Justice as Formal TheoryTowards a New Theory of Distributive Justice. By Norman Bowie A Theory of Justice. By John Rawls

Abstract

To pursue justice and trap it in its lair has been the goal, the conceit, and the moral torture of more of man's finest minds than any other of our perennial quests. These disparate works-one a masterful distillation of two decades of an original and thoughtful intellectual enterprise of the first order, the other a useful schematization of the major answers of othersboth represent genuine contributions to that quest. There are many levels on which one can approach these volumes. The clear importance of Rawls' magisterial volume will ensure its examination in many disciplines and from many standpoints. It is no less important to those in our discipline who fall outside as inside the domain of traditional political philosophy, and that significance extends both to its function as a paradigm of work and as an argument-in-its-own-right. Bowie's work has value in its more modest role. Such at least is my assessment, coming from one whose orientations are primarily toward inquiry into judicial behavior and organizational theory rather than the more expected normative-philosophical tradition. While these works are those of normative thinkers, they are clearly postlogical positivists who have responded to the challenge of mathematical and empirical rigor and range far beyond mere ipse dixit, or contrived definitions which are concealed and congealed value statements or the retelling of philosophical chronology. They are analytic in crucial ways, telling us new things about old problems, even should we disagree with some premises and more conclusions. They draw heavily upon rationalistic and schematic economic theory (in contradistinction to more empirically oriented econometrics.) This is particularly true of Rawls, with Bowie relying rather more heavily upon symbolic logic and linguistics. Both, however, are close to the body of somewhat disparate systematically derived thought now found in our field under various rival rubrics of which per-