The Bizarre World of Historical Theories of Justice: Revisiting Nozick's Argument (Robert Nozick) (Critical Essay‪)‬

1. Introduction In Anarchy, State, and Utopia, (1) Robert Nozick defends his entitlement theory against patterned and end-state theories of justice. He claims that unlike patterned and end-state theories of justice, the entitlement theory is consistent with people's liberty. In other words, he argues that the entitlement theory is consistent with people's liberty because it is a historical unpatterned theory of justice. This argument has been attacked on many different grounds. For instance, it has been argued that some patterned and end-state theories of justice are not inconsistent with people's liberty. (2) Others have claimed that the entitlement theory itself is a patterned or end-state theory of justice and that, therefore, it has the defect that Nozick attributes to all patterned and end-state theories of justice. (3)