Rawls expounded “a theory of justice that generalizes and carries to a higher level of abstraction the traditional conception of the social contract.” His theory applies to society’s basic structure, a system of productive cooperation over generations. The state of nature was reconfigured as an “original position” which “incorporates certain procedural constraints on arguments.” The “parties” in the original position have general knowledge but no knowledge specific to themselves: their strengths, weaknesses, values, desires, social position, and so on. The “parties” choose principles that will maximize their fund of “primary goods,” or all-purpose means – means useful to all, whatever their particular interests, talents, etc. Two principles would be chosen: a maximum-equal-liberties principle, and a principle governing the distribution of opportunities, wealth, and income. These are in “lexical” order: equal basic liberties, then fair equal opportunity, then the “difference principle,” viz. distribute so to maximize the resources of the least-advantaged class. The chapter describes the “fact of reasonable pluralism” the social contract must accommodate, and the “well-ordered society” the social contract is to stabilize “for the right reasons,” securing the three great achievements of the tradition: toleration, limited government by popular consent, and “the winning of the working classes to democracy.”