CRITICAL AMARTIA SEN OF THE THEORY OF JUSTICE RAWSLIANA

Abstract

The present paper focuses on Amartia Sen and an aspect of his reflection on the Rawslian theory of justice, especially about the justification of substantive and social rights and more particularly those that demand the discussion about the character and nature of the right to private appropriation of social effort. Thus, tehe focuse is understand an aspect of Amartia Sen's reflection exposed in the 3rd chapter of 'Development as freedom', in which Sen contrast the formulation of Rawls' theory of justice, regarding the priority that the author grants the formal element of freedom to the detriment of its materialization and concretization. In the name of those emerges a clear theoretical (and practical) conflict with the demands for the realization of certain rights, resulting in a dichotomy between liberties (as formal, procedural or negative freedoms) vis-a-vis the liberal-individualist tradition and within which they are opposed freedoms (understood in the context of the debate put there as concrete, material or substantive freedoms). So, we have an antinomy will be confronted with the Hart’s 'Essays in Jurisprudence and philosophy', in the sense of pointing out that a problem with Rawls' formulation is that he does not understand it necessary to reconcile the admission of private property as freedom with the general principle of maximum ‘equal freedom’. So want to ask is whether the model proposed by Sen tackles this issue better and more adequately, which implies a hypothetical framework by which, by establishing a small number of basic freedoms, the Rawslian formulation does nothing more than treat property rights as mere formal guarantee of those who have it and to the detriment of all other components of the social body. It is, therefore, as to the method, of research centered on bibliographic review.