restatement and defence of strong private property rights. A theory of justice applies to the basic structure of society. This consists of those institutions fundamentally affecting a person’s life. Included are the structure of the economy – rules of ownership and exchange – and the provision of services such as health and education, as well as constitutional rights. Rawls argues that agents in the original position would choose the democratic conception. He distinguishes a special and a general-conception, which are versions of democratic conception. The creation of a class of rural wage labourers presaged the development of an urban working class with the industrialisation of the eighteenth and (especially) the nineteenth centuries. The risks of starvation were significantly greaterfor the wage labourers than for their earlier counterparts, theserfs.
