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THE INSTABILITY OF JOHN RAWLS'S “STABILITY FOR THE RIGHT REASONS”

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  22 May 2017

Abstract

John Rawls's most mature notion of political order is “stability for the right reasons.” Stability for the right reasons is the kind of political order that Rawls hoped a well-ordered society could ideally achieve. In this paper, I demonstrate through the tools of modern game theory, the instability of “stability for the right reasons.” Specifically, I will show that a well-ordered society can completely destabilize by the introduction of an arbitrarily small number of non-compliers whenever individuals fail to achieve full common knowledge ever so slightly.

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Articles
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Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2017 

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