Plural Values and Heterogeneous Situations. Considerations on the Scope for a Political Theory of Justice

Abstract

This paper aims to investigate the way in which a political theory of justice should respond to the endorsement of pluralism. After offering reasons in support of the necessity for such a theory to take pluralism seriously, an argument is put forward for its characterisation in minimal and procedural terms. However, taking issue with the straightforward relationship of implication identified by a number of scholars between pluralism and procedural justice, this paper contends that a direct relation can only be established between pluralism and the need to define a minimal theory of justice, i.e. a theory that assumes as little as possible in terms of values and views of the world. Its procedural formulation is seen, instead, as a consequence of the limited predictive power of theory facing the heterogeneous situations with which it is expected to deal.

Keywords: Justice, Justification, Pluralism, Procedural Justice, Substantive Justice, Theories of Justice