5 Social Justice: Defending Rawls’ Theory of Justice Against Honneth’s Objections

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2011 37: 95Philosophy Social CriticismMiriam Bankovsky

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Social justice:Defending Rawls’theory of justice againstHonneth’s objections

Miriam BankovskyPolitics Program, La Trobe University, Melbourne, Australia

AbstractThis article argues that Honneth’s ‘plural conception of justice’, founded on a theory ofrecognition, does not succeed in distancing itself from Rawls’ liberal theory of justice. Thearticle develops its argument by evaluating three major objections to Rawls’ liberalism raised byHonneth in his recent articles on justice: namely, first, that the parties responsible for choosingprinciples of justice are too individualistic and their practical reasoning too instrumentalist;second, that by taking as its ‘object-domain’ the negative liberty of persons, Rawls’ theory failsto promote the actual realization of liberty; and finally, that Rawls’ method of principlejustification undermines the ‘priority’ of its Kantian ‘formality’ by presupposing a substantivecommitment to a conception of individual good. Arguing that Honneth’s interpretation ofRawls’ theory contains important errors, the article concludes that both theories share thebasic intention of securing for all citizens the material and institutional conditions for theactualization of otherwise merely formal liberties or, in Honneth’s terms, mutual self-realization.

KeywordsAxel Honneth, justice, liberalism, John Rawls, recognition, redistribution, self-realization

Introduction

Since the publication of The Struggle for Recognition: The Moral Grammar of Social

Conflicts (1995a), Axel Honneth has produced a number of articles dealing with the

implications of his theory for political and social justice.1 Using the framework he had

developed for determining the normative content of claims raised in individual and

Corresponding author:

Miriam Bankovsky, Politics Program, La Trobe University, Melbourne, VIC 3086, Australia.

Email: [email protected]

Philosophy and Social Criticism37(1) 95–118

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social struggle, Honneth now outlines a ‘plural theory of justice’ which he hopes will

break the theoretical deadlock between, on the one hand, formal, Kantian and liberal

theories of justice and, on the other hand, axiological, Hegelian and civic republican

theories of ethical life. Where Kantian theories (like those of John Rawls and Jurgen

Habermas) defend egalitarian norms which hold independently of actors’ commitments

to specific values, and where Hegelian theories (like those of Charles Taylor, Alasdair

MacIntyre and Michael Sandel) seek instead to promote the qualitative conditions of

human flourishing defined within specific communities, Honneth’s plural theory of jus-

tice intends to walk the fine line between the two positions. More precisely, it seeks first

to articulate and then to promote those structural elements of human flourishing which

can be normatively extricated from the plurality of all particular forms of human life

(Honneth, 1995a: 172).

In this article, I propose to focus attention on only one part of Honneth’s intention.

I want to determine whether Honneth succeeds in distancing himself from Rawls’ lib-

eral theory of justice. I undertake this task by presenting and evaluating, in each of

three sections, three major criticisms of Rawls’ liberalism found in Honneth’s recent

articles on justice.

Honneth’s first criticism targets the ‘ideal of the person’ which Rawls’ constructivist

decision procedure incorporates. The liberty of the parties who are responsible for choos-

ing principles of justice is too individualistic and the practical reasoning of these parties

is too instrumentalist (Honneth, 1991: 20–2, 27, 29; Honneth and Anderson, 2005: 127–31,

138, 142–5). Real and effective liberty (or human flourishing) depends, Honneth argues,

on the existence of certain types of self–other relations which support the development of

practical relations-to-self. Consequently, insofar as the realization of individual liberty

depends on instituting supportive self–other relations, the practical reasoning of Rawlsian

parties should not be instrumentalist.

Honneth’s second criticism targets the ‘object-domain’ of Rawls’ theory of justice.

The theory’s object of concern is negative liberty or freedom from external interference

in individual choice (Honneth and Anderson, 2005: 129, 133). Insofar as material and

institutional disadvantage is equivalent to ‘external interference’ in the free choice of the

individual, the theory seeks to protect the individual from such disadvantage. For

Honneth, however, preventing external interference in individual life- projects in no way

guarantees the realization of individual liberty (that is, positive or social liberty) which

remains, for Honneth, the true object-domain of a theory of justice. An appropriate the-

ory would not merely distribute advantages (as does Rawls’ theory) but would also bring

into effect those supportive intersubjective relations on which real and effective freedom

depends (ibid.: 131, 137, 142, 144).

A third criticism targets the ideal Rawls employs in his method of principle justifica-

tion. Justified by reference to their form, principles refer to a formal Kantian ideal of

impartiality or neutrality: they are justified when deemed acceptable by those free and

equal persons who are affected by them. Principles can then be said to apply to all in the

same way, formally maintaining ‘egalitarian right’, hence Rawls’ claim that ‘right’ lim-

its the different substantive conceptions of the good life which may legitimately be pur-

sued. Reversing the justification procedure, Honneth argues that Rawls’ theory cannot

maintain its claim to neutrality because it implicitly requires an anterior commitment

96 Philosophy and Social Criticism 37(1)



to a conception of the good: seeking to guarantee individual liberty, egalitarian right

presupposes an ideal of individual human flourishing (Honneth, 1991: 29–31; Honneth,

2004a: 357). However, by prioritizing right, Rawls’ ideal of human flourishing is too

individualistic (Honneth, 2004b: 389). The theory thus misunderstands its true objec-

tive: instead of securing individual rights to freely pursue a project, a theory of social

justice should critically identify, diagnose and redress those concrete experiences of

injustice which prevent individual human flourishing. Instead of principles justified

by reference to a formal Kantian ideal of impartiality (right), Honneth recommends

principles which amend social pathologies and ensure mutual self-realization (the

good). This, Honneth and Anderson write, ‘is a profoundly different – and largely

unexplored – way of thinking about social justice’ (Honneth and Anderson, 2005:

144; see also Honneth, 2004a: 353).

Honneth’s alternative model promises in this way to focus theoretical attention on

everyday cases of disrespect and humiliation which disable real freedom, cases that

Rawls’ theory might appear to overlook (Honneth, 1997: 323). However, I intend to

show that Honneth’s criticisms of Rawls should not be so easily accepted and that

Honneth’s interpretation of Rawls’ theory contains important errors. To this end, I will

now examine more closely Honneth’s three criticisms of Rawls’ liberalism. Concluding

that Honneth does not succeed in distancing himself from Rawls’ theory, the article will

show, by means of its analyses, that the theories of both thinkers indeed share the basic

intention of securing for all citizens the material and institutional conditions for the

actual exercise of otherwise merely formal rights and liberties or, in Honneth’s terms,

mutual self-realization.2

I The ‘ideal of the person’ in Rawls’ constructivism:individualistic and instrumentalist?

Let us examine, first, Rawls’ ‘ideal of the person’, which Honneth argues misrepre-

sents the autonomy of real persons and fails to appreciate the nature and extent of the

various threats to autonomy. To evaluate Honneth’s objection, we must first under-

stand the role Rawls himself attributes to the ideal of the person in constructivist the-

ory. While certainly implied by A Theory of Justice (1971a),3 the defining features of

this ideal are explicitly clarified only later in ‘Kantian Constructivism in Moral The-

ory’ (1980), in ‘The Independence of Moral Theory’ (1975) and in Political Liberalism

(1993). Honneth’s reconstruction of Rawls’ theory overlooks Rawls’ developed

account of the role of personhood ideals in theory and, consequently, Honneth’s criti-

cisms miss their true target.

