Abstract

Political theorists disagree on the origin of justice. According to the cosmopolitan conception of justice, duties of justice are pre-political and universal. According to the political conception of justice, on the other hand, full duties of justice arise within and only within the context of a political community. Which one of these conceptions one adopts will have a comprehensive impact on ethical issues concerning global justice, such as migration ethics and foreign assistance. In this paper I argue that the political conception is problematic, since it cannot be applied in cases of anarchy. Since anarchic societies are not politically organized, the political conception implies that they are not bound by full duties of justice. Thus, the political conception is unable to criticize some rival theories of justice, such as anarchistic libertarianism, for being unjust. Reversely, if one does find anarchic societies unjust, this intuition speaks against the political conception of justice, but in favor of the cosmopolitan conception. I illustrate my argument by applying it in the case of liberal egalitarianism.