Liberalism and the Limits of Justice

Liberalism and the Limits of Justice (1982; second edition 1998) is a book by the American political philosopher Michael J. Sandel. It offers a critique of John Rawls's theory of justice as fairness, set out in A Theory of Justice (1971). Sandel questions the conception of the self on which Rawls's theory rests, and argues that liberal political philosophy does not adequately account for the way individuals are embedded in social and historical contexts. The book is regarded as an important contribution to communitarian criticisms of liberalism, although Sandel himself does not fully accept that label.

The central argument is that Rawls's theory depends on an "unencumbered" self, meaning individuals conceived as free and rational agents, independent of their social, historical or communal ties. This assumption is illustrated by the "original position", a hypothetical scenario in which people choose the principles of justice behind a "veil of ignorance" that hides their traits, social standing and values. For Sandel, this figure does not reflect how people understand themselves in everyday life, since moral and political choices are always made within relationships, histories and social roles that partly constitute who we are.

Sandel further contends that the neutrality liberalism claims toward competing conceptions of the good is itself a substantive moral commitment. The work was first published in 1982, and its second edition adds a new introduction in which the author responds to later developments, particularly the continuing influence of Rawls and the rise of deliberative democracy. Its reception was broad: the book helped drive the liberal–communitarian debate that dominated Anglo-American political philosophy in the 1980s.