Humanities Core: Winter 2007

Rawls and Beitz study questions

Rawls (Note: don’t worry about the confusing title of this selection, and skip the first paragraph).

p. 145—In looking beyond a single society, what do parties to the original position represent?

p. 145-6—What are the principles the parties would choose (aside from the general idea that peoples organized as states are equals). Hint: there are five, including the natural duties.

p. 146—What is the (permissible) aim of war?

p. 146—How should societies think of the “national interest”?

Beitz

p. 148—In what two respects is society not necessarily a scheme of cooperation, from the point of view of justice?

p. 148—When, in general, do principles of distributive justice apply?

p. 149—Does Beitz take Rawls to imagine that societies are engaged in significant trade?

p. 150-1—For Beitz, what conditions must be met before the “traditional rules” apply?

p. 152—What are the “main features of contemporary international interdependence”?

p. 153—List three ways benefits and burdens get distributed in the global economy.

p. 153—How does the world economy create political inequalities?

p. 154—What burdens can the global economy create within a society?

p. 154—What is included in the “global regulative structure.”

p. 155—What political and legal institutions shape interdependence?

p. 156—Why should parties to the original position not know that they are “members of a particular national society?

p. 156—Why does the difference principle apply globally?

p. 157—Who are the “subjects” of a global difference principle?

p. 157—Do international obligations derive from the obligations of persons? Yes.