While ideal theory tells us “what a perfectly just society would be like” (Rawls, 1971, p. 8), our current social world is far from perfectly just, and we clearly want to know how to orient ourselves and act in these less than perfectly just, or unjust, circumstances. This is why many political philosophers1 today agree that what is needed is nonideal theory. There is, however, disagreement on one key issue. While some—most notably Charles W. Mills and Amartya Sen—have argued that nonideal theory does not need to build on ideal theory and should do without it, others have pointed out ways in which ideal theory may still be necessary for doing nonideal theory, and that ideal theory should not be dismissed so easily for the project of nonideal theory. The central question, then, is whether nonideal theory should rely on ideal theory.