Abstract

This paper reconstructs Jean-Jacques Rousseau’s position on the limits of legitimate economic inequality as presented in his Second Discourse. It argues that, although Rousseau’s position is egalitarian in that it places severe limits on permissible inequalities, he values economic equality instrumentally, not for its own sake but only as a means for promoting freedom and for securing the social conditions that make recognition, a central component of human well-being, available to all. The paper articulates the conception of freedom at work in Rousseau’s view, showing both how his conception differs from Philip Pettit’s and how John Rawls’s conception of justice could be enriched by according greater importance to Rousseau’s concerns about economically caused forms of domination.