In ‘Kantian Constructivism and Moral Theory’ Rawls defines constructivism and the

role it ascribes to personhood ideals. First, constructivism’s ‘real task’ is practical not

epistemological (Rawls, 1980: 306, 341). Unlike moral realist views such as rational

intuitionism, whose first principles are self-evident truths given by the nature of things

and known by rational intuition (ibid.: 344), constructivism frames its first principles to

meet particular social problems, providing a public basis by means of which citizens jus-

tify their institutions to one another (ibid.: 347). Second, constructivism’s method begins

with the standpoint of persons as agents of construction. Whereas the rational intuitionist

Bankovsky 97



method requires quite simply the correct recognition of first principles whose content is

already fixed, constructivism establishes a framework for deliberation which relies on

our own powers of judgement, powers which are not fixed once and for all but are devel-

oped and shaped by a shared public culture (ibid.). Constructivism seeks in this way to

establish a suitable connection between a particular ideal of the person and first princi-

ples of justice using a procedure of construction (ibid.: 304). Moreover, if constructivism

is to generate an appropriate public basis for justification, it must also be coherentist: it

must coincide with those considered moral and non-moral judgements which we are

unlikely to give up, thus clarifying the reason for our refusal to renounce them. Conse-

quently, whereas rational intuitionism implies a sparse notion of the person as one who

cognizes moral truth, constructivism requires a complex ideal of the person as an agent

of construction. Principles result from a construction which expresses conceptions that

citizens have of themselves and of their society.

Now, there are as many constructivisms as ideals of persons. Examining average uti-

litarianism and Hobbes’ contractarianism from the perspective of what Rawls refers to as

the ‘original position’, Rawls concludes that both are compatible with constructivism.4

Both can be said to refer to a particular ideal of the person as part of a contract device,

whose outcome determines the content of justice. Rawls’ Kantian constructivism seeks

the principles on which free and equal moral persons would all agree when fairly repre-

sented as such (Rawls, 1980: 305). The moral person is endowed with two moral facul-

ties – rationality and social cooperativeness – which make justice both necessary and

possible. The capacity for formulating and pursuing a conception of one’s rational

advantage makes justice necessary since it leads persons with different life-plans to

make conflicting claims on the available natural and social resources (Rawls, 1971a:

127/110 rev.). The capacity for formulating and abiding by a conception of justice (or

the Reasonable), makes justice possible, describing a willingness to live by principles

of justice even when their contravention might bring personal advantage.

Rawls’ constructivism thus varies with alternative constructivist views on account of

this personhood ideal. Persons in a ‘Hobbesian’ contract are, according to Rawls, atomistic

and instrumental rational egoists. Hobbesian persons are unlike their Rawlsian counter-

parts in that the former are endowed with the faculty of instrumental rationality alone

whereas the latter are also endowed with the second moral faculty of social cooperative-

ness. I will return to this point when dealing with Honneth’s first objection that the parties

responsible for choosing principles of justice are too individualistic and their practical rea-

soning too instrumentalist. Returning to Hobbes, Rawls suggests that self-, family- and

group-interest is, for Hobbes, the only available political motivation (Rawls, 1971b:

204–5; Rawls, 1987: 422–3). Consequently, Hobbesian partners choose principles of mere

prudence and not of justice. Since cooperative institutions are extremely fragile – persons

might at any moment attempt to secure their own interests at others’ expense – a powerful

sovereign with effective penal machinery is required to guarantee the security of all

(Rawls, 1963: 104; Rawls, 1971a: 240/211 rev.).

It is also by reference to a constructivist procedure that the principle of average uti-

litarianism is defended against its classical version (Rawls, 1971a: § 27–§ 28). Only

when a decision on principles is considered from the perspective of free and equal per-

sons, whose moral relevancy depends, in this case, on their capacity to satisfy desires and




on their willingness to take the same risks, can the average utility principle be favoured

over its classical alternative. Given the choice, such persons would choose to maximize

their individual total utility (the average utility principle), having no interest in total util-

ity sum (the classical utility principle) which ignores the large differences in well-being

which can exist among individuals.

As for the Rawlsian decision procedure, moral persons are represented by contractual

parties who are modelled as free, equal and rational and who are placed in a decision

situation, ‘the original position’, which interprets the idea of a fair agreement. To prevent

parties from choosing only those principles to their individual advantage, a veil of

ignorance models the reasonable – the sense of justice (Rawls, 1971a: § 24). Behind this

veil, parties lack knowledge of those particular facts about their individual situation

which would position them unequally. Parties are unaware of their class, social status,

particular generation and natural abilities. They do not know the nature of their particular

conception of the good, nor are they aware of their individual psychological tendencies.

Representatives of real citizens, parties must choose those principles which citizens

would find acceptable when they finally have full knowledge of the particularities of

their situation.

Are parties characterized by individualistic liberty? Does the veil ofignorance fall ‘too low’?

Honneth objects to the description of the liberty of parties behind the veil of ignorance.

The notion of an autonomous and atomistic individual selecting personal projects in a

purely monological manner is, says Honneth, unrealistic (Honneth, 1991: 20–2, 26–7,

29). The veil of ignorance falls ‘too low’: ‘Rawls insists that the parties in the original

position should not have knowledge of what people in the society are like, except the

most basic features of their instrumental rationality’ (Honneth and Anderson, 2005:

140–1). However, if principles are to be adequate to the needs of real persons, parties

need to know that they cannot actually realize their liberty without the support of others

(ibid.: 127–31, 138, 142–5).

In Honneth’s own theory, real and effective freedom depends on developing certain

practical relations to self, relations which themselves depend on the validation of one’s

capacities by one’s peers. Drawing on the distinction that Hegel makes within Objective

Spirit between the family, the state and civil society, Honneth abstracts three practical

relations to self (each with their mode of intersubjective validation) from the social

life-world of modern societies. The first is self-confidence or the ability to trust in one’s

own feelings and desires, insofar as these are validated by the solicitude of others (in the

intimate, affective relations of love and friendship). The second is self-respect or the

belief that one has an authority equal with others to make claims and demands, insofar

as this authority is validated by others (who mutually accord each other egalitarian

rights). The third is social esteem, social achievement, or the feeling of belonging,

insofar as this feeling is validated by others (in relations of solidarity) (Honneth and

Anderson, 2005: 127–31, 138, 142–5).

For Honneth, the concept of ‘justice’ has ‘plural’ meanings: moral claims can be

raised in all three spheres of intersubjective relation (affective, reciprocal, or

Bankovsky 99



cooperative). ‘The content of what we call ‘just’ is here to be measured according to the

respective kind of social relationship that subjects maintain with one another. If the con-

cern is with a relationship shaped by an appeal to love, then the principle of need has

priority, whereas in legally shaped relationships the principle of equality takes priority,

and in cooperative relationships the principle of merit’ (Honneth, 2004a: 358; see also

Honneth and Fraser, 2001: 170, 174–5, 180–1). In the affective sphere, appeal to

mutually attested love can ground a demand for the affective recognition of newly devel-

oped or previously unconsidered needs in what Honneth refers to as ‘a different or

expanded kind of care’ (ibid.: 144).5 In the sphere of egalitarian right, appeal to the basic

idea of equality can ground a demand for the legal recognition of previously excluded

groups or of previously neglected facts (ibid.). In the sphere of cooperative and social

recognition, appeal to the achievement principle can ground a demand for the consider-

ation of hitherto neglected or underappreciated activities and capacities which contribute

to the common good and are deserving of greater social esteem and material resources

(ibid.). Justice always concerns the individual requirements for effective freedom,

dependent on social patterns of mutual recognition. ‘The justice or well-being of a soci-

ety is proportionate to its ability to secure the conditions of mutual recognition under

which personal identity-formation, hence individual self-realisation, can proceed ade-

quately’ (ibid.: 174).

It is because principles must respond adequately to real vulnerabilities and needs that

Honneth speaks of his theory as an attempt to reinvigorate the project of a ‘social philo-

sophy’ which would elucidate and diagnose social pathologies. As Christopher Zurn

explains, in contrast both to moral philosophy, which deals with questions of individual

obligation and right action, and to political philosophy, which attends to those of law and

fair distribution, ‘social philosophy’ is concerned with the structural conditions necessary

for human flourishing and the social deformations in those conditions which damage sub-

jectivity (Zurn, 2000: 118).6 Social philosophy is a therapeutic critique of pathological

social practices and, as such, requires a standard of social normalcy for evaluation, namely,

a standard which extrapolates, from all particular substantive conceptions of the good life

in developed societies, the formal conditions necessary for a healthy identity or, in other

words, ‘a formal conception of ethical life’ (Honneth, 1995a: 171–9).7 As concerns Rawls’

theory, Honneth argues that for principles of justice to take account of the real vulnerabil-

ities and needs of parties, the latter must be aware of their subjective dependence on inter-

subjective recognition relations (Honneth and Anderson, 2005: 140).

