Until the 1970s, utilitarianism held a dominant position in the practical moral philosophy of the English-speaking world. Since that time, it has had a serious rival in contractualism, a, ethical theory that was relaunched into modern thinking in 1971 by John Rawls’s Theory of Justice. There were even reports of utilitarianism’s imminent death. But utilitarianism is now in a vigorous and healthy state. It is responding to familiar objections. It is facing up to new problems such as the ethics of population. It has revitalized its foundation with new arguments. It has radically changed its conception of human wellbeing. It remains a credible moral theory.

John Broome, ‘Modern Utilitarianism’, in Peter Newman (ed.), The New Palgrave Dictionary of Economics and the Law, London, 1998, p. 656