advocates for a realization-based comparison of actual institutions and
behaviour, rather than the search for “perfectly just institutions” on which
theories of justice are typically focused (Sen, 2009). The author draws attention
to the problems of feasibility and redundancy that are inevitably present in a
transcendental agreement of justice. The example employed, “Three Children
and a Flute”, suggests that three different Children claim a flute – the one who
made it, the one who knows how to play it, and the poorest one among the
three. Different perspectives would suggest different responses regarding who
should get the flute, all with meaningful arguments in their support, illustrating
the difficulty in establishing a unique set of principles. Consequently, Sen
considers a transcendental identification of justice to be neither necessary nor
sufficient (Sen, 2009:4).
Much of Sen’s criticism is directed at John Rawls, as the developer of the
most widely accepted theory of justice. Nonetheless, Sen draws a lot from
Rawls’s work, particularly from his account of justice as fairness, which has been
crucial to the overall understanding of the impartiality requirements of justice.
Yet, Rawls’ theory is what Sen identifies as “transcendental institutionalism”. The
assumption that in the original position, under the “veil of ignorance”, everyone
would choose the same highly specific principles, does not account for the
“plurality of sustainable reasons”, or the several conflicting matters that should
concern justice (Sen, 2009: 2). Accordingly, Rawls’s theory seems to be too
focused on just institutions and disregarding of actual behavioural patterns to fit
into Sen’s realization-based resolutions. Additionally, although the “veil of
ignorance” eliminates the possibility of biased decision-making at the individual
level, it fails to eliminate group prejudices, potentially allowing the persistence
of parochial values which compromise objectivity (Sen, 2009:6). The contractual
nature of the Rawlsian perspective also seems to eliminate the possibility of
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