The Law of Peoples: Beyond Incoherence and Apology
| Date | 01 October 2011 |
| DOI | 10.3366/jipt.2011.0014 |
| Author | Pietro Maffettone |
| Published date | 01 October 2011 |
| Subject Matter | Article |
THE LAW OF PEOPLES:
BE YON D INCOHERENCE AND APOLOGY
PIETRO MAFFETTONE
Abstract: The essay provides a reconstruction of Rawls’s The Law of Peoples
that makes sense of three main discontinuities between Rawls’s domestic theory
of justice and his international outlook, namely the absence in the latter of:
a) individualism, b) egalitarianism, and c) structural justice. The essay argues
that while we can make sense of such differences without charging Rawls’s
account of blatant inconsistency, we can nonetheless criticize such an outlook
from an internal perspective. There is a middle way between claiming that no
significant differences are present between A Theory of Justice and The Law
of Peoples and, on the other hand, that the differences between the two are so
large as to make them totally incompatible. Furthermore, to argue in favour of
Rawls’s consistency does not, as many seem to have thought, entail agreeing
with his overall conclusion for justice in international relations. The final part of
the essay illustrates this point by analyzing the case of trade.
Keywords: Distributive justice, interpretation as method, law of peoples, Rawls,
trade
Introduction
In The Law of Peoples (LOP) John Rawls put forward a version of international
justice that is indebted to a classical vision of international law and practice.
Many liberal scholars have disagreed on both the content and the methodology
adopted by Rawls in the LOP. The latter has been accused of being centrally
biased in favor of existing international political structures (Moellendorf 2002).
On the other hand the content of the LOP has been pictured as inherently
inadequate and strongly incoherent with the rest of Rawls’s previouswork (Beitz
2000; Pogge 2005).
Journal of International Political Theory, 7(2) 2011, 190–211
DOI: 10.3366/jipt.2011.0014
© Edinburgh University Press 2011
www.eupjournals.com/jipt
190
The Law of Peoples: Beyond Incoherence and Apology
In the first part of the essay, I will briefly summarize the main tenets of
the LOP. The summary will act as a background to my discussion. Then I
will go on to explain Rawls’s adoption of the LOP in a way that does not
picture him as departing from his initial liberal commitment. I will draw on
Aaron James and his practice-dependent reading of Rawls (James 2005). While
defenses of Rawls’s consistency are not lacking in the debate (Freeman 2007;
Reidy 2007), the main consequence of such defenses is often some form of
endorsement. Eventually, it seems that we are doomed either to think that Rawls
has mysteriously changed his mind about the concept of justice, or, in order
to avoid such view and to save his domestic theory from criticism, to endorse
his international outlook as uncontroversial and consequential from the point of
view of his domestic thought.1
Both alternatives are frankly unattractive. The first (the ‘Rawls has changed
his mind’ view) runs afoul of what Donald Davidson has called interpretive
charity (1984). Our account of Rawls must be coherent enough as to account for
the author’s plausible motivation in constructing a moral theory of international
relations. Attribution of blatant inconsistency is a weak form of critique and
it certainly falls short of thorough understanding of Rawls’s project. The
second view (the ‘nothing has changed’ view) is, on the other hand similarly
flawed. There are at least three strong differences between Rawls’s account
of international and domestic justice. I call them losses. The first is the loss of
individualism, the second is the loss of egalitarianism, and the third is the loss of
structural justice. While such differences must not signify that Rawls is a victim
of inconsistency, at the same time they call for widespread interpretive revision
for what sometimes seems different projects altogether.
In the following I will introduce a mainly methodological reading of Rawls.
My reading will assume that we can make better sense of the idea of continuity
of Rawls’s works if we concentrate on the type of method he uses when
constructing the principles of justice. I will maintain, following James (2005),
that Rawls is constructing justice for existing practices. I will also draw on
Ronald Dworkin’s idea of interpretation (1986) in order to show that moral
interpretation of social practices is a crucial part of Rawls’s project (see
Sangiovanni 2008). Eventually I will show how my reading of Rawls is fruitful
and helps us in making sense of the three losses I identified. Yet my final aim is
not to endorse Rawls’s view. In the last part of the essay, I try to show how the
reading of Rawls I provide is also viable as a starting point for the construction
of arguments that are in sharp disagreement with Rawls’s view.
Rehearsing the Law of Peoples
The Law of Peoples (LOP) provides a remodelling of the ‘social contract’2put
forward by Rawls in A Theory of Justice (TJ) (1971/1999). Rawls’s domestic
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