Free and Equal: What Would a Fair Society Look Like?

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Taking Rawls’s humane and egalitarian liberalism as his starting point, Chandler builds a careful and ultimately irresistible case for a progressive agenda that would fundamentally reshape our societies for the better. A magnificent attempt to apply fundamental philosophical principles to the practical building of a better world. Far-reaching and well-evidenced, it offers a new, coherent, principles-based approach to policy design -- Professor Lord Richard Layard There is of course a case for UBI (emphasised as a tool to give more power to the workers not to be afraid to quit their jobs or to retrain), but also a variation of universal inheritance (like baby bonds). The most convincing case is, however, for compulsory representations of workers on boards of companies (like is done in more tripartite systems and coordinated markets, in Germany or Austria, with a third of board seats in smaller companies and a half in bigger ones) as well as workers’ cooperatives like the Mondragon Corporation in Spain - and Chandler proposes a few policies that would encourage this shared ownership model, through specialised banks creating financing for employee buyouts. The argumentation in this part was for me the most useful part of the book, providing a imaginative justification for policies achieving equity through relatively novel means. Free and Equal” is a book of two halves. The first half is an exposition of Rawls’ central principles. It lays out Rawls’ conception of a fair society, one in which basic freedoms of humans are protected, genuinely fair equality of opportunity for all is secured, and, the economic structure prioritizes the needs of the most disadvantaged. Chandler highlights ideas which could be misunderstood in Rawls, like his recognition that economic inequalities are about power and status as well as wealth and income. These explanations help the reader to comprehend the ideas of Rawls, by being explained by another person.

Funder reveals how O’Shaughnessy Blair self-effacingly supported Orwell intellectually, emotionally, medically and financially ... why didn’t Orwell do the same for his wife in her equally serious time of need?’ This is superb work, in both explaining Rawls for general readers and in applying Rawlsian principles to contemporary problems of social and political justice ... It is impressive - clear, concise, thorough, and accessible -- Professor Samuel Freeman, author of Rawls and editor of The Cambridge Companion to Rawls An exceptionally sane, judicious essay on what a viable democracy entails... [Chandler] develops a realistic, humane - and in its way, revolutionary - vision of a society committed to equity, inclusion and accountability. It should become an indispensable tool in political debate in the years ahead Rowan Williams, former Archbishop of Canterbury The insights from the original position experiment, which Rawls imagined would be so inspiring as to bind fractured societies together, are what Chandler thinks we need now, not only to make societies more equal, but to fill the moral vacuum at the heart of our politics. It is this, he argues, that “has made space for the rise of illiberal, antidemocratic populism”. The first part of his book is a fine elucidation of Rawls’s ideas and critical responses to them, which will be familiar to most philosophy undergraduates. It is the second part, though, in which Chandler applies Rawls’s ideas to our current plight, where things get exciting. He derides Jeremy Corbyn’s 2019 manifesto as a wishlist rather than a coherent programme, but his ideas are also a wishlist, albeit underpinned by the Rawlsian conception of justice as fairness, and more committed to the continuation of market economics and capitalism than Corbyn would countenance.This is a morally steadfast book, which liberalism's honest opponents should take for their target, and which will enliven liberal theory and perhaps even reinvigorate liberal political practice Daniel Markovits If Rawls is the answer, what is the question? Free and Equal suggests that Rawls has a distinctive moral vision that can help shift our political priorities. But that doesn’t quite seem right. There are radical and destabilising ideas out there in philosophy that would change everything if we took them seriously: deliberative democracy, cosmopolitanism and longtermism, to name three. Rawls’ core ideas – that we should protect basic freedoms, promote equality of opportunity and improve the lot of the disadvantaged – do not represent such a radical break from the status quo. They are values most people from across the political spectrum would claim to believe in, even if they fail to put them into practice. The real challenge facing Chandler and Rawls, then, is whether the book can convince people to follow through on the things they profess to believe in. Rawls’ arguments may be cogent, but I have my doubts that they have the rhetorical force to inspire and motivate people to effect change.

The other half, or rather two-thirds, of the book, is more interesting and likely more impactful, as it presents a take on the application of these theoretical principles on specific (well, to a limited extent) policy questions and areas. Some are quite common - democratic reforms like doing elections through proportional representation, written constitution, limiting the amount of campaign spending or supporting public broadcasting and media. In the sphere of creating equality of opportunity, Chandler argues for greater support of pre-primary education (expanding instruments like the pupil’s premium in the UK), but also the abolishing of private schools and a form of student fees for universities (so that those who do not attend do not subsidise benefits for the mode advantaged in the society). What is interesting is how radically unradical these ideas sometimes feel - surely for instance the abolishment of private schools in the UK is a dramatic change, but it is well argued on the basis of the difference principle and one can see the coherence of its overall approach. This is a book brimming with hope and possibility – a galvanising alternative to the cynicism that pervades our politics. Free and Equal has the potential not only to transform contemporary debate, but to offer a touchstone for a modern, egalitarian liberalism for many years to come, cementing Rawls’s place in political discourse, and firmly establishing Chandler as a vital new voice for our time. Imagine: you are designing a society, but you don’t know who you’ll be within it – rich or poor, man or woman, gay or straight. To be fair, in some cases Chandler’s recommendations flow naturally from Rawls’ work in ways that seem prescient given our current challenges. For example, Chandler’s call for a written constitution makes sense as a way to recognise the priority Rawls gives to basic liberties, and to make the protection of individual rights less precarious, given recent efforts to scrap the Human Rights Act. His discussion of Rawlsian ‘public reason’ – to simplify, the notion that our democratic arguments should be couched in terms of political values everyone can accept rather than controversial moral or religious worldviews – has obvious relevance to ongoing ‘culture war’ issues. We are experiencing delays with deliveries to many countries, but in most cases local services have now resumed. For more details, please consult the latest information provided by Royal Mail's International Incident Bulletin.Daniel Chandler's provocative book helps make human possibilities more credible than they have been in our neoliberal age. Free and Equal doubles as an accessible guide to a leading philosophical system, and a call for a new agenda for justice in our time Samuel Moyn, author of Not Enough: Human Rights in an Unequal World If we are really serious about creating a free and equal society, at least some of the ideas Chandler suggests are necessary. Whether the next Labour government has the bottle to put them into practice is another matter. Free and Equal provides that vision. In this hugely ambitious and exhilarating debut, philosopher and economist Daniel Chandler argues that the ideas we need are hiding in plain sight, in the work of the twentieth century's greatest political philosopher, John Rawls. Although they have revolutionised philosophy, his ideas have had little impact on politics - until now. Taking Rawls's humane and egalitarian liberalism as his starting point, Chandler builds a careful and ultimately irresistible case for a progressive agenda that would fundamentally reshape our political and economic institutions. A brilliantly eloquent, incredibly insightful reimagining of liberalism, and by such a compelling writer Owen Jones Digital Reads A Curse For True Love : the thrilling final book in the Once Upon a Broken Heart series