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The Liberal State is a book written by Bruce A. Ackerman on the topic of social justice given scarcity in society. In this paper Ackerman gives an argument on how several principles, rationality, consistency, neutrality, and undominated equality can result in a conversational method that can determine the legitimacy of the use of power by an individual over a given resource.
Summary of the book
Ackerman starts his argument with the idea that there are a scarce amount of resources in society, and people will conflict over these scarce resources. The conflict arises over resources since a person must control their person and their immediate environment (to get food, etc.) to sustain life.
It is inevitable in a world of scarce resources in which a person will claim control over resources that another person has. The question is, how would such a conflict be resolved with a conscientious attempt at a reasonable answer?
One possible answer is to use power to attack the claimant. As well, the less power the person has, the more they stand to lose from argument; the more power the person has the more easily they can suppress the claimant. Ackerman assumes that instead of violence, the person will respond with an argument, with particular features to be discussed, as to why they should control the resources in question.
Principles, building the argument
Ackerman hopes to build a blueprint of an argument method that can successfully be used to settle claims over resources. The assumption mentioned in the last section is that the parties will not use violence to suppress the speech of the other party. Ackerman's blueprint has four principles that, when used together, can lead to a successful discussion method to resolve resource conflicts.