What would a fair society look like?

Our society faces multiple crisis — culture wars, unprecedented dissatisfaction with democracy, vast inequalities, a climate and ecological emergency — but where is the alternative? 

In his recent book, Free and Equal: What Would a Fair Society Look Like?, Daniel Chandler argues that the ideas we need are hiding in plain sight, in the work of the twentieth century's greatest political philosopher, John Rawls. Although Rawls revolutionised philosophy — he is routinely compared to figures such as Plato, Hobbes and Mill – his distinctive vision of a fair society has had little impact on politics, until now. 

In this talk Daniel Chandler will explore how Rawls’s ideas can rehabilitate liberalism as a progressive public philosophy, and point the way towards a practical agenda that would reinvigorate democratic politics and transform, or even transcend, capitalism.

Daniel Chandler is an economist and philosopher based at the LSE. He has degrees in economics, philosophy and history from Cambridge and the LSE, and was awarded a Henry Fellowship at Harvard where he studied under Amartya Sen. He has also worked as a policy advisor in the Prime Minister's Strategy Unit and at think tanks including Resolution Foundation and the Institute for Fiscal Studies.

The event is supported by STICERD and the Mouradian Foundation. 

Professor Oriana Bandiera will chair the event. 

Further discussants to be announced.

Tickets to attend will be available closer to the time.