Rich democracies around the world are today afflicted by an array of morbid symptoms: rampant economic inequality, disaffection with democratic institutions and ruling elites, increasing partisan polarization, a rising tide of authoritarian populism, and an ever more dire climate crisis. In his new book, Free and Equal: What Would a Fair Society Look Like?, economist and philosopher Daniel Chandler argues that advocates for progressive social change must respond to these crises by offering a coherent, systematic vision of what a just society looks like, and that we can find a framework for such a vision in the political philosophy of John Rawls.

It is to Chandler’s credit that he appreciates the power and radicalism of Rawls’s theory, and that he ably defends the philosopher from common misreadings and misplaced objections. Free and Equal effectively argues that, taken seriously, Rawls’s theory of justice would recommend wide-ranging social and economic reforms to rich democracies like the United States and the UK, many of which the Left indeed embrace. But in showing himself to be a faithful disciple of Rawls, Chandler recapitulates an important weakness of the former’s philosophy: failing to grapple adequately with the structural obstacles capitalism imposes to realizing a just society.