Underlying Counterfactual Conditionals in Rawls' 'Justice as Fairness' - How the Overlapping Consensus Becomes Functional to the Original Position

Since A Theory of Justice came up in 1971, the metaphor of the Original Position has brought up not only a nurturing debate but also enduring criticism. Rawls himself contended that the Original Position was merely an hypothetical expository device to build up a foundational environment where a fair agreement could be settled for the best principles of justice to obtain. He even took great pains to improve upon his basic arguments. However, as he humbly acknowledged many times, there remained unwieldy issues at the core of A Theory of Justice in need of further diligence