Realistic Utopia

Rawls perceives political philosophy as “realistically utopian: that is, as probing the limits of practical political possibility.”¹ Rawls considers it vital to establish that it is not unreasonable to hope for a just and stable pluralist constitutional liberal democracy. In his words, “Our hope for the future of our society rests on the belief that the social world allows for at least a decent political order, so that a reasonably just, though not perfect, democratic regime is possible.”² Rawls even states in the introductory remarks to Political Liberalism that the practice of political philosophy may be meaningless unless we sincerely believe that a just, stable democratic regime can be achieved.³ For Rawls, justice as fairness functions not only as the blueprint for the realistic utopia he envisions but also as a source of symbolic hope that we can one day live in just and stable society.

1. John Rawls, Justice as Fairness: A Restatement, ed. Erin Kelly, (Cambridge: The Belknap Press of Harvard University Press, 2001), 4.
2. Ibid.
3. John Rawls, Political Liberalism: Expanded Edition (New York: Columbia University Press, 2005), lx.