Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- List of Abbreviations for Rawls’s texts
- Introduction
- A
- B
- 14 Barry, Brian
- 15 Basic liberties
- 16 Basic needs, principle of
- 17 Basic structure of society
- 18 Beitz, Charles
- 19 Benevolent absolutism
- 20 Berlin, Isaiah
- 21 Branches of government
- 22 Buchanan, Allen
- 23 Burdened societies
- 24 Burdens of judgment
- C
- D
- E
- F
- G
- H
- I
- J
- K
- L
- M
- N
- O
- P
- R
- S
- T
- U
- W
- Bibliography
- Index
21 - Branches of government
from B
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 05 February 2015
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- List of Abbreviations for Rawls’s texts
- Introduction
- A
- B
- 14 Barry, Brian
- 15 Basic liberties
- 16 Basic needs, principle of
- 17 Basic structure of society
- 18 Beitz, Charles
- 19 Benevolent absolutism
- 20 Berlin, Isaiah
- 21 Branches of government
- 22 Buchanan, Allen
- 23 Burdened societies
- 24 Burdens of judgment
- C
- D
- E
- F
- G
- H
- I
- J
- K
- L
- M
- N
- O
- P
- R
- S
- T
- U
- W
- Bibliography
- Index
Summary
Rawls does not provide a detailed account of the structure of political and economic institutions that would be needed in order to secure stable conditions of justice as fairness. However, his account of the “Background Institutions for Distributive Justice” (TJ §43, 242–251) does provide at least a sketch of the central institutions for governing the economy in a property owning democracy. In delineating a number of distinct “branches of government” Rawls is explicitly following Musgrave’s approach to public inance (Musgrave 1959). It should be stressed that these various “branches” may each involve the activities of a number of distinct government agencies (TJ 243). Each branch is defined functionally (TJ 243–244) and should not be thought of as being equivalent to a traditional government department. While Rawls’s speciication of the branches of government is for a property-owning democracy with private ownership of land and capital, he thinks that a slightly amended scheme could also secure social justice under a liberal socialist regime (TJ 243, 247–249).
The four main branches of government are the (1) allocation, (2) stabilization, (3) transfer, and (4) distribution branches. These four branches, taken together as constituting one integrated scheme, constitute the “supporting institutions” required for achieving pure procedural justice (TJ 243), when operating under a just constitution that secures the equal basic liberties, and together with other institutions needed to secure the fair value of the political liberties and fair equality of opportunity.
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- The Cambridge Rawls Lexicon , pp. 65 - 68Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 2014
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