Farrelly critically assesses the main contemporary theories of justice, including liberal egalitarianism and right and left variants of libertarianism. He argues against the principled paradigm of ideal theory and champions instead a virtue-oriented theory of justice entitled 'civic liberalism'. Farrelly focuses on three civic virtues -toleration, civility and fairness - and applies the theory of civic liberalism to a number of applied topics, ranging from constitutional design and free speech to welfare reform and economic incentives. Justice, Democracy and Reasonable Agreement is a plea for political philosophers to take seriously a range of non-ideal considerations such as scarcity, pervasive disadvantage, non-compliance, indeterminacy, disagreement and fallibility. This book helps bridge the gap between political philosophy and real politics.

The 'Principled Paradigm' of Ideal Theory
The Virtues of Fair Social Cooperation
The Simplifying Assumptions of Rawlsian Justice
The Cost-blind Approach to Rights (Continued…)
Dualism, Incentives and the Demands of Justice
Should the Left Embrace Left-Libertarianism?
A Citizens' Basic Income, Workfare and Reciprocity
Neutrality and Toleration
The 'Dialogical Model' of Judicial Review
Deliberative Democracy
Conclusion

COLIN FARRELLY is Assistant Professor in the Department of Political Science at the University of Waterloo, Canada. He is the author of An Introduction to Contemporary Political Theory (2004) and he has held academic appointments at Oxford University, Manchester University, Birmingham University and Aberdeen University.