Where Do Our Political Rules Come From? A Look at Political Constructivism
The Puzzle
Imagine you and your best friend are trying to divide a pizza. You both agree it should be fair. But what does “fair” actually mean? Does it mean equal slices? Does it mean the person who’s hungrier gets more? Does it mean whoever paid gets the biggest piece? You could argue about this forever.
Now imagine that instead of arguing about what fairness is, you both agree to a different approach. You say: “Let’s create a procedure for deciding. We’ll both close our eyes. One of us will cut the pizza, and the other gets to pick their slice first.” That way, neither of you can cheat, and whatever you end up with is fair because you both agreed to the rules beforehand.
A group of political philosophers, led by John Rawls (pronounced “rawlz”), wondered: what if the same idea applies to the big rules that govern our entire society? What if there’s no secret “true” list of what justice requires—out there in the universe like a hidden treasure map—and instead, justice is something we construct together, using a fair procedure?
This idea is called political constructivism. It’s weird, it’s powerful, and philosophers still argue fiercely about whether it’s right.
Part 1: The Big Claim
Here’s the bold claim that constructivists make: some things become reasons for acting fairly because we’ve gone through the right procedure to decide what counts as fair. Not because those reasons were always there, hiding in some invisible moral universe.
Think about it this way. In your school, there’s probably a rule about raising your hand before speaking. That rule wasn’t discovered by some ancient philosopher who stared at the cosmos until they saw “RAISE YOUR HAND” written in the stars. Someone made it up. And it gives you a reason to act (raise your hand) that you wouldn’t have had without the rule. The procedure (the class agreeing on rules, or the teacher setting them) created a new reason.
Constructivists say something similar about basic principles of justice. The principles that tell us what’s fair aren’t discovered—they’re constructed. They’re like artifacts, things we build, not things we find.
But here’s the tricky part: constructivists don’t think we can just make up any rules. The procedure itself has to be fair. And that’s where things get complicated.
Part 2: Rawls’s Thought Experiment
John Rawls, the most famous political philosopher of the 20th century, had a brilliant idea for what a fair procedure might look like. He called it the original position.
Here’s the thought experiment he wanted you to run in your head:
Imagine you have to design the basic rules for a brand-new society. But there’s a catch. You’re behind a veil of ignorance. You don’t know anything about yourself. You don’t know if you’ll be rich or poor, smart or not-so-smart, born into a supportive family or a difficult one, healthy or sick. You don’t even know what you’ll value most in life.
What rules would you choose, knowing you could end up anywhere?
Rawls argued that people in this situation would choose two basic principles. First, everyone gets the most extensive basic liberties possible (freedom of speech, religion, etc.). Second, inequalities are only allowed if they benefit everyone, especially the least advantaged. (This is called the difference principle.)
The point isn’t that these principles are “true” in some cosmic sense. They’re reasonable. They’re what free and equal people would agree to if they had to think fairly about their society.
This part gets technical, but here’s what it accomplishes: Rawls tried to show that principles of justice don’t need to be based on some mysterious “moral reality” floating out there. Instead, they come from a procedure that anyone, regardless of their background beliefs, could accept. That’s the heart of constructivism.
Part 3: What’s Being Constructed (and What Isn’t)
One thing that’s easy to misunderstand: constructivists don’t think everything is constructed. Rawls was clear about this. The procedure itself—the original position, the veil of ignorance, the idea that citizens are free and equal—these are not constructed. They’re assumptions we start with, what Rawls called the “material” we build from.
Think of it like baking a cake. You start with flour, eggs, sugar, and butter (the non-constructed ingredients). Then you follow a recipe (the procedure). The cake (your principles of justice) is what comes out. The cake is constructed, but the ingredients aren’t.
What’s special about Rawls’s view is that the ingredients he starts with are things he thinks any reasonable person in a democratic society already accepts: that people are free, that they’re equal, that society should be fair. You don’t need to be a religious believer or an atheist or anything else to agree on those basics.
Part 4: Why “Political” Matters
You might be wondering: why call it political constructivism? Why not just moral constructivism?
Here’s where things get interesting—and a little painful for some philosophers.
Rawls noticed something about modern societies: people disagree about almost everything important. Some people believe God gave us moral rules. Others think morality comes from human reason. Others think it’s about making the world better. And these disagreements don’t seem to go away, no matter how smart or well-meaning people are.
Rawls called this the fact of reasonable pluralism. It’s not just that people disagree. It’s that reasonable people—people who think carefully and in good faith—still end up with different views.
So here’s the problem: if you try to base your political rules on one particular moral or religious view (say, “God says everyone should be treated equally”), you’re asking people who don’t share that view to accept rules they don’t have good reason to accept. That’s not fair to them.
