In a hugely significant and much discussed series of writings, G. A. Cohen attacks John Rawls's “justice as fairness” for permitting morally arbitrary inequalities. On Cohen's view, these inequalities are at odds with the egalitarian ethos that ought, by Rawls's own lights, to govern the attitudes and actions of agents in a Rawlsian society.1 One potential reply which Cohen canvasses on behalf of Rawlsians, and then proceeds to attack, is the “Freedom Objection.”2 The Freedom Objection has received some attention, but there is much more to say about it. In my view, the Freedom Objection constitutes an important line of the Rawlsian's defense against Cohen's criticisms, and it remains underappreciated why and how Cohen's responses to it are unsatisfactory.3 The article unfolds as follows. Section I deals with necessary points of exposition: I supply some brief background to Cohen's general critique of Rawls's justice as fairness, and then I go on to outline the Freedom Objection, which comes in two versions. In section II, I outline and then assess Cohen's response to the “First Version” of the Freedom Objection, which has received comparatively little examination thus far. Then, in section III, I outline and assess Cohen's way of dealing with the “Second Version” of the Freedom Objection. A notable inconsistency between Cohen's treatment of the First Version and his treatment of the Second Version is also identified in section III. The discussion concludes, in section IV, with a further suggestion of why Cohen may find it more difficult than he thinks to escape commitment to the legal enforcement of occupational choice.

中文翻译：

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罗尔斯激励和自由反对

GA Cohen 在一系列意义重大且讨论广泛的著作中抨击了约翰·罗尔斯 (John Rawls) 的“正义即公平”，因为它允许道德上任意的不平等。在科恩看来，这些不平等与平等主义精神不一致，根据罗尔斯自己的观点，平等主义精神应该支配罗尔斯社会中代理人的态度和行为。 1 科恩代表罗尔斯主义者进行了一项潜在的答复，然后继续攻击，就是“自由反对”。2 自由反对受到了一些关注，但关于它还有很多话要说。在我看来，自由反对构成了罗尔斯对科恩批评的重要防御路线，而科恩对它的回应为何以及如何令人不满意，仍然没有得到充分理解。3 文章展开如下。第一部分处理必要的阐述要点：我对科恩对罗尔斯的正义作为公平的一般批判提供了一些简要背景，然后我继续概述了自由反对意见，它有两个版本。在第二部分中，我概述并评估了科恩对自由反对“第一版”的回应，迄今为止，该反对意见的审查相对较少。然后，在第三部分，我概述并评估了科恩处理“第二版”自由异议的方式。科恩对第一个版本的处理与他对第二个版本的处理之间的显着不一致也在第三部分中确定。讨论在第四节结束，