Hope Transfigured

When a friend publishes a book you sort of feel you ought to read it - especially when it only costs £3.95 and spans only 26 pages! When I was sent the information about Nick Sagovsky's new book "The Revelance of Rawls" I was trying to remember whether rawls were some sort of wood working tool or one of those financial packages like 'futures', 'sub-primes', and 'derivatives'. It turns out Rawls, John Rawls, was a political philosopher whom Sagovsky considers to be the most significant of the twentieth century. His concerns were for justice and the creation of just political structures in society.

Sagovsky, who has been Canon Theologian at Westminster Abbey and held professorial chairs at Roehampton and Liverpool Hope Universities, has sub-titled his book(let) "Justice as Fairness in Turbulent Times". In seven short chapters he reviews Rawls' approach to justice and then applies this to our contemporary context of bankers' bonuses, child poverty, Greece's collapsing economy, and environmental destruction. I was interested to see that in his search for justice and fairness Rawls came to reject the Christian faith, not because of its basic doctrines but because of "its persecution" of heretics and dissenters.

So why has Sagovsky resurrected Rawls (who died in 2002) now? Because he feels that he has something to say to us about "fairness" as justice in society today. For example Sagovsky suggests that Rawls would not necessarily have objected to banker's bonuses BUT he would have asked who benefits from these. If it is only the 'already rich' that is unjust, but if it can be reliably shown that these bonuses benefit the most vulnerable and deprived in society (by, for example, providing the sort of financial stability now sadly missing in Greece) then they could be judged just. Rawls had some very interesting criteria for judging what is just - ensuring that all members of society (present and future) have equal access to all basics needed for human thriving. The question Sagovsky raises is, "What do human beings need in order to thrive?" How would a Christian answer that question?

If you are interrsted in justice in society and our current political/economic structural crises then this is a stimulating read.