In this thesis I explore an alternative formulation of the circumstances of justice. The circumstances of justice are the circumstances that make human cooperation necessary and possible, and because human cooperation is necessary to justice, they make justice both necessary and possible. For constructivists, principles of justice respond to these circumstances. Standard accounts of the circumstances of justice can be found in Hobbes, Hume, and Rawls, and many contemporary theorists rely on these accounts. My dissertation rejects these standard accounts of the circumstances of justice—on the grounds of exclusion and trust—and defends an alternative account. A core idea of my proposed alternative is that the circumstances of justice must be understood in terms of solidarity. A proper understanding of the role of solidarity in an adequate characterization of the circumstances of justice requires a good grasp of the nature of solidarity itself. To that end I offer a novel account of solidarity which I argue improves existing theories of solidarity. In the first part of this project I explain the role and importance of the circumstances of justice. I then offer a full description of solidarity and its normative character. In the second half of the project I offer my new account of the circumstances of justice, including an explanation and examples of how broad the scope of this reformulation is. I conclude the project by applying my new account of the circumstances of justice to the problem of climate change, and ask whether we can now construe the coordination of resources between generations as a problem of justice.

George Klosko attempts to solve a problem put forth by Rawls, namely how to create a persisting, just and stable liberal democracy in light of pluralism. He believes Rawls has failed at this task through the employment of political constructivism. Klosko claims that since Rawls does not utilize actual views within the existing public to form principles of justice, his method would fail to reach an overlapping consensus. As an alternative, Klosko proposes the method of convergence, which utilizes actual societal views to find overlapping concepts that inform the principles of justice. My argument is that Klosko misconstrues the method and aims of political constructivism. Klosko seems to incorrectly believe that stability is primary to establishing a liberal democracy, whereas it is secondary to the achievement of justice. Because of this error, Klosko’s method of convergence potentially has the consequence of creating a society which is stable but unjust.

Made available in DSpace on 2014-08-20T13:17:40Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 1 Ataualpa_Godolphim_Feijo_Dissertacao.pdf: 1157658 bytes, checksum: 39418b95a73eb9413821bfe66409f3e2 (MD5) Previous issue date: 2011-05-09 / Contemporaries democratic societies are deeply distinguished by the diverseness of ethical, phylosophical and religious doctrines so that the principles that govern the basic structure of society must be established in a way this pluralism be respected. John Rawls, in this context, shows his theory of justice as fairness, which proposes a political constructivism for constructing and justify the Equal Liberty and the Fair Equality of Opportunity/Difference principles. So, such principles are not introduced as more fitness for the basic structure because they allude to a prior normative order foregoing the conceptions of person and society, but because they express shared political values that constitute moral facts which, for them part, doesn t need be epistemologically proved in order to be utilized as ground points for the more general principles. Thus, arouse the concept of reasonable as opposed to true, because the idea of reasonableness alludes to an account of justification that doesn t appeal to an autonomous or heteronomous foundational authority. In this manner, this idea becomes an substitute for the idea of truth, which inevitably implies a notion of absolute and foudationalist justification that, according to Rawls, isn t suitable for a theory of justice which intends itself tolerant and freestanding. We must therefore, in order to expose this constructivism in a didactic way, analyse the three procedures which compose it, namely, original position, reflective equilibrium and overlapping consensus. It has evidenced that these procedures work in narrow syntony, so that them propitiate a normative account of objectivity for the principles of justice which can perfectly leave aside the notions of truth and absolute growndwork / As sociedades democráticas contemporâneas são profundamente marcadas pela diversidade de doutrinas éticas, filosóficas e religiosas, de modo que os princípios que regem a estrutura básica da sociedade precisam ser estabelecidos para que este pluralismo seja respeitado. Nesse ínterim, John Rawls apresenta sua teoria da justiça como equidade, a qual propõe um construtivismo político que visa a construção e a justificação dos princípios de Igual Liberdade e Igualdade Equitativa de Oportunidade/Diferença. Assim, tais princípios não são apresentados como sendo os mais adequados - para a estrutura básica social - em vista de remeterem a uma ordem normativa anterior às concepções de pessoa e sociedade, mas, sim, por expressarem valores políticos compartilhados que constituem fatos morais, os quais, por sua vez, não necessitam ser epistemologicamente comprovados a fim de poderem ser utilizados como pontos de ancoramento para os princípios mais gerais. Surge, desta forma, o conceito de razoável (reasonable) como sendo contraposto ao conceito de verdadeiro (true), uma vez que a ideia de razoabilidade remete a uma concepção de justificação que não apela para uma autoridade fundacional de cunho autônomo ou heterônomo. Logo, esta ideia vem a substituir a de verdade, a qual acarreta, inevitavelmente, uma noção de justificação absoluta e fundacionalista, justificação esta que, conforme Rawls, não é adequada para uma teoria da justiça que se pretenda tolerante e autossustentada (freestanding). Desta maneira, a fim de expormos didaticamente este construtivismo, precisamos analisar os três procedimentos que o compõem, a saber, a posição original (original position), o equilíbrio reflexivo (reflective equilibrium) e o consenso sobreposto (overlapping consensus). Constatou-se que esses procedimentos operam em estreita sintonia, de modo que propiciam uma concepção de objetividade normativa para os princípios políticos de justiça - que pode, perfeitamente, prescindir das noções de verdade e de fundamentação absoluta