Deadline for submission: March 2, 2012

Sponsored by the Global Justice Program of the Whitney and Betty MacMillan Centre for International and Area Studies, Yale University and the Program in Cognitive Science, Yale University

Keynote Speakers: Paul Slovic, University of Oregon and Nicole Hassoun, Carnegie Mellon University

The call
Many individuals in affluent nations are aware that a vast number of people live in conditions of severe poverty. Yet they are more likely to go to the movies or to buy an expensive sweater than they are to give their money to humanitarian aid. The question arises, how can individuals be motivated to act on their duties to aid the global poor?

The Global Justice Program and the Department of Cognitive Science invite the submission of 350-500 word abstracts for 25-minute presentations on the subject of “Moral Psychology and Poverty Alleviation” for their upcoming workshop. The conference aims to stimulate research that can be used to develop more effective means of motivating individuals to act on their moral obligations to alleviate global poverty. For more information about topics relevant to the conference click here.

Abstracts are invited from those working in cognitive science, moral philosophy, and political science and submissions are encouraged from all levels of academia. Submissions from those taking an experimental approach to the topic are especially encouraged. Abstracts should be sent as a PDF or Word document to asapmppa (at) gmail.com by 2 March 2012. The subject line of email should read “SUBMISSION [YOUR NAME]”. In the body of the email, please state your name, affiliation, and contact information.

The conference
The Moral Psychology and Poverty Alleviation workshop is part of a two-day conference marking the one year anniversary of Academics Stand Against Poverty (ASAP). ASAP is an international network helping scholars, teachers, and students enhance their impact on global poverty. It does so by promoting collaboration amongst poverty-focused academics, helping academics reach out to broader audiences on issues of poverty, and helping them turn their expertise into impact through specific intervention projects (www.academicsstand.org).

The first day of the conference, April 12th, will be a symposium on the future of global poverty alleviation after the expiration of the Millennium Development Goals in 2015. This symposium will bring together experts in development, aid, and global justice in a dialogue about next steps on global poverty alleviation. Speakers will examine the record on increasing global inequality, developments such as large-scale microfinance, and poverty measurement and trends. Each will offer crucial insights about what has been learned about reducing severe poverty, and which lessons must be highlighted in any MDG-replacement efforts.

• Relatively advanced technical competence regarding WordPress, blogging, the ability to write/fix code, etc.
• Commitment to academic political philosophy/theory.
• General togetherness, punctuality, reliability, etc.

There is little prospect of any meaningful remuneration, but it should provide the opportunity to become more involved in the political philosophy community and play an important role in interesting new initiatives. Since the website is international, you needn’t be located in the US. I’d be especially interested if some graduate students located at a single institution were to work together to keep things ticking along smoothly, although it shouldn’t be an onerous responsibility for a single person.

If you’re interested, please send me a CV, some evidence regarding your technical expertise, and any feasible ideas/thoughts you may have about how the website could be improved. Ideally, I’d like to sort this out by the end of the month.

Charles Taylor at 80: An International Conference

March 29-31 2012, Musée des beaux-arts, Montréal

Charles Taylor à 80 ans: un colloque international

29 au 31 mars 2012, Musée des beaux-arts de Montréal

PROGRAM

March 29
9 h Introduction : Daniel Weinstock, CRÉUM, Canada Research Chair in Ethics and Political Philosophy

• 9 h 30 Epistemology, philosophy of mind and philosophy of language I

To follow a rule : Lessons from baby logic
Shaun Gallagher (University of Memphis)

Self-Interpreting Animals
Evan Thompson (University of Toronto)

Taylor’s Situated Epistemology
Ian Gold (McGill University)

• 13h30-16h00 Epistemology, philosophy of mind and philosophy of language II

Embodiment and Self-interpretation
Hubert Dreyfus (University of California at Berkeley)

Charles Taylor’s conception of language and the current debate about a theory of meaning
Hans Julius Schneider (University of Potsdam)

Taylor’s Engaged Pluralism
Richard Bernstein (New School for Social Research)

March 30

• 9h30-12h00 Religion and modernity

Varieties of Religious and Secular Phenomenological Experiences
José Casanova (Georgetown University)

A Crisis of Secularism ?
Tariq Modood (University of Bristol)

