Please make sure to answer the following essay question  “Do you agree with Rawls that justice is the first virtue of politics or political institutions? Discuss.” If you agree or disgree with Rawls then please make that clear throughout the essay. Please provide wide knowledge of relevant literature and insight into what is at stake in debates within the literature in the broadest context; Insights into works of art and theories of art AND/OR into philosophical arguments and their implications which are evidently the result of independent, original and highly innovative thinking;  Subtle, discriminating and sophisticated arguments;  Flawless or nearly flawless presentation. Evidence of wide, critical reading and mastery of the relevant literature; sensitive and original visual analysis of works of art AND/OR very detailed and insightful presentation of philosophical ideas; well-founded knowledge of the broader historical or critical context of a particular problem or phenomenon AND/OR sophisticated exposition of philosophical positions and arguments; sustained imaginative and rational argument based on individual reflection and thought. 
Below are the mandotory readings that you MUST use but you can include a couple of your readings to back up the arguments in this essay question:
Samuel Freeman, Rawls, Routledge, 2007. 
Raymond Geuss, Philosophy and Real Politics, Princeton UP, 2008.
John Rawls, Justice as Fairness: A Restatement, Erin Kelly (ed.), Harvard UP, 2001, pp. 1-50.
Samuel Freeman (ed.), The Cambridge Companion to Rawls, CUP, 2003, esp. “Introduction” and Ch. 3.Samuel Freeman, Rawls, Polity, 2007.
Katrina Forrester, In the Shadow of Justice: Postwar Liberalism and the Remaking of Political Philosophy, Princeton University Press, 2019.
Charles Mills, ‘The Whiteness of Political Philosophy’, in: Black Rights/White Wrongs: The Critique of Racial Liberalism, Oxford UP, 2017.
Thomas Pogge, John Rawls: His Life and Theory of Justice, OUP, 2007.
John Rawls, A Theory of Justice, Revised Edition, Harvard UP, 1999, §§ 1-4, pp. 3-19.
 John Simmons, “Ideal and Nonideal Theory”, Philosophy & Public Affairs 38 (2010), pp. 5- 36.