In The Just State, Richard Dien Winfield has completed his exposition of the immanent logic of ethical life, the earlier parts of which are developed in his books The Just Economy, The Just Family, and Law in Civil Society. The purpose of his exposition is not to discuss isolated or miscellaneous topics pertaining to politics or ethics. Instead, his goal from the beginning has been to show objectively what justice looks like when it is fully embodied in a state's political and social institutions. The just state, as he presents it, is simply the largest possible political framework for maintaining equitable arrangements within a country's already established civil society, a framework that permits civil society to adjust to new contingencies as they arise, be they domestic or international. The purpose of the just state is to preserve, not to tamper with, the political and nonpolitical freedoms of its citizens. The essence of these freedoms is that they are all modes of self-determination, whereby what one does is freely determined by oneself and not by the arbitrary controlling authority of others. An individual whose life is determined by family, by tradition, or by commandment, is unfree. A state whose people are imposed on by a leadership class, or by any authority other than that of the people themselves, is likewise unfree. In order to establish freedom and justice, the citizens of a sovereign state must codetermine their own institutions. In accordance with this purpose, their institutions must be constructed in a particular way, which is the subject of The Just State.