Some (Banal and Boringly Familiar) Thoughts about Secularism
Ronald Beiner (University of Toronto)

TBA, Jeanne Bethke Elshtain (University of Chicago)

• 13h30-15h00 Moral agency and the Self I

What is Wrong with Positive Liberty : The Struggles of Agency in a Non-Ideal World
John Christman (Penn State University)

What’s Right With Positive Liberty : Agency, Autonomy, and the Other
Nancy Hirschmann (University of Pennsylvania)

• 13h15-16h30 The interpretation of modernity I

Social Imaginaries, Human Action, and History
Craig Calhoun (New York University/London School of Economics)

The Telos of Modernity
Jacob Levy (McGill University)

• 16h30-18h00 The interpretation of modernity II

Whatever Happened to the Ontic Logos ?
Michael Rosen (Harvard University)

The Fragility of Things : Fullness, Vitality and the Contemporary Condition
William Connolly (Johns Hopkins University)

March 31

• 9h30-12h00 Moral agency and the Self II

Self-creation or self-discovery ?
K. Anthony Appiah (Princeton University)

Reflective Equilibrium and Degrees of Abstraction in Moral Theory
Joseph Heath (University of Toronto)

Charles Taylor and ethical naturalism
Nigel DeSouza (University of Ottawa)

• 13h30- 16h00 Political philosophy, recognition and multiculturalism

Protecting Freedom of Conscience in the Secular Age
Cécile Laborde (University College, London)

The Multiple Social Imaginaries of Modern Indian secularism
Rajeev Bhargava (Delhi/Center for the Study of Developing Societies)

“Exercises in Retrieval” : Taylor as a Thinker of Historical Transitions
Paolo Costa, (Fondazione Bruno Kessler)

TBA Michele Moody-Adams (Columbia University)

• 16h15 -18h30 Canadian politics

Charles Taylor on Deep Diversity
James Tully (University of Victoria)

Cultural Differences, Languages, Perspicuous Contrasts, and Recognition
Jeremy Webber (University of Victoria)

Démocratie, diversité et inclusion
Dominique Leydet (Université du Québec à Montréal)

Charles Taylor: Closing remarks

March 30th (evening)Public event in honor of Charles Taylor as a public intellectual

Partenaires / Partners (provisional list):

• Centre de recherche en éthique de l’Université de Montréal (CRÉUM)
• Centre for Global Challenges / Centre sur les défis mondiaux, York University
• Chaire de recherche du Canada en éthique et philosophie politique
• Association des études canadiennes
• Department of Political Science, McGill University
• Dean of Arts Development Fund, McGill University
• Fédération canadienne des sciences humaines/Canadian Federation for the Humanities and Social Sciences
• Groupe de recherche interuniversitaire en philosophie politique (GRIPP)
• Groupe de recherche sur les sociétés plurinationales (GRSP), UQÀM
• Research Group on Constitutional Studies, McGill University
• Secrétariat aux affaires intergouvernementales canadiennes (SAIC) du Québec
• Vice-rectorat à la recherche, à la création et à l’innovation, Université de Montréal

Conference co-organizers: Daniel Weinstock (Montreal), Jocelyn Maclure (Laval), Jacob T. Levy (McGill), Pierre-Yves Néron (CRÉUM)

For more information:

• http://www.creum.umontreal.ca/spip.php?article1280
• http://www.mcgill.ca/rgcs/gripp/events/taylor

Reminder - apologies for cross-posting

The Department of Politics at the University of York is now accepting applications to its long-established MA programmes in Political Philosophy and Political Philosophy (The Idea of Toleration). We typically welcome 20+ postgraduate students each year to read for these two interlinked programmes.

Our postgraduate students come from all over the world, as well as from a variety of institutions in the U.K. The size of our MA programme means that we always have a lively community of graduate students in political philosophy, with events such as the biweekly Morrell Political Theory Workshop providing a focus for staff and students working in the area.

We are a distinctively pluralistic department, which means that students on our MA degrees in Political Philosophy and Political Philosophy (The Idea of Toleration) have the opportunity to pursue a broad range of interests, from the history of early modern political thought, to contemporary liberal egalitarianism and philosophy of law, international political theory, recent European political thought, and democratic theory.

