Poeticized Culture: The Role of Irony in Rawls's Liberalism

In Poeticized Culture, James Hersh shows the John Rawls' framework of liberal public reason (Political Liberalism, 1993), within which he proposes his scheme of justice as fairness, includes an unacknowledged call for a Richard Rortian "poeticized culture." Hersh argues that, despite Rawls's intentions, his framework within which he proposes justice as fairness demands a Rortian ironic perspective and does not allow for citizens to hold absolute or literal religious beliefs.

Hersh argues that this Rortian perspective makes Rawls's justice as fairness the most reasonable scheme for the world's emerging democracies, particularly for those democracies emerging in the Middle East where literal religious beliefs are held with such fervor.