# Quote — Amartya Sen, The Idea of Justice

> ...a theory of justice that can serve as the basis of practical reasoning must include ways of judging how to reduce injustice and advance justice, rather than aiming only at the characterization of perfectly just societies – an exercise that is such a dominant feature of many theories of justice in political philosophy today.

- Author: [Amartya Sen](https://www.leafyquotes.com/amartya-sen.md)
- Book: [The Idea of Justice](https://www.leafyquotes.com/amartya-sen/the-idea-of-justice.md)
- Source: [Wikiquote](https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Amartya_Sen#The_Idea_of_Justice_(2009)) ([CC BY-SA 4.0](https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/))
- Quote page: https://www.leafyquotes.com/amartya-sen/the-idea-of-justice/a-theory-of-justice

## More from this book

> Rather, it is the firmly ‘open’ outlook, which Smith’s ‘impartial spec tator’ invokes, that may be in some need of reassertion today. It can make a substantial difference to our understanding of the demands of impartiality in moral and political philosophy in the interconnected world in which we live.

[Quote page](https://www.leafyquotes.com/amartya-sen/the-idea-of-justice/rather-it-is-the.md)

> To ask how things are going and whether they can be improved is a constant and inescapable part of the pursuit of justice.

[Quote page](https://www.leafyquotes.com/amartya-sen/the-idea-of-justice/to-ask-how.md)

> Even though in the approach presented here principles of justice will not be defined in terms of institutions, but rather in terms of the lives and freedoms of the people involved, institutions cannot but play a significant instrumental role in the pursuit of justice.

[Quote page](https://www.leafyquotes.com/amartya-sen/the-idea-of-justice/even-though-in-the.md)