Students accepted to study for the MA in Political Philosophy (The Idea of Toleration) are eligible to apply for one of up to eight studentships generously funded by the C and JB Morrell Trust, which cover fees at the Home/EU rate, plus a £2000 contribution to living expenses.

Each year the Geoffrey Heselton Prize (worth £500) is awarded to the best dissertation written by a student on either of the programmes. There is a further prize for the student who produces the best work over the whole degree.

Previous graduates include many who have gone on to successful careers in academia, as well as high flyers in the world of business, the civil service, the media, NGOs, and a range of other careers.

Further details about these programmes, including profiles of previous students and information on the research interests of staff, is available here:

http://www.york.ac.uk/politics/prospective/postgraduates/pg-courses/ma-in-political-philosophy/

Speakers: Jean Grondin, Paul H. Fry, Carsten Dutt, Dieter Teichert, Mark Bevir, John G. Gunnell, Michael Freeden, Michael L. Frazer, Pamela Anderson, Terrell Carver, Elizabeth Frazer, James Martel, Lasse Thomassen, Joshua Foa Dienstag, Al P. Martinich, Terence Ball, David Boucher, Stanley Rosen, David Weinstein, and James Connelly. A short report on the conference can be found here. For the podcasts, please check itunes here.

Brave New World 2012, the Sixteenth Annual Postgraduate Conference organised under the auspices of the Manchester Centre for Political Theory (MANCEPT), will take place on Wednesday 27th and Thursday 28th June 2012 at the University of Manchester.

We are pleased to announce that our guest speakers this year are:

Richard Arneson (University of California, San Diego)

Charles Larmore (Brown University)

The Brave New World conference series is now established as a leading international forum dedicated exclusively to the discussion of postgraduate research in political theory. The conference offers a great opportunity for postgraduates from many different countries and universities to share experiences, concerns and research interests, to exchange stimulating ideas and to make new friends - all in a financially accessible and highly informal setting. Participants will also have the chance to meet and talk about their work with eminent academics, including members of faculty from the University of Manchester and guest speakers, who will deliver keynote addresses at the event.

Guest speakers in previous years have included Brian Barry, Simon Caney, G.A. Cohen, Roger Crisp, Cecile Fabre, Jerry Gaus, Peter Jones, Chandran Kukathas, Kasper Lippert-Rasmussen, Susan Mendus, David Miller, Onora O’Neill, Michael Otsuka, Bhikhu Parekh, Carole Pateman, Anne Phillips, Thomas Pogge, Joseph Raz, Andrea Sangiovanni, Quentin Skinner, Adam Swift, Philippe Van Parijs, Leif Wenar, Andrew Williams, and Jonathan Wolff.

Papers focusing on any area of political theory or political philosophy are welcome. If you would like to present a paper then please send a 300-word, anonymised abstract (including the title of the paper) to Brave.New.World@manchester.ac.uk no later than 9th April 2012. Please also include in your email your name and institutional affiliation. Please note that the conference is self-financed and participants are responsible for seeking their own funding. For further details please contact us at Brave.New.World@manchester.ac.uk

March 2-3, 2012
Howard Baker Center for Public Policy
Animals, Ethics and Law Symposium
Speakers and Titles:

• Colin Allen
  Indiana Philosophy, Cognitive Science
  Ethics, Law and the Science of Fish Welfare
• Taimie Bryant
  UCLA Law
  Animal Law and Virtue Ethics
• David DeGrazia
  George Washington University Philosophy
  The Question of Animal Suffering
• David Favre
  Michigan State Law
  Respectful Use: An ethical construct for lawful interactions with animals
• Rebecca Huss
  Valparaiso Law
  The Intersection of Legal Issues Involving Animals and Gerontology
• Clare Palmer
  Texas A&M Philosophy
  What (if anything) Do We Owe Wild Animals?
• Nick Robinson (keynote)
  Pace, Law, and Yale, Forestry and Environmental Studies
  The Legal Principle of Resilience: A guiding norm for life in our anthropocene epoch

Relational and Non-relational Views

July 5-7, 2012, Central European University, Budapest

Organized by the Departments of Political Science and Philosophy, CEU and the Global Justice Network

Keynote speakers:

Simon Caney (Oxford University)
Samuel Scheffler (New York University)