To what extent are parties in Rawls’ original position aware of human vulnerabilities

and needs? And, more generally, what kind of knowledge do they actually have access

to? Rawls’ response is very clear and indicates an error in Honneth’s interpretation. ‘There

are no limitations on general information’: parties know everything they need to about their

society in order to decide upon its principles (Rawls, 1971a: 137–8/119 rev.).

Parties know, first, that their society is defined by the ‘circumstances of justice’ –

objective and subjective alike – which ‘define the role’ that justice is to play (Rawls,

1971a: 126/109 rev.). Objective circumstances are the relevant facts about the object

of cooperation: that many individuals coexist together; that their geographical territory

is finite; that there exists moderate scarcity in natural and other resources so that, while

mutually advantageous arrangements are feasible, benefits fall short of the demands put




forward. Subjective circumstances are the relevant facts about the subjects of cooperation:

that subjects have their own conception of the good which leads them to make conflicting

claims on available resources; that subjects regard their own life-projects as worthy of rec-

ognition; that persons have similar needs and interests as determined by the positive

sciences – for example, persons need the recognition of others in order to even want to

pursue a conception of the good; that persons are able to abide by a conception of justice;

and that persons suffer shortcomings of knowledge, thought and judgement such that there

exists a diversity of belief and a conflict of interests. ‘Unless these circumstances existed

there would be no occasion for the virtue of justice’ (ibid.: 128/110 rev.). Moreover, parties

are also presumed to know general facts about their particular society: facts about political

affairs, the general principles of economic theory, the basis of social organization, the laws

of human psychology, and the empirical findings of the human and social sciences.

Honneth misinterprets the role which the veil of ignorance is to play. Rawls clearly

states that ‘the parties are presumed to know whatever general facts affect the choice

of the principles of justice’ (Rawls, 1971a: 137/119 rev.). If relevant, then, such knowl-

edge certainly includes the general findings about subjective interdependency as deter-

mined by the positive sciences. As a procedural device, the veil of ignorance interprets

the second moral faculty – the sense of justice – by modelling the inadmissibility of any

unilateral defence of purely individual interests. The veil does not block out facts in gen-

eral, but only knowledge of those particular facts about one’s own context which would

situate parties unequally: each person abstracts from his or her individual interests,

impartially considering the interest of all.

Rawls explains why parties are to have access to these general facts: constructivism

defends its ideal of the person by reference to a coherentist theory of justification which

means that personhood ideals are themselves justified relative to different bodies of evi-

dence. A personhood ideal must satisfy two requirements. First, it must cohere with non-

moral judgements about ‘normal’ empirical identity established by the human sciences,

insofar as these conclusions refer to the ideal of scientific impartiality. Second, it must

cohere with considered moral judgements about justice which we are unlikely to give up,

insofar as these judgements refer to the ideal of moral impartiality. If a constructivist

solution did not satisfy such coherentist requirements, it would not respond to the prac-

tical problem for which it is designed.

As regards the first requirement, Rawls explains that the conclusions of the human

sciences impose ‘feasibility’ requirements on personhood ideals (Rawls, 1975:

295–301). Whereas the human sciences provide descriptions of human needs and capa-

cities, moral and political theory produces normative ideals of the type of person we

aspire to be.8 The descriptions of the human sciences represent ‘the constraints that any

sound criterion of identity must satisfy’ (ibid.: 296), detailing minimal conditions of

mental and physical health necessary for any social cooperation whatsoever. The human

sciences identify conditions for physical and mental continuity, the capacity to reason

and use language and, most importantly, the ability to cooperate with others. A moral

theory must be rejected if its incorporated personhood ideal requires physical or psycho-

logical characteristics which would violate the minimal conditions that descriptivist con-

ceptions indicate are necessary for personal identity, survival and intersubjective

cooperation (ibid.: 296; Rawls, 1980: 321).

Bankovsky 101



The empirical conditions of ‘intact identity’ which Honneth provides are clearly

descriptivist. He uses the idea of recognition ‘in a merely descriptive sense’, pinpointing

minimal conditions of mental and physical health necessary for undamaged social interac-

tion (Honneth, 2004a: 354; see also Honneth and Fraser, 2001: 173). Rawls would certainly

agree that parties in the original position should be aware of such conditions. As Rawls him-

self notes, parties indeed know that without the pre-requisite experience of social recogni-

tion, no one would even wish to formulate and pursue a conception of the good.9 As

coherentist requirements specify, should Rawls’ ‘ideal of the person’ prevent the production

of the practical relations to self which are minimally necessary for valuing both our pursuits

and our own capacities for pursuing them, then the ideal would need to be rejected.

However, says Rawls, the first ‘feasibility constraint’ imposed by the non-moral jud-

gements of the human sciences is rather weak: most standard moral theories tend to sat-

isfy it (Rawls, 1975: 296).10 The feasibility constraint imposed by non-moral scientific

findings thus underdetermines choice among the different ideals – Hobbesian, average

utilitarian and Kantian – because such findings are consistent with the available ideals

and provide no conclusive evidence for the validity of one over another. The instrumen-

tal self-interest of the Hobbesian person is fully compatible with the conclusions of the

human sciences: in Hobbes’ social context, the desire to pursue a rational life-project and

to seek the positive recognition of certain significant others is the very reason why indi-

viduals require a powerful sovereign to guarantee all the necessary conditions for sur-

vival and basic social cooperation. Equally compatible with the empirical descriptions

of the human sciences is the average utilitarian personhood ideal: the interest of persons

in satisfying their desires leads them to defend the average utility principle so as to guar-

antee for themselves the right to survival and the right to pursue life-projects in satisfying

cooperative forms. And, finally, the Rawlsian person’s interest in her or his two moral

faculties (for formulating and pursuing a conception of the good and for formulating and

abiding by a conception of justice) also concords with descriptivist feasibility require-

ments: by acting in accordance with principles of justice, persons express their nature

as free, equal, rational and socially cooperative beings ‘subject to the general conditions

of human life’ (Rawls, 1971a: 253/222 rev.).

It is because the first feasibility constraint provides no conclusive evidence for the

validity of one personhood ideal over another that a second feasibility constraint comes

into play: a personhood ideal must also cohere with the considered moral judgements of

the society in question.11 Such judgements are ‘provisional fixed points which we pre-

sume any conception of justice must fit’ (Rawls, 1971a: 20/18 rev.; see also § 9), and

they include the convictions that religious intolerance, racial and sexual discrimination,

the institution of slavery, manipulation and torture are unjust. It is because the Kantian

ideal of the person coheres more clearly with such judgements that Rawls prefers it to the

alternatives. The average utility principle, he argues, runs the risk of authorizing judge-

ments which we think unjust: persons, represented by parties who without exception fol-

low the principle of insufficient reason in their calculations and thus take the same risks,

might well justify to each other the institution of slavery on the basis that it produces the

greatest average happiness, and that each, in the initial contractual situation, would

choose the average utility principle even at risk of subsequently being enslaved (ibid.:

167/145 rev.). This judgement being intolerable to persons in modern liberal democratic




societies, the average utility personhood ideal must be rejected. Equally untenable in

today’s society is the Hobbesian view that purely instrumental interest is the only avail-

able, or the only politically relevant, motivation. Our democratic society, argues Rawls,

is no longer fragmented by those sectarian divisions and conflicts of interest which once

characterized Hobbes’ historical moment (Rawls, 1987: 422).

Against Honneth, then, I argue that the veil of ignorance does not fall ‘too low’.

Parties in the original position know whatever facts affect their choice of principles,

including the empirical findings about persons which the human sciences describe and

the considered moral judgements about justice of the society in question. ‘I shall suppose

that the parties possess all general information. No general facts are closed to them’

(Rawls, 1971a: 142/122 rev.).

