ABSTRACT
Why do we need it: the need and equality criteria of moral desert, a “fair-share” distribution of goods, welfare? Why must democratic control pervade society in order for us to take our lives into our own hands? What is there about us, we whose lives are the point of departure for any vision of ideal society, that requires all this? Let us ask: who are the liberal’s constituents? For whom does he claim to speak? “The helpless,” “the powerless,” “the underprivileged,” “society’s victims,” he answers and, distinguishing himself from his political opponent by saying that he, the liberal, “cares about people,” he implies that people need caring about. As I said at the beginning of chapter one, liberalism has almost no plausibility unless one believes in a sufficiently profound human incompetence.
