Academia – Justice Everywhere

“What I would like is for people to come at the world with lots of different ways of seeing things”; Dr Liam Kofi Bright on the philosophical canon

On 4 October, 2021

In Academia, Education, General, Pedagogy, Teaching, Teaching Philosophy

Detail of Raphael's The School of Athens

Detail of Raphael’s fresco, The School of Athens, depicting among others Plato and Aristotle

In 2020, Dr Liam Kofi Bright (LSE) was interviewed by the Dutch newspaper Trouw [in Dutch]. In that interview, he outlined his case for getting rid of philosophical canons. “The Dutch far right got very angry with me on Twitter,” Bright says. “A quite prominent far-right politician said what a terrible person I am, and a bunch of her followers agreed.” But much of this anger was based on a misunderstanding of Bright’s argument. “They assumed without really reading what I was saying that my objection was to the particular people on the canon, so say Descartes, because he was a white guy from Europe. And they, being the far right, didn’t like that. But actually my objection isn’t really to any particular items on the canon at all.”

To start off our new series of posts about teaching philosophy – titled, unimaginatively but succinctly, “Teaching Philosophy” – we caught up with Dr Bright in August 2021 to discuss his argument, and to learn more about what teaching philosophy without teaching to the philosophy canon might look like.

Political Philosophy in a Pandemic: Chapter Preview (Adam Swift)

By admin

On 13 September, 2021

In Academia, Beyond the Ivory Tower, General, MediaPhilosophy, Public Philosophy

Several Justice Everywhere authors have been involved in a book project about the ethics and politics of COVID-19. The volume, Political Philosophy in a Pandemic: Routes to a More Just Future (Bloomsbury 2021), is a collection of 20 essays covering five main themes: (1) social welfare and vulnerability; (2) economic justice; (3) democratic relations; (4) speech and (mis)information; and (5) the relationship between crisis and justice.

The second of three chapter previews that we’re releasing in the run up to the book’s publication next week comes from Adam Swift, who contributed a chapter to the final theme on the relationship between crisis and justice. His chapter, Pandemic as Political Theory, takes a step back to consider what the COVID-19 crisis reveals about the nature of politics and political theory in general.

From the Vault: Collaboration with Journal of Applied Philosophy

By admin

On 16 August, 2021

In Academia, Children, Distribution, Gender, General, Health, War

While Justice Everywhere takes a break over the summer, we recall some of the highlights from our 2020-21 season. This post focuses on our ongoing collaboration with the Journal of Applied Philosophy.

In 2019, Justice Everywhere began a collaboration with the Journal of Applied Philosophy. The journal is a unique forum that publishes philosophical analysis of problems of practical concern, and several of its authors post accessible summaries of their work on Justice Everywhere. These posts draw on diverse theoretical viewpoints and bring them to bear on a broad spectrum of issues, ranging from the environment and immigration to economics, parenting, and punishment.

For a full list of these posts, visit the JAP page on Justice Everywhere. For a flavour of the range, you might read:

Dick Timmer’s post, which explores the question: Can Someone Be Too Rich? In it, he spells out his version of “limitarianism” – a theory about why we should limit people’s wealth.
Fiona Woollard’s post on Why There are Some Things You Can Only Know if You’ve Been Pregnant – and Why this Matters.
Kasper Lippert-Rasmussen’s post, A Puzzle about Disability and Old Age, which explores the connections between disability-related disadvantages and old-age-related disadvantages.
A Symposium on the Ethics of Indirect Intervention, co-edited by Helen Frowe and Ben Matheson, which includes contributions from James Christensen on Selling Weapons to Oppressive Regimes: Does it Make a Difference? and Helen Frowe on Why We (Usually) Shouldn’t Fund Rebellions.

From the Vault: Good Reads on Public Philosophy

By admin

On 9 August, 2021

In Academia, Beyond the Ivory Tower, Children, General, Governance, Public Philosophy

While Justice Everywhere takes a short break over the summer, we recall some of the highlights from our 2020-21 season.

Here are three good reads on issues relating to public philosophy that you may have missed or be interested to re-read:

In From Armchair to Engaged Philosophy, Nicolás Brando reflects on the the benefits of philosophers directly engaging with their subjects of research throughout the whole research process – applying this to children as the subject of an important strand of recent and current philosophising. Nicolás’s post references Diana Popescu’s interview with Jo Wolff, which discusses the idea of “engaged philosophy”, published as part of our Beyond the Ivory Tower series.
Anh Le’s post, which addresses the question: Should Academics also be Activists?
Lisa Herzog’s interview with Rowan Cruft, the latest in our Beyond the Ivory Tower series, in which they discuss his public philosophy, and in particular his contribution to the Leveson Inquiry into the practices and ethics of the British media.

Should we revive the ancient practice of ostracism?

