A classic of twentieth-century political thought on the nature of justice.
“This is a humane and hopeful vision, and Mr. Walzer conveys it with a wry and gentle grace.” ―New York Times Book Review
In this landmark work, Michael Walzer makes the provocative claim that the real enemy of a just society is not inequality itself but domination—the quiet way that wealth turns into power and power into deference until an advantage in one corner of life rules over the others. Walzer offers instead a vision of what he calls complex equality, which requires that we recognize that justice is not one thing but many. Each social good, whether money or education or even love, belongs to its own sphere and follows its own rule. Society, he argues, can be just only when no one can parlay their advantages in one sphere to dominate their fellow citizens. Eschewing abstract first principles and working from the shared understandings of real communities, Spheres of Justice remains one of the most compelling challenges to abstract universalism ever written.