The publicity condition requires the parties to assume that as members of society they will

also know the general facts. The reasoning leading up to the initial agreement is to be acces-

sible to public understanding. Of course, in working out what the requisite principles are, we

must rely upon current knowledge as recognized by common sense and the existing scien-

tific consensus. But there is no reasonable alternative to doing this. We have to concede that

as established beliefs change, it is possible that the principles of justice which it seems

rational to acknowledge may likewise change. (Rawls, 1971a: 548/480 rev.)

Principles of justice must thus cohere with these non-moral findings and moral

judgements. ‘There is no reason to rule out these facts . . . since conceptions of justice

must be adjusted to the characteristics of the systems of social cooperation which they

are to regulate’ (Rawls, 1971a: 138/119 rev.). Moreover, in anticipation of Honneth’s

next criticism, it appears that Rawls’ ideal, in contrast to that of Hobbes, does not attri-

bute to persons a merely instrumental capacity for practical reasoning.

Are persons endowed with merely instrumental reason?

According to Honneth, Rawls commits a second error when defining his personhood

ideal: he ‘attributes to the parties merely instrumental capacities for practical reasoning,

in order to avoid having to take up complex and controversial claims about the moral

character of humans’ (Honneth and Anderson, 2005: 140). Consequently, it is ‘difficult

to explain why the parties should subsequently be motivated to abide by the agreed-upon

principles’ (ibid.: 140).

Now, insofar as parties in the original position are not fundamentally motivated by

any sense of obligation towards other persons and are, in contrast, only concerned to

advance their own interests, their reasoning is purely instrumental, says Honneth, and not

moral.12 Parties behind the veil of ignorance are motivated solely by their instrumental

desire to secure what Rawls calls primary goods. With more primary social goods (lib-

erties and opportunities, income and wealth, and the social bases of self-respect, etc.) and

with more primary natural goods (health and vigour, intelligence and imagination, etc.),

persons are generally assured greater success in advancing their ends (Rawls, 1971a: 62/

54–5 rev., 92/79 rev.). Lacking all knowledge of their particular situation, parties choose

to guarantee for all a fair distribution of these goods, thereby protecting themselves from

Bankovsky 103



being subsequently disadvantaged either by their particular end or by the lottery of birth.

As Rawls himself says, parties ‘are conceived as not taking an interest in one another’s

interests’ and the concept of rationality is interpreted ‘in the narrow sense, standard in

economic theory, of taking the most effective means to ends’ (ibid.: 13–14/12 rev.).

However, there are two ways that Rawls could respond to Honneth’s criticism.13 First

of all, Honneth overlooks the distinction Rawls draws between ‘party’, ‘personhood

ideal’ and ‘citizen’. The motivation of the parties should not be confused with that of the

moral person (the personhood ideal) whose two moral faculties are interpreted by two

very different procedural devices (Rawls, 1980: 316). The original position procedurally

renders the first faculty (the Rational) by describing parties – artificial representatives of

real citizens – as agents who pursue their own rational advantage. In this respect,

Honneth’s criticism appears to hold. However, the second faculty (the sense of justice)

is procedurally rendered by the constraints imposed on deliberation by the veil of ignor-

ance, constraints which situate parties symmetrically such that the outcome can be said

to be fair (ibid.: 308). Although the first device does appear to model merely instrumen-

tal interest, the second device represents the obligation to cooperate in view of mutual

good. By conflating ‘party’ and ‘moral person’ Honneth overlooks the procedural role

of the veil of ignorance which is intended to abstract from instrumental private ends and

instead represent the non-instrumental sense of justice.

It is because he also confuses ‘party’ and ‘citizen’ that Honneth finds it difficult to

explain why citizens – Honneth and Anderson unfortunately use the term ‘party’ –

should subsequently be motivated to abide by the agreed-upon principles. Indeed, a cit-

izen’s desire to live in accordance with a normative personhood ideal is neither instru-

mental nor difficult to grasp: this motivation is already included in the ‘ideal of the

person’ which real citizens implicitly affirm in a well-ordered society.

Second, one can indeed argue – and Rawls suggests as much himself – that even the

purely rational interest of parties equates to interest in both moral faculties, including

instrumental and non-instrumental interest alike. Rational interest in this enlarged sense

concerns the realization not only of instrumental advantage but also the sense of justice.

‘The rational is interpreted by the original position in reference to the desire of persons to

realise and to exercise their moral powers’ and to these powers correspond two ‘highest-

order interests’ (Rawls, 1980: 316). Our good is ultimately determined by the plan of life

which we would adopt with ‘full deliberative rationality’ if the future were accurately

foreseen and adequately realized in the imagination (Rawls, 1971a: 421/370 rev.). Pur-

suing both of the higher-order interests, full deliberative rationality appears to coincide

with the Hegelian and Honnethian ideal of ‘self-realization’ in that it concerns the reali-

zation of effective liberty in association with others. From which it follows that rational

desire for primary goods is desire for those goods which are necessary for the pursuit of

both instrumental and moral ends alike.

II The ‘object-domain’ of Rawls’ theory: merely negative liberty?

I will now examine the object-domain of Rawls’ theory. Following Honneth, Rawls’ the-

ory takes as its object the purely negative liberty of individuals (Honneth and Anderson,

2005: 129, 133). Rawls’ theory seeks to protect individuals from the ‘external




interference’ represented by material and institutional disadvantages such as inadequate

access to food and shelter, education, opportunities for participating in one’s culture and

so on, hence the term ‘redistributive justice’.

According to Honneth, Rawls commits two errors. First, his theory limits itself to the

language of egalitarian right, that is, equal right to the same formal liberty to develop

one’s faculties and pursue life-projects or, in Rawls’ vocabulary, right ‘to a fully ade-

quate scheme of equal basic liberties, which scheme is compatible with the same scheme

of liberties for all’ (Rawls, 2001: 42). For Honneth, this language of right ‘misses its tar-

get’ (Honneth and Anderson, 2005: 138): although egalitarian right may well protect

individuals from external interference, thus formally guaranteeing the liberty to develop

one’s faculties, protection alone does little to guarantee the realization of these faculties.

Such faculties cannot be actualized without the development of practical relations to self

(self-confidence, self-respect and self-esteem) which themselves require validation in

the form of supportive intersubjective relations. In this sense, the object-domain of

Rawlsian egalitarian right equates to negative, not positive, liberty (ibid.: 131, 137,

142, 144).

Second and consequently, Rawls’ theory of justice maintains egalitarian right by ‘the

fair distribution’ of primary goods which means, again, that it does not deal with the real

source of positive, social liberty. Realized liberty results not from a fair distribution of

goods but rather from the existence of practical relations to self, conditioned by suppor-

tive communicative relations. For Honneth, the true ‘object-domain’ of a theory of social

justice is the quality of communicative relations (Honneth, 2004a: 351). ‘The broad rele-

vance of recognitional conditions necessitates a shift away from exclusively distributive

issues’ (Honneth and Anderson, 2005: 142; see also Honneth, 2004b: 387). Justice’s

object-domain is not the negative liberty to seek the recognition which permits the

self-confidence, self-respect and self-esteem that are necessary for liberty to be actua-

lized, but rather, the actualization of liberty (that is, positive or social liberty).

So, then, do the egalitarian rights of Rawls’ constructivist procedure undertake to

guarantee the mere right to seek the realization of liberty and of the moral faculties

(which, as Honneth claims, in no way guarantees this realization), or do such rights

undertake to guarantee the realization of this liberty and of the moral faculties?

Against Honneth, I argue that Rawls’ constructivist procedure aims – at least in inten-

tion – to guarantee the actual realization of these faculties to a certain minimal level of

functioning.14 A well-ordered society should ensure that citizens’ capacities do not fall

‘below the minimum essential capacities for being normal and fully cooperating mem-

bers of society’ (Rawls, 2001: 171–2). For Rawls then, a theory of justice should allow

citizens to realize the ‘basic capabilities’ necessary for normal functioning (ibid.: 169).

As we saw earlier, the theory must abide by the conclusions established by the human

sciences regarding the nature of these basic capabilities, and this requirement demands

that the theory be realistic: it must actually realize these capacities to the required min-

imum level.

