ABSTRACT
This chapter introduces the development and defense of basic principles of civil association—norms of social justice, in effect—capable of resolving the problem of pluralism and reconciling the apparent tension between the justice and normalcy functions of law. Social justice is concerned with the norms that control the basic structure of society and dictate how social goods are to be distributed throughout the population. Discussions of the nature and significance of social justice within the American academy have been both inspired and influenced for well over 50 years by John Rawls's monumental contributions to political thought and by his justly famous notion of justice as fairness. Because the norm systems defined a culture that ranged over moral, economic, and political aspects of the community, the legal system became infused with the moral, economic, and political norms of the community. The political culture of the state is fixed by the concerns of social justice.
