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John Rawls (1921-2002)
Giant on the Shoulders of Giants
ANDREAS FOLLESDAL *
(Universidade de Oslo)
John Rawls, the most influential political philosopher of the 20th
century, died on Nov. 24, 2002. His book A Theory of Justice from 1971
is the book in political philosophy that has received most attention in
the previous century.
The book A Theory of Justice reset the agenda for ethicists and
political theorists, who soon realised that they must either work within
Rawls’ framework, or argue why they would not. Amazingly, this
complex book also had a massive impact on the intellectual and
political discussions within law, psychology, political science and
economics, across the globe – most recently witnessed by a special
issue of the European Journal of Political Theory tracing his impact
in Europe, published in October 2002. The book made two major
contributions of interest to a broad readership: It presented and
argued for principles for assessing burning political issues of its time,
and it suggested how it is possible to argue and reason about values.
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* Andreas Follesdal (1957) is Professor of practical philosophy at the University
of Oslo, Norway, and at ARENA, a research program on the Europeanisation of the
Nation-State. He has his Ph.D. in political philosophy from Harvard University on
the topic of international justice, with John Rawls as adviser; the last year as a Graduate
Fellow at the Program in Ethics and the Professions.
Follesdal works on domestic and international justice, and democracy and legitimacy
in the European Union.
DIACRÍTICA, FILOSOFIA E CULTURA, n.º 17/2 (2003), 285-290