Should duties of distributive justice extend to humanity at large or be limited to compatriots? The debate about the proper scope of distributive duties explores whether the concern with individual distributive shares is grounded in our shared humanity, as cosmopolitans claim, or rather duties of justice arise only among those who are subject to the same coercive political institutions, participate in a shared social practice, or share in the same culture, as proponents of the so-called practice-dependent view hold. Parallel to this debate, discussions in the theory of justice have focused increasingly on the problem whether an egalitarian distribution of social resources has independent moral significance, as distributive conceptions propose, or instead any profile of distribution is morally desirable only insofar that it advances egalitarian social and political relations, as social-relational conceptions of justice claim. The workshop aims to bring together these two debates in contemporary political theory, with the expectation that insights from one may shed new light on problems discussed in the other. We especially welcome papers that aim to bridge the two problems, but also interested in papers with new insights in either of the two fields. We welcome papers that discuss general theoretical problems as well as those with a practical political focus.

To apply, please send us an abstract of max. 500 words by January 30^th 2012 to the email address ceuglobaljustice@gmail.com

Accepted participants will be notified by March 1^st, 2012.

For inquiries please write to Eszter Kollar: ekollar@johncabot.edu or Zoltan Miklosi: MiklosiZ@ceu.hu

Kind regards,

Eszter Kollar (JCU, Global Justice Network)
Zoltan Miklosi (CEU)
Andres Moles (CEU)
Orsi Reich (CEU, Harvard)

Lecturer / Senior Lecturer in Political Theory

Closing date: 16/01/2012
Faculty / Organisational unit: Humanities
School / Directorate: School of Social Sciences
Salary: £32,751 to £55,758
Reference: HUM-00419

Applications are invited for a full-time, continuing, Lectureship or Senior Lectureship in Political Theory, tenable from 1 September 2012. The successful candidate will join the Politics discipline area and be attached to the Manchester Centre for Political Theory (MANCEPT). Lectureship applicants must have, or be about to complete, a relevant PhD and demonstrate the potential to produce high quality publications and provide excellent teaching. Senior Lectureship applicants must have established a strong record of publication and be experienced teachers at both undergraduate and postgraduate levels. Research and teaching interests may be in any core areas of contemporary analytic political theory including theories of justice, democracy, equality, rights and responsibility. Applicants must be prepared to teach across undergraduate and postgraduate courses, supervise undergraduate and postgraduate dissertations and make appropriate teaching and administrative contributions across Politics.

Further details about Politics at Manchester can be obtained from its Web pages at: http://www.socialsciences.manchester.ac.uk/disciplines/politics/index.html

Informal enquiries
Informal enquiries can be made to Professor Alan Hamlin
Email: alan.hamlin@manchester.ac.uk
The University of Manchester values a diverse workforce and welcomes applications from all sections of the community.

Application Instructions
In considering your application we will need to know of your future research plans and your teaching and learning philosophy so please include a statement on these two points in the “Additional Information” section of the application form.

Further particulars
HUM-00419 Lecturer / Senior Lecturer in Political Theory (PDF, 16.7 Kb)

Closing Date: 7th February 2012

Job Title: Lecturer in Philosophy

Salary: £36,868 to £44,016 per annum (pro-rata), with potential to progress to £49,539

Department: Department of Philosophy

Location: 45 Victoria Street, Sheffield

Job Reference Number: UOS003839

Summary:

An exciting opportunity has arisen for a research active Lecturer to join the Department of Philosophy from September 2012. The Sheffield Philosophy Department is one of the strongest in the UK, ranked very highly indeed both for its teaching and research. (See www.shef.ac.uk/philosophy/home )

The area of specialisation for the post is open, although we have a defeasible preference for Philosophy of Mind/Cognitive Science, Political Philosophy or Continental Philosophy.

You will be expected to conduct excellent research and deliver high quality and innovative teaching to both undergraduate and postgraduate students. You will also be expected to contribute to the operation of the Department through appropriate administrative responsibilities and committee memberships, and where appropriate represent the Department and discipline within the University. You will have (or be very near to completion of) a PhD in a relevant subject area (or have equivalent experience) and be able to evidence research and teaching excellence.

It is anticipated that interviews and presentations will be held in March 2012.   Full details will be provided to invited candidates.

To view current vacancies and apply online please go to: www.sheffield.ac.