On one occasion, Honneth does suggest that Rawls implicitly shares his own commit-

ment to the actualization of the social and psychological preconditions for the realization

of individual autonomy. Honneth suggests that the commitment is implied by Rawls’ list

of ‘basic goods’ because Rawls believes that such goods ‘express the conditions that, to

Bankovsky 105



the best of our knowledge, are indispensable to giving every individual an equal chance

to realise his or her personality’ (Honneth and Fraser, 2001: 177). Moreover, Honneth

refers – albeit rather briefly – to the importance of the basic good of ‘self-respect’ for

the moral-psychological development of the person (ibid.: 179). He nonetheless con-

cludes that by focusing exclusively on distributive issues Rawls does not follow this

implied commitment to its logical conclusion.

And yet, Honneth seems unaware of the extent to which Rawls’ sociologically

informed description of the stages of moral development indeed resembles his own.

Rawls explicitly foregrounds the ‘Honnethian’ idea that intersubjectively developed

practical relations to self are conditions for the actualization of freedom, and that a just

society must secure realized freedom to the required minimum degree.

Let us consider the development of ‘self-confidence’, the first of Honneth’s condi-

tions for social freedom and ‘the first stage in the sequence of moral development’ for

Rawls (Rawls, 1971a: § 70). Where Honneth attributes to intimate, affective relations

of love and friendship the task of confirming or correcting the feelings and desires of the

individual, Rawls in a similar vein entrusts the family – in one of various forms – with

the role of validating, by precepts and injunctions, the moral attitudes of children (ibid.:

462–3/405 rev.). Given that the child does not yet understand moral distinctions, the

reactions of parents or carers to his or her instincts, desires and behaviours function as

validations or injunctions. Drawing on the human sciences in a manner which closely

resembles Honneth’s, Rawls explains that these reactions enable the child to trust in her

or his feelings, to trust in others, and to have confidence in his or her abilities, enabling

the child to launch out and test maturing abilities and skills (ibid.: 464/406 rev.). The

transmission of socially acceptable behaviour contributes to the orderly reproduction

of society, its values and its culture from one generation to the next (Rawls, 1997:

595; Rawls, 2001: 162). The family can, of course, exert an unfavourable influence

on the child, infringing the latter’s basic liberties and opportunities as a future citizen.

In a manner similar to Honneth’s, Rawls maintains that a public conception of justice

requires the family to guarantee the reproduction of basic capabilities: the abuse and

neglect of children is thus prohibited by family law (Rawls, 2001: 165). While it would

be inappropriate to require that the internal life of families be fully regulated by political

public principles, a public conception does bind the family indirectly because it requires

the prevention of mental and physical precariousness so as to ensure that the minimal

essential capacities for normal functioning – and for achieving voluntarily organized,

reciprocal relations – are maintained (ibid.: 10–11, 163–7).

According to Honneth, Rawls’ account of the indirect regulation of internal family

life by principles of justice is ‘not sufficient’ because it does not ‘stress the fact that

justice in families makes internally necessary another, more just, division of labour in

families’ (Honneth, 2004b: 387), one that demands concrete guarantees of the intersub-

jective conditions of effective freedom. In the context of the family, this means that

social measures must actively encourage the production and maintenance of reciprocal

intimate relations and this requires, for Honneth, the familial institutionalization of reci-

procity of labour. For Honneth, the normative requirement that reciprocal intimate rela-

tions be secured within the family means that the problem of justice in families does not

simply include the negative Rawlsian task of merely reducing social and economic




conditions which support a certain unjust division of labour but also includes the

enforcement (ibid.) of a certain understanding of the normative infrastructure of families

so that participants themselves come to see that they should accept a fair distribution of

labour in families (ibid.). According to Honneth, Rawls defends the position that a nor-

mative understanding of families should not be enforced and that a shared concept of

justice will probably suffice to guarantee social conditions under which the division

of labour in families is organized voluntarily. Honneth says, explicitly, that this ‘is not

sufficient’ (ibid.).

Against Honneth, I have attempted to show that Rawls’ public conception does

require a normative conception of family life ensuring the development and maintenance

of minimal essential capacities and seeking to guarantee voluntary organization. Albeit

not as thick as Honneth’s, this conception nonetheless intends to guarantee the reciprocal

intimate relations which Honneth’s theory emphasizes. Rawlsian justice should guaran-

tee social conditions under which the division of labour in families may be organized

voluntarily, that is, in terms of structures which are mutually recognized. In this sense,

justice is to protect the individual from physical and psychological abuse while at the

same time protecting the family from the external interference of an overly paternalis-

tic state. If intimate relations are mutually and voluntarily recognized within families

in this way, then it seems undesirable to enforce – as Honneth appears to suggest – a

thicker normative conception of family life (Honneth, 2004b: 387). Rawls’ normative

conception of family life need not include more than the guarantee of minimal essential

capacities for pursuing and maintaining reciprocal relations (which includes protective

measures against both intra-familial physical and psychological abuse and extra-

familial state paternalism).

Let us consider, next, the development of ‘self-respect’, the second condition accord-

ing to Honneth of realized liberty. For Honneth, juridical relations function to confirm

the belief in one’s authority – equal to that of all others – to make claims and demands.

This view is mirrored in Rawls’ description of the way in which egalitarian right distri-

butes liberties and the social bases of self-respect. This intersubjective validation of

one’s equal authority allows one to see oneself as entitled to the same status and treat-

ment as all others. Indeed, Honneth himself remarks that Rawls’ account of egalitarian

right is ‘an important step in the right direction’ (Honneth and Anderson, 2005: 129)

because it supports the development of self-respect, the second practical relation to self

necessary for realized liberty.

Let us consider, finally, the development of ‘self-esteem’, the third condition accord-

ing to Honneth of realized liberty. ‘Solidarity’, for Honneth, describes a cultural climate

where the acquisition of a sense of belonging and of interdependence is possible: no

member of society is denied social esteem for her or his contribution to the common

good. Again, in intention, Rawls’ theory is not dissimilar: the ‘second stage of moral

development’ (the morality of association [Rawls, 1971a: § 71]) describes the internali-

zation of norms of conduct imposed by the reactions of approval and disapproval of

group members, or of those in authority, to one’s behaviour, a description supported

by ‘the companion principle’ of ‘the Aristotelian Principle’ (ibid.: 440–1/386–7 rev., see

also § 65 and § 67). Without the pre-requisite experience of social recognition, no one

would even wish to formulate and pursue a conception of the good. By internalizing

Bankovsky 107



normative patterns of social recognition, one learns the virtues of a good student and

classmate, the ideals of a good sport and companion and even of a good citizen (ibid.:

467–8/409–10 rev.). Seeking to secure for all the opportunities to strive to perfect one’s

conception of the good and to seek recognition for this good among one’s peers, Rawls’

theory formulates the Honnethian idea that expressing one’s nature in mutually sustain-

ing forms is a fundamental element of one’s good. Speaking of the idea of social union,

Rawls explains that ‘people need one another since it is only in active cooperation with

others that one’s powers reach fruition. Only in the social union is the individual com-

plete’ (ibid.: 525 n./460 n. rev.), like a group of musicians, says Rawls, who by tacit

agreement set out to perfect their skills on a chosen instrument so as to realize the powers

of all in a joint orchestral performance (ibid.: 524 n./459 n. rev.). In this respect, Rawls’

theory intends to realize the sense of belonging and social esteem which the human

sciences reveal to be minimally necessary for normal functioning. ‘It is through social

union founded upon the needs and potentialities of its members that each person can par-

ticipate in the total sum of the realized natural assets of the others. . . . [Members] recog-

nize the good of each as an element in the complete activity, the whole scheme of which

is consented to and gives pleasure to all’ (ibid.: 523/459 rev.).

In intention, then, Rawls’ theory surely aims to actualize real and effective powers

and not simply to protect the merely negative and empty liberty to seek such actualiza-

tion. ‘Since a democracy aims for full equality of all its citizens, it must include arrange-

ments to achieve it’ (Rawls, 1997: 600; emphasis added). If a democracy did not realize

the faculties to a minimal degree, it would not facilitate a relatively well-ordered society.

The question turns, then, around what constitutes the minimal degree for a relatively

well-ordered society.

