In Defense of Transcendental Institutionalism

Abstract

What do we want from a theory of justice? Amartya Sen argues that what we should not want is to follow the social contract approach revived by John Rawls, or transcendental institutionalism, in its preoccupation with perfectly just institutions. Sen makes an effective case against approaches, such as G. A. Cohen’s, concerned with transcendent, fact-independent principles of justice, but not against Rawls’ constructivist approach to justice when this is properly interpreted as making a weak transcendental argument. Situating Rawls’ approach within the tradition of the liberalism of freedom provides a basis for interpreting his Kantian constructivism as a form of transcendental institutionalism, and for revealing the affinities between Rawls’ idea of reflective equilibrium and Jürgen Habermas’ method of rational reconstruction. Such a Kantian conception of justice, concerned with constituting relations of equal liberty between free and equal citizens, remains essential for orienting our pursuit of justice.