Eric Mack

December 2004 -- Ayn Rand was an advocate of both egoism and rights. As an advocate of egoism, she held that the individual ought not to impose upon himself sacrifices of his well-being, even if those sacrifices would promote the well-being of others. She held that the appropriate ultimate end for each individual is his achievement of his own well-being.

July/August 2001 -- John Rawls's A Theory of Justice, which was published thirty years ago, has been the most influential work of political philosophy in the second half of the twentieth century. Rawls (pictured at left) has published a great deal since, but this later work generally advances a more guarded, less universalistic, and to my mind less interesting version of the doctrine developed in A Theory of Justice.