Review essay: Deregulation and distributive justice [Book Review]

This article is an extended critical review of a set of essays arguing for the deregulation of U.S. industry. The essays are by mostly lawyers and economists, not philosophers. The writers act as though non-market-based theories of distributive justice do not exist. Nonetheless, the essays are ingenious and sophisticated enough to present a considerable challenge to such theories. In criticism I discuss chiefly two broad themes — the considerations a non-market-based theory would adduce in rebuttal, and the use by the writers of the existing legal framework. The book illustrates most forcefully the clash between rival philosophical visions of the Good Society.