In Elements of a Critical Theory of Justice, the Uruguayan political philosopher Gustavo Pereira (2013a) does an admirable job of combining, in an original theoretical formulation, contributions for reflection on the nature of justice in a democratic society, deriving from two distinct traditions of contemporary political philosophy. One tradition is the “Critical Theory†of society, as expressed in writings by the contemporary heirs of the Frankfurt School, especially Jürgen Habermas, Karl-Otto Apel and Axel Honneth. Let me call the other tradition “post-Rawls theories of justiceâ€. At least for the aims of the present article, this latter broad category can include the theoretical formulations of authors who have significant differences with Rawls, such as G. A. Cohen, Amartya Sen and Martha Nussbaum. The idea is to propose a “critical theory of justice†or, we might say, a conception of “critical social justice.†The basic elements of this conception are extracted from theoretical perspectives that belong to these two traditions and are then articulated “in a new and systematized fashion, in such a way that the new theory can overcome the shortcomings of the original theories and express a higher commitment to application†(PEREIRA, 2013a, p. 05). The intellectual ambition of this effort can hardly be underestimated. Regardless of how one appraises the success of this project by judging it according to its most ambitious aspirations, the discussion developed by Pereira to specify the “elements†of his conception of critical social justice makes this book highly relevant for students of normative political theory, especially those concerned with social justice issues.