III Rawls’ method of principle justification: formal Kantianegalitarian right, or mutual self-realization (good)?

I turn, finally, to examine the ideal Rawls employs in his method of principle justifica-

tion. Rawls’ theory explicitly founds itself on a formal, Kantian ideal of impartiality

(right). Honneth argues that Rawls’ theory cannot maintain its claim to be neutral among

ends but instead involves an anterior commitment to a particular conception of mutual

good, namely, an ideal of individual human flourishing (Honneth, 1991: 29–31;

Honneth, 2004a: 357). Moreover, misunderstanding its fundamental commitment, the

theory’s implied ideal of human flourishing is overly individualistic (Honneth, 2004b:

389): by prioritizing the fair distribution of equal rights, Rawls’ theory overlooks those

concrete experiences of injustice which damage subjectivity and impede self-realization.

In ‘The Limits of Liberalism’ (1991), Honneth considers the contrasting assessments

provided by Rawlsian liberalism and communitarianism to explain the accelerated plur-

alization of individual life-orientations and the associated degeneration of cultural com-

munities in contemporary western industrial societies. He situates his own assessment

between the two. Liberalism evaluates this trend with reference to a formal ideal of

impartiality. If egalitarian right indeed limits substantive conceptions of the good life,

then the trend is acceptable. Right endorses ‘neutrality’: the state should not privilege

any one particular conception of the good – be this individual or communitarian – over




any another. In contrast, communitarians analyze the same trend with reference to the

ideal of individual good. Drawing on the findings of the human sciences, Charles Taylor

(1977) shows that the ability to objectively evaluate our own desires – a condition for

liberty to be effective – depends on internalizing the confirmations or corrections of

these desires by other people who also orient themselves towards our own good. Social

trends are thus assessed by communitarians with reference to their ability to allow

individuals to validate their values in relations of solidarity.

For Honneth, Rawls’ defence of formal egalitarian right involves an implicit and

anterior commitment to the ideal of freedom in association with others, that is, social

freedom or mutual ‘self-realization’ (Honneth, 1991: 27–9). Without this commitment,

argues Honneth, persons would have no reason even to demand the formal protection of

autonomy which egalitarian right offers. Rawls must concede that egalitarian right is

necessary only insofar as it promises to safeguard the process of ethical self-assurance

– now conceived as intersubjective in nature – against social and economic limitations

(ibid.: 25). However, now that egalitarian right has been shown to derive from an ideal

of individual good, Rawls’ theory can no longer maintain its commitment to ‘neutrality’

among values: to orient itself towards its ideal, it must support those values which are

structurally necessary for mutual human flourishing.

Moreover, by prioritizing right, Rawls’ theory misunderstands its fundamental

commitment. ‘With respect to Rawls, for example, I would say there is already a certain

pre-understanding of what the good life incorporates, namely, a quite individualistic one

as some other critiques such as Thomas Nagel’s (1973) have made clear’ (Honneth,

2004b: 389). If Rawls’ theory had correctly understood the fundamental ideal which

implicitly informs it – i.e. human flourishing in social interaction – then it would have

needed to sacrifice Kantian neutrality for the pursuit of those intersubjective values nec-

essary for the realization of persons in their various communities (Honneth, 2004a:

357–8). Honneth thus reverses Rawls’ justification procedure: the defence of egalitarian

right becomes necessary only insofar as a particular conception of the good discovers a

limit to its applicability when faced with other, sometimes conflicting, conceptions of the

good. As alluded to earlier, theory’s task is, for Honneth, therapeutic rather than proce-

dural. Misunderstanding its fundamental ideal, Rawls’ theory overlooks its real task.

Instead of diagnosing and redressing those social deformations which give rise to concrete

experiences of injustice that injure subjectivity, Rawls’ theory presents mere procedures

which are supposed to interpret the ideal of impartiality such that the fairness of the pro-

cedure can be said to carry over to the results.

My first response is to confess that I do not quite understand how Rawls’ theory of

justice can be said to overlook the concrete experiences of injustice with which

Honneth’s alternative theory supposedly begins. In other words, I cannot see the differ-

ence that Deranty and Renault are driving at when, following Honneth, they write that

‘the definition of justice will be provided by the criteria of the experiences of injustice

rather than by a reconstruction of our intuitions of justice’ (Deranty and Renault, 2007:

95). The reflections about justice which provide the starting point for Rawls’ construc-

tivist, coherentist justification are precisely those judgements which arise in concrete

situations that are experienced as just or unjust. Hence, Rawls’ ‘judgements about jus-

tice’ and Honneth’s ‘concrete experiences of injustice’ are closely and internally related.

Bankovsky 109



Rawls’ constructivist approach to judgement begins with ‘judgements about justice’

which arise in concrete experiences, judgements which are then ordered, first, by means

of a coherentist theory which requires that they also coincide with descriptivist and

experiential conceptions of healthy subjectivity and, second, by the ideal of the person

implied by the most stable of such judgements. In so doing, normative standards can

be determined that constructively account for this body of moral and non-moral judge-

ments. Moreover, it is by reference to the constructivist formulation of immanent norma-

tive standards that experiences themselves can be normatively judged. If Honneth is

indeed to begin with ‘concrete experiences of injustice’ then he requires a normative

conception of justice – immanently defined in relation to ‘judgements about justice’ –

that would allow him to determine which experiences actually qualify normatively as

experiences of injustice. In this sense, Rawls’ constructivist approach to the determina-

tion of normative standards cannot be said to overlook the experiences with which Hon-

neth begins.

Second, Rawls’ model does appear to permit responses to these concrete experiences

of injustice: if it did not, it would need to be rejected for constructivist reasons, since it

would no longer respond to the problems for which it is designed. If, on the Honnethian

model, an analysis of a concrete situation reveals that individual experiences of

disrespect can be read as typical for an entire group and that a claim of justice is at stake

(Honneth, 1995a: 160–70), then, on the Rawlsian model, such groups would be entitled –

by reference to the principles of justice – to demand that their rights to the social, mate-

rial and institutional conditions of real freedom be reinstated. Such experiences would

point to the fact that public institutions are not yet sufficiently ordered by the appropriate

public conception of justice. Moreover, as the body of judgements about justice change,

that is, as new experiences are taken up in judgement, constructivist requirements may

well require adjustments to the public conception itself: ‘as established beliefs change, it

is possible that the principles of justice which it seems rational to acknowledge may like-

wise change’ (Rawls, 1971a: 548/480 rev.). In my view, Rawls, like Honneth, must com-

mit, in this sense, to a concept of ‘progress’ in the determination of principles,

acknowledging that the public conception on which an overlapping consensus should

obtain is necessarily open to change. The public conception will need to respond, in

Rawls’ case, to new judgements about justice and, in Honneth’s case, to those particular

aspects of a person’s context (his or her needs, her or his legal status, or the perceived

value of his or her contributions) which have not been adequately considered.15

Finally, as regards Honneth’s claim that an ideal of human flourishing is logically

implied by Rawlsian egalitarian right, Rawls would certainly not disagree. Indeed, in

Political Liberalism, Rawls himself affirms explicitly that ‘the just and the good are

complementary: no conception of justice can draw entirely upon one or the other, but

must combine both in a definite way’ (Rawls, 1993: 172). Indeed, Rawls could remind

Honneth that the defence which the latter offers for the supposed ‘anteriority of the com-

mitment to the ideal of mutual good’ itself invokes Rawls’ Kantian ideal of impartiality,

thus confirming the Rawlsian claim that the just and the good are complementary.

Honneth clearly states that his defence of the ideal of self-realization in association with

others is not of a strictly communitarian nature: the commitment is rather to the individ-

ual self-realization of all members of society, in their different communities, and thus




beyond any one particular community. Honneth’s ideal of the self-realization of all

members of society already includes the Kantian ideal of impartiality, neutrality,

formality and mutuality, that is, ‘right’ (Honneth, 1991: 29–31).