Political constructivism tries to sidestep this problem. It doesn’t claim to be the whole truth about morality or God or the meaning of life. It only claims to be reasonable for political purposes—for deciding how we should treat each other as citizens.
This part gets complicated, but here’s the upshot: Rawls wanted a political system that people with very different worldviews could all sign onto, without having to give up their deepest beliefs. It’s a bit like asking: can we agree on traffic laws even if we disagree about what makes life worth living?
Part 5: The Big Critic
No big philosophical idea goes unchallenged. G. A. Cohen (another philosopher, not the musician) spent years arguing that constructivism is deeply mistaken.
Cohen’s main objection went something like this. Imagine you believe that inequality is bad just because it’s inequality—not because it hurts anyone, but just because people being unequally well-off is itself unfair. Most of us have felt this: it bothers you when someone gets more even if you’re not losing anything.
Cohen argued that constructivism can’t explain why that’s wrong. Because constructivism only cares about whether people benefit from the rules, not about whether the rules are truly fair in some deeper sense.
Here’s an example Cohen might give. Suppose there are two ways to split a pizza between three people:
Option A: Everyone gets 2 slices. Option B: Two people get 3 slices, one person gets 2 slices.
If the person with 2 slices isn’t complaining (they’re not worse off than in Option A), constructivism might say: Option B is fine. It makes two people better off and nobody worse off.
But Cohen would say: No! The inequality itself is unjust, even if it’s “harmless.” And constructivism has no way to account for that.
Rawls had an answer to this, but philosophers still argue about whether it works. The debate gets very technical, but the core question is simple: are there moral truths that exist before any procedure, or do we create them through fair procedures?
Part 6: Why It Still Matters
This might seem like an abstract debate among philosophy professors. But it has real-world stakes.
Think about political arguments you hear. Some people say: “We need to fix the system based on what’s actually just.” Others say: “We need to find rules that everyone can agree on, even if they’re not perfect.”
These two approaches reflect the tension between constructivism and its critics. Constructivists worry that if you claim to know “what’s really just,” you’ll end up forcing your view on other people who don’t share it. Critics worry that if you settle for “what reasonable people can agree on,” you might tolerate injustices that no amount of agreement can fix.
There’s no easy answer. That’s what makes this a live debate, not a settled question.
What You Can Do With This
The next time you’re in an argument about what’s fair—whether it’s about rules at school, dividing chores at home, or how to treat a friend—you can notice something. Are you trying to discover what fairness really requires? Or are you trying to construct a fair procedure that everyone can live with?
Neither approach is obviously right. But noticing the difference might change how you argue, and maybe even help you find agreements you didn’t see before.
Appendices
Key Terms
| Term | What it does in the debate |
|---|---|
| Constructivism | The view that principles of justice are created, not discovered, through a fair procedure |
| Original position | Rawls’s thought-experiment where you design society without knowing your place in it |
| Veil of ignorance | The device that prevents you from designing rules that just benefit yourself |
| Fact of reasonable pluralism | The observation that reasonable people will always disagree about deep moral and religious questions |
| Political constructivism | A version of constructivism that only claims authority for political rules, not for all of morality |
| Difference principle | The idea that inequalities are only fair if they benefit the least advantaged people |
| Harmless injustice | Unequal outcomes that hurt nobody but still seem unfair—a problem for constructivism |
Key People
- John Rawls (1921–2002): A Harvard philosopher who spent decades thinking about justice. He argued that fair procedures create fair principles, and that we can agree on basic political rules without agreeing on everything else.
- G. A. Cohen (1941–2009): A philosopher at Oxford who was both a socialist and a sharp critic of Rawls. He believed that some truths about justice are deeper than any procedure can capture.
Things to Think About
- If you were behind the veil of ignorance, would you really choose the principles Rawls said you would? Or would you choose something different—and why?
- Is it possible for a procedure to be truly fair if the people designing it don’t agree on what “fair” means in the first place?
- The “harmless injustice” objection: does it bother you if some people have more than others, even if nobody is worse off? Should it?
- Can you think of a time when you accepted a rule you didn’t fully agree with, just because the process that made it seemed fair? What made you accept it?
Where This Shows Up
- School politics: Debates about student government, dress codes, and classroom rules often involve the same question: should rules come from what’s “right” or from what everyone can agree on?
- Real politics: Arguments about taxes, healthcare, and education often boil down to this: is there a “true” just distribution, or just one we can all live with?
- Your own arguments: Next time you fight with a friend about what’s fair, notice whether you’re trying to discover a hidden truth or create a workable agreement.