Debating Libertarianism
What Makes Society Just?
Published on 26. August 2025
288 pages
978-0-19-754089-3 (ISBN)
Description
Debating Libertarianism offers readers a sustained debate between two leading political philosophers over which vision of society--Rawlsian left-liberalism or libertarianism--is best and most just. In this crucial and timely book, Samuel Freeman and Jason Brennan consider both fundamental questions of justice and issues of applied policy. Along the way, they debate which economic rights people have; whether democracy liberates people and is essential for social equality, or is merely a tool to promote justice; the justification and extent of property rights and of taxation; whether the fact that freedom permits people to make bad choices is a reason to limit freedom; and whether the modern welfare state is necessary for social justice or instead a barrier to it. Debating Libertarianism offers readers both a succinct defence and critique of two important conceptions of what makes institutions just and good.
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Persons
Jason Brennan is the Robert J. and Elizabeth Flanagan Family Professor of strategy, economics, ethics, and public policy at the McDonough School of Business at Georgetown University. He is the author of seventeen books, including Cracks in the Ivory Tower (2019), When All Else Fails (2018), In Defense of Openness (2018), and Against Democracy (2016).
Samuel Freeman is the Avalon Professor Emeritus in the Humanities and Professor of Philosophy at the University of Pennsylvania. He is the author of Liberalism and Distributive Justice (2018), Justice and the Social Contract (2007), and Rawls (2007). He edited The Cambridge Companion to Rawls (2003), Rawls's Lectures in the History of Political Philosophy (2008), and John Rawls's Collected Papers (1999). He is the editor of the Oxford Political Philosophy Series and a member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences.
Content
PART 1: The Case Against
Samuel Freeman
Introduction
Chapter 1: Liberalism and Libertarianism
Chapter 2: Ideal Libertarianism and the Orthodox View
Chapter 3: Liberal Libertarianism
Chapter 4: Neoliberalism--the Intersection of Classical Liberalism and Libertarianism
Chapter 5: High Liberalism and Distributive Justice
PART 2: The Case For
Jason Brennan
Introduction
Chapter 6: Rawlsian Liberalism: Why Not
Chapter 7: Why Not Libertarianism?
Chapter 8: Anti-Social Democracy: A Libertarian Left-Wing Critique
PART 3: Responses
Chapter 9: Response to Brennan
Chapter 10: Response to Freeman
Part 1 Bibliography
Part 2 Bibliography
Index