Indeed, it is precisely so as to accentuate the formal nature of mutual good that

Honneth sketches ‘a formal conception of ethical life’, to be understood as a critical nor-

mative standard which is both universal and substantively concrete (Honneth, 1995a:

171–9). The conception is universal in the Kantian sense because it applies in the limit

to everyone in society (communities, groups and individuals). It is concrete and substan-

tive in the communitarian sense because it includes those values particular to the society

in question which are necessary for the realization of all members of that particular soci-

ety (mutual good). Rawls’ conception of justice is likewise at once formal and substan-

tive, cohering with the normative expectations at work in everyday intersubjective life

and with the descriptivist conditions of healthy identity formation. Indeed, the normative

conception of mutual good which it expresses theoretically resembles Honneth’s. Rawls

writes: ‘In the well-ordered society of justice as fairness, citizens share a common aim,

and one that has high priority: namely, the aim of insuring that political and social insti-

tutions are just, and of giving justice to persons generally, as what citizens need for them-

selves and want for one another’ (Rawls, 1993: 146; emphasis added). Such a society

realizes itself ‘in activities that are intrinsically good and not merely cooperation for

social or economic gain’ (Rawls, 1971a: 525 n./460 n. rev.). Honneth thinks that his own

intersubjective determination of the good contrasts with Rawls ‘insofar as subjects are

also presumed to have an interest in the freedom of the others from whom they expect

social recognition’ (Honneth and Fraser, 2001: 259) However, Honneth overlooks the

fact that Rawls expresses his normative conception of mutual good in precisely these

intersubjective terms, namely, ‘as what citizens need for themselves and want for one

another’ (Rawls, 1993: 146; emphasis added).

On one brief occasion, Honneth himself concedes that Rawls, like Hegel, ‘tie[s] a

justification of [his] conception of social justice to an ethical theory that defines the

socially influenced preconditions that must be available for individual subjects to real-

ize their autonomy’ (Honneth and Fraser, 2001: 178). Honneth nonetheless believes that

this dimension ‘only ashamedly forms the hidden basis’ of Rawls’ liberalism (ibid.:

180). It seems to me, however, that Rawls’ constructivist methodology explicitly yields

a formal conception of mutual, substantive good which is not dissimilar to Honneth’s.

Indeed, Rawls’ later presentation of justice as fairness is explicitly framed not merely

by a formal conception of right but also by what Rawls takes to be a distinctly Hegelian

insight, namely, the determination of the normative potential of historical institutions of

social cooperation or, in Rawls’ words, the determination of the normative structures of

society’s historical form as a ‘fair system of social cooperation over time from one gen-

eration to the next’ (Rawls, 2001: 3–5; see also Rawls, 2000: 371). Like Honneth,

Rawls thus ascribes to political philosophy what he takes to be an explicitly Hegelian

task: political philosophy is to constructively formulate the fair and mutually recognized

conditions of cooperation which are implied by the main political and social institutions

in which we find ourselves in a particular moment of historical time (Rawls, 2001:

3–4).16 Both Honneth and Rawls agree that this task requires a methodological approach

which is at once formal and substantive. For Rawls and Honneth alike, political

Bankovsky 111



philosophy has the potential to illuminate the shared good and benefits of political

society (Rawls, 2001: 4).

Conclusion

Honneth does not achieve the desired break with Rawls’ liberal theory of justice

because Rawls’ political liberalism does not in fact resemble the interpretation which

Honneth offers of it. Indeed, Rawls’ liberalism is far closer to Honneth’s own theory

than the latter realizes.

Rawlsian parties in the original position are not characterized by purely individua-

listic liberty, as Honneth claims, but rather are fully aware that the citizens they rep-

resent are subjectively interdependent, vulnerable to attack and unable to realize their

liberty without the support of others. In this sense, the veil of ignorance does not fall

‘too low’.

Moreover, Rawlsian parties in the original position are not endowed with merely

instrumental reason, as Honneth argues, but rather are interested in realizing their ‘full

deliberative rationality’ which includes the real pursuit of their two higher-order interests

in their capacity to formulate and pursue a conception of their good and their capacity to

formulate and abide by a non-instrumental conception of justice. In this sense, full delib-

erative rationality coincides with the Hegelian and Honnethian ideal of ‘self-realization’

in association with others.

Furthermore, Rawlsian egalitarian right does not aim merely to protect the negative

liberty of individuals to seek the realization of life-projects and faculties, as Honneth

suggests, but rather undertakes to secure the actual realization of such projects and pow-

ers. Indeed, Rawls’ theory was shown to draw on the descriptions provided by the human

sciences concerning subjective interdependence, the stages of moral learning and the

need for self-confidence, self-respect and social esteem. And it was shown that Rawls’

conception of justice intends to ensure that citizens’ capacities do not fall below the min-

imum essential capacities – as specified by the human sciences – which are necessary for

existing as normal and fully cooperating members of society or, in Honneth’s terms, for

pursuing and maintaining reciprocal recognition relations.

Finally, the anterior commitment to an ideal of mutual good which Honneth argues is

nonetheless implied by Rawls’ theory of impartial right is not too individualistic. Nor

does Rawls misunderstand the ideal by focusing on the procedural rendering of the value

of impartiality rather than on concrete experiences of injustice. Rather, the ideal of

impartiality which founds Rawls’ theory is at once formal and substantive, informed

by those very judgements about justice which arise within concrete experiences of injus-

tice and by those judgements about the nature of healthy subjectivity which the human

sciences provide. In this sense, Rawls’ ideal closely resembles Honneth’s ‘formal con-

ception of ethical life’ and is not so far removed from Honneth’s self-avowed ‘pro-

foundly different’ model (Honneth and Anderson, 2005).

Indeed, by means of its analyses, this article has revealed that the theories of both

thinkers in fact share a basic intention, namely, to guarantee for all citizens the social,

material and institutional conditions for the actual exercise of otherwise merely formal

rights and liberties or, in Honneth’s words, mutual self-realization. Consequently, both




thinkers commit to the idea of ‘progress’ in the construction of principles of justice, so

as to consider new judgements about justice or previously unconsidered injustices

within a social context.

Notes

I thank Paul Patton, Christian Lazzeri, Sotiria Liakaki and an anonymous referee for their helpful

comments on an earlier draft of this article. My thanks also go to Alice Le Goff, Marie Garrau and

Christian Lazzeri for the opportunities offered by the research centre SOPHIAPOL. I acknowledge

that this research was generously supported by the Bourse d’excellence Eiffel doctorat awarded by

the French Ministry of Foreign and European Affairs. An earlier version of some of the ideas pre-

sented here has been published in ‘La Justice sociale: defendre Rawls contre les objections de

Honneth’ (Bankovsky, 2009).

1. Honneth deals with the question of political and social justice in the following articles: ‘The

Limits of Liberalism’ (Honneth, 1991), ‘Recognition and Justice: Outline of a Plural Theory

of Justice’ (Honneth, 2004a), ‘From Struggles for Recognition to a Plural Concept of Justice:

an Interview with Axel Honneth (Interviewed by Gwynn Markle)’ (Honneth, 2004b) and

‘Autonomy, Vulnerability, Recognition and Justice’, co-authored with Joel Anderson

(Honneth and Anderson, 2005). Honneth also provides some ‘perspectives for a

recognition-theoretical concept of justice’ in his debate with Nancy Fraser in Redistribution

or Recognition?: A Political-Philosophical Exchange (Honneth and Fraser, 2001: 170–89).

2. There are two further reasons why Honneth’s relation to Rawls must be assessed. First, to the

best of my knowledge, the task has not yet been explicitly undertaken in the English second-

ary literature. Second, Honneth’s claims regarding the differences between himself and

Rawls tend to be merely repeated in the secondary literature without critical reflection.

Nancy Fraser’s presentation of the apparent opposition is certainly cursory; intuitive rather

than argued (Honneth and Fraser, 2001). And Jean-Philippe Deranty and Emmanuel Renault

are not alone when they remark in passing, and again without real argument, that a political

theory of recognition allows justice to ‘be defined in terms that do include the real experi-

ences of social injustice, whereas the different Kant-inspired theories of justice [e.g. Rawls]

all end up devising theoretical models that seem unable to account for the modern phenom-

ena of exclusion, oppression and domination’ (Deranty and Renault, 2007: 107). It is my

view that Honneth’s claims should not be so easily accepted and that Honneth’s discussion

of Rawls requires more careful consideration.