By Alexandru Volacu

On 3 May, 2021

In Academia, Democracy, General, Governance

A well-known aphorism by George Santayana says that “those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it”. Less well-known, though, is the sentence used to preface this aphorism, namely that “when experience is not retained […] infancy is perpetual”. While the former is often used to highlight the importance of learning from past mistakes, the latter underlines the importance of learning from the beneficial (albeit defunct) practices of the past. But can historical practices inform contemporary political philosophy? Anthoula Malkopoulou’s insightful analysis of the Athenian institution of ostracism suggests a positive response. On her view, we should understand ostracism as a mechanism of democratic self-defence, which could plausibly be revived in a modern version. In the following lines I will further explore this suggestion.

Political Philosophy and Political Work at the University

By admin

On 29 March, 2021

In Academia, Education, General, Work

In this guest post, Gottfried Schweiger (University of Salzburg) discusses the university as a political place and outlines four different kinds of political work that take place within it.

Political philosophy reflects on the big problems and injustices in the world and how they can be changed for the better. Political work and the specifics of the organization and social space that is the “university” are rarely explicitly reflected upon, yet political philosophy would have the tools to do so.

It is not enough to listen carefully – we also have to identify who is not in the epistemic room

By Leonie Smith

On 15 February, 2021

In Academia, Duties, Gender, General, Moral values

Shawn raises his hand and asks quietly: “Mr Warner?” […] Mr Warner does not hear Shawn or notice his raised hand. Instead, Mr Warner is fielding questions from a group of middle-class students […] Shawn sighs and puts his hand down (Calarco 2018: 164).

Post by Leonie Smith and Alfred Archer

Introduction

When middle-class students are regularly heard in the classroom and working-class students, such as Shawn, are regularly not heard, and when news reporters consistently fail to seek out women experts to the same extent that they seek out men experts, something unjust is happening. In a recent paper, we argue that this something is an epistemic attention deficit.

With Friends Like These, Free Speech Doesn’t Need Enemies

By Robert Simpson

On 18 January, 2021

In Academia, General, Governance, Liberty, MediaPhilosophy

Conservatives are the only people who believe in free speech nowadays. At any rate, that’s what many conservatives seem to think. Witness the wearying succession of anti-leftist think-pieces about how progressives have turned into authoritarian censors. Or notice the meteoric rise (and fall) of Parler, a social media site touting itself as a free-speech-friendly rival to censorious Silicon Valley tech giants. Or see the many comedians who, while mostly sharing the progressive sensibilities of coastal elites, bemoan the chilling of free speech at universities. Today, if you care about free speech and you’re looking for staunch allies, they’re more likely to be found in conservative circles.

The Left, the Right and Political Realism

By Pierre-Etienne Vandamme

On 11 January, 2021

In Academia, General, Migration, Moral values, Public Philosophy

Realism Vs Idealism Quotes. QuotesGram

Stating that it is difficult nowadays for a state to pursue ambitious redistributive policies through a highly progressive tax system: is it right-wing or simply realistic? Claiming that it will not be possible to fund a universal basic income sufficient to cover the basic needs of all citizens, or to open borders and offer quality social protection to everyone at the same time: are these instances of taking economic constraints seriously or defending the status quo?

Is realism right-wing?

On closer inspection, many political issues that tend to be placed on the left-right spectrum could be interpreted as opposing an idealistic and a realistic perspective. However, these two oppositions are not identical.

From Armchair to Engaged Philosophy

By Nicolás Brando

On 7 December, 2020

In Academia, Children, General

by Leslie Herman.

Philosophy as a method of study is perceived as detached from reality. When we think of a philosopher, we tend to imagine him (unfortunately, we usually imagine a man) with his books, locked in a room, roaming in a field alone with his thoughts. Traditionally, philosophy is considered as a detached exercise: it is a research process between me, my books and my thoughts; at best, it is considered as an exercise of Socratic dialogue with peers and colleagues. Even in more “engaged” philosophical subdisciplines (political, social, moral philosophy, or ethics), philosophers have tended to work in a vacuum; unencumbered by the contingencies and general messiness of everyday reality, they attempt to find absolute truths about justice, inequality, the good, or society, without looking out the window to see what justice, inequality, the good or society are in real life.

While there are, indeed, benefits to armchair philosophising, I want here to briefly explore its limitations, and to encourage the use of an alternative philosophical method, especially when working on topics or issues that are relevant to our society, our political system, and our understanding of justice. Namely, I want to encourage direct engagement with our subjects of research, not only as sources of information, but as structural contributors to the development of our research projects and its priorities.

Justice Everywhere

a blog about philosophy in public affairs

Category: Academia (Page 1 of 8)

“What I would like is for people to come at the world with lots of different ways of seeing things”; Dr Liam Kofi Bright on the philosophical canon

Political Philosophy in a Pandemic: Chapter Preview (Adam Swift)

From the Vault: Collaboration with Journal of Applied Philosophy

From the Vault: Good Reads on Public Philosophy

Should we revive the ancient practice of ostracism?

Political Philosophy and Political Work at the University

It is not enough to listen carefully – we also have to identify who is not in the epistemic room

With Friends Like These, Free Speech Doesn’t Need Enemies

The Left, the Right and Political Realism

From Armchair to Engaged Philosophy

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