SYMPOSIUM ON GLOBALIZATION AND JUSTICE: INTRODUCTION

Abstract

For over half a century in more than a dozen books and 600 philosophical articles Kai Nielsen has developed and defended a radically egalitarian theory of social justice as well as a political vision demanding a democratic, humane form of socialism and, on an international level, a federative world socialist government embodying these values. In Globalization and Justice Nielsen applies his acute analytical abilities and his substantive theories and views to the present ongoing reality of corporate, capitalist globalization, arguing that this sort of globalization is unjust in that it further disadvantages the developing world. He then argues for an alternative sort of globalization, a process that he believes could and should have, as its end goal, a democratic and humane socialist government and society on a world-wide scale. Along the way he compares his theory and vision to those of such other major contemporary thinkers as John Rawls, Jürgen Habermas, G.A. Cohen, and Richard Rorty representing, respectively, liberal egalitarianism, critical theory, analytical Marxism (at least formerly), and post-modern eclecticism.