3. As is customary, references to A Theory of Justice (Rawls, 1971a) will indicate page numbers

for both the 1971 original edition and the revised edition (Rawls, 1999).

4. Rawls writes that ‘there are various forms of constructivism. A number of views not usually

thought of as constructivist can be presented in this way’ (Rawls, 1980: 322–3). He adds that

‘average utilitarianism might be presented as a kind of constructivism’ (ibid.: 323). As Onora

O’Neill remarks, Rawls also contrasts his Kantian constructivism with a further version of

non-Kantian constructivism, namely, the Hobbesian version of liberalism found in the work

of David Gauthier (O’Neill, 2003: 364; see also Rawls, 1987: 422). As O’Neill explains,

Gauthier views morality as constructed out of a process of rational bargaining which presup-

poses the ideal of a person who seeks the satisfaction of antecedent individual preferences

(O’Neill, 2003: 364; see also Gauthier, 1997 and 1986).

Bankovsky 113



5. Honneth now insists that normative claims to justice can indeed be raised in all three spheres

of intersubjective relation, including that of the affective sphere. He thus corrects the thesis

that he still maintained in The Struggle for Recognition according to which love ‘does not

admit of the potential for normative development’ (Honneth, 1995a: 282).

6. For Honneth’s account of social philosophy as an endeavour distinct from moral and political

philosophy, see Honneth, 1994. Christopher Zurn also directs us to consult Honneth, 1995b,

especially pages xix–xxii, and chs 3, 13 and 14.

7. I will discuss the defining elements of Honneth’s ‘formal conception of ethical life’ in Section

III of this article.

8. As concerns the difference between descriptivist conceptions and normative ideals of person-

hood, Rainer Forst is correct to remark that the ideal of the person as free and equal with a

conception of the good and a sense of justice ‘is not a theory of the self . . . the concepts lie

on different levels, one ontological, one abstract and normative. To argue for individual rights

is not to argue for individualist life-plans: legal rights do not replace relations of love, affec-

tion, friendship, and solidarity . . . they secure the needs of concrete persons’ (Forst, 1992:

299). Unfortunately, the distinction between ‘normative ideals’ of autonomous personhood

and descriptivist theories of the self is overlooked by Bryce Weber when he uses the earlier

work of Honneth to argue against liberal ideals of autonomous subjectivity (Weber, 2006).

9. For Rawls’ account of the pre-requisite need for social recognition, I advise the reader to con-

sult his discussion of the Aristotelian Principle and its ‘companion effect’: ‘The conception of

goodness as rationality allows us to characterise more fully the circumstances that support the

first aspect of self-esteem, the sense of our own worth. These are essentially two: (1) having a

rational plan of life, and in particular one that satisfies the Aristotelian Principle [i.e. one that

calls upon natural capacities in an interesting fashion]; and (2) finding our person and deeds

appreciated and confirmed by others who are likewise esteemed and their association enjoyed.

. . . Unless our endeavours are appreciated by our associates, it is impossible for us to maintain

the conviction that they are worthwhile’ (Rawls, 1971a: 440–1/386–7 rev., see also 414–15/364

rev., § 65 and § 67).

10. For further discussion of the ‘undetermined’ nature of personhood ideals in Rawls’ construc-

tivist ethics, see David O. Brink (1987).

11. Gerald Doppelt (1988, 1989) and William Galston (1982) argue that liberal democratic soci-

eties are characterized by a variety of rival personhood ideals – not only Kantian, but also

bourgeois-individualist and patriarchal ideals – and that these alternatives are also rooted in

modern political judgements and practices. Neither author believes that Rawls offers objective

criteria for preferring one ideal over another. In contrast, I argue that Rawls does offer such

criteria: constructivist conceptions must satisfy the two feasibility requirements, namely,

coherence with non-moral judgements about the person established by the human sciences and

coherence with considered moral judgements about justice of the society in question.

12. Honneth’s argument that the reasoning for the principles is instrumental and not moral is

not novel. The claim was first raised against Rawls in the context of the ‘Kantian interpre-

tation’ which he provided for his theory (Rawls, 1971a: § 40). Critics like Oliver Johnson

(1974, 1977), Andrew Levine (1974), Thomas Nagel (1973), Robert Paul Wolff (1977) and

Homer Mason (1976) argued that Rawls’ personhood ideal was not Kantian enough: where

Kant requires that principles be chosen on the basis of pure duty to persons, Rawlsian par-

ties are motivated by purely instrumental desire for a greater stake in primary goods.




Honneth explicitly sides with the argument which Nagel develops in 1973 (Honneth,

2004b: 389) (see Section III of this article). In contrast to such views, others, like Stephen

Darwall (1976, 1980), have argued that Rawls’ description of the two moral faculties incor-

porates both instrumental and non-instrumental reason alike. Clearly, I side with Stephen

Darwall in such debates.

13. The defences which I offer for Rawls are inspired by the arguments of Stephen Darwall (1976,

1980), arguments to which Rawls himself will refer when defending justice as fairness against

the criticism that Schopenhauer makes of Kant, a criticism which resembles the one that

Honneth here brings to Rawls (Rawls, 1980: 318–19; Rawls, 1993: 104–7). Schopenhauer

argues that Kantian principles are those that egoism cunningly accepts as a compromise

because it appeals to what rational agents, as finite beings with needs, can consistently will

to be universal law.

14. I maintain that Rawls’ constructivist procedure intends to guarantee the actual realization of

the moral faculties. As to whether or not public institutions regulated by Rawls’ principles of

justice would, in fact, achieve the actualization of these faculties is another question, beyond

the scope of this article. If their institutionalization carefully sets its sights on their normative

intention, then faith in or commitment to the success of the constructivist procedure is war-

ranted. However, I refer the reader to Christian Lazzeri’s detailed and ultimately negative eva-

luation – within the framework of recognition theory – of the capacity of Rawls’ two

principles to satisfy the desire for realized liberty (2004). I do not deal with Lazzeri’s argu-

ments here because my fundamental question is different. I do not seek, as does Lazzeri, to

determine whether Rawls’ principles would, in fact, satisfy the desire of real individuals for

realized liberty, but rather, I ask whether or not Rawls’ constructivism even intends to satisfy

this desire because it is precisely the existence of such an intention in Rawls’ theory that Hon-

neth calls into question. Against Honneth, I claim that Rawls’ theory does intend to satisfy

such desires.

15. For Honneth’s commitment to ‘progress’ in the quality of recognition relations, see Honneth,

2004a: 355, 359–63; Honneth, 2002; and Honneth, forthcoming). For a consideration of the

necessarily revisable character of theories of justice, and a reflection on the radical implica-

tions of the ‘Kantian faith’ in ‘progress’ which I believe characterizes the constructivist,

rational reconstructivist and normative reconstructivist theories of Rawls, Habermas and

Honneth alike, I refer the reader to Perfecting Justice in Rawls, Habermas and Honneth:

Constructivism from a Deconstructive Perspective (Bankovsky, forthcoming).

16. It seems to me that the criticism Honneth here develops is the opposite of the one Habermas

brings to Rawls in ‘Reconciliation through the Public Use of Reason: Remarks on John

Rawls’s Political Liberalism’ (Habermas, 1995). For Honneth, Rawls’ method fails because

it attempts a purely ‘formal’ justification of principles (in terms of the idea of Kantian impar-

tiality) where it should instead justify principles in terms of the substantive conception of

mutual good which is implied by historical institutions. In contrast to Honneth’s take on

Rawls, Habermas states that Rawls’ failure lies in the fact that his method depends on shared

substantive assumptions which are contingent to a historical tradition and does not develop

itself in a strictly procedural manner as per Habermas’ discourse-theoretical approach

(Habermas, 1995: 126). In my view, the fact that Honneth and Habermas each direct opposing

criticisms at Rawls’ methodology is significant: Rawls’ political constructivism is neither

simply formal nor simply historical and substantive.

Bankovsky 115



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5 Social Justice: Defending Rawls’ Theory of Justice Against Honneth’s Objections

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