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Shiavault - a Vault of Shia Islamic Books Book Review: Whose Justice? Which Rationality? By Alasdair Macintyre Book Review: Whose Justice? Which Rationality? by Alasdair MacIntyre University of Notre Dame Press, 1988, 410 pp, index . By Dr. Muhammad Legenhausen Introduction This is an important book, a book with which Muslims, in particular, need to become acquainted. The author, Alasdair MacIntyre, is one of the most profound and most controversial moralists and social thinkers of our time.

The book, Whose Justice? Which Rationality? Is not an easy work it requires some familiarity with various details of Western culture, in particular its moral and political philosophies. So, rather than merely summarize the work, I will try to show why I think it is important for Muslim thinkers to read and criticize it.

For this purpose I begin with a general discussion of the work's importance in the context of MacIntyre's other writings, and then turn to two of the major topics discussed in the work, relativism and liberalism. Finally, I offer some humble criticisms of my own, and suggestions for further research. Of all those who have stood against the currents of modernism, Alasdair MacIntyre stands out as the philosopher who has offered the most profound critique.

His After Virtue , which was first published in 1981, sent shock waves through the Western intellectual world.1 He committed what for many was an unforgivable sin when heclaimed that the project of the Enlightenment period of European thought was a failure. This rejection of modernist thinking was focused upon moral philosophy, but it attracted the attention of a readership much wider than what could be expected for a book in ethics.

There were even articles in the popular press about the revival of Aristotelian thought initiated by MacIntyre's work, and in the article on the history of twentieth century Anglo-American Ethics in the Encyclopedia of Ethics, Alan Donagan predicts that MacIntyre's attention to Thomistic thought will influence the philosophical work to be done in the Twenty first century.2 MacIntyre's work has also sparked controversy among political theorists and social critics, as well as professional philosophers.3 Conferences have been convened to discuss his ideas, critical studies of his work have been compiled, and several of his books and articles have been translated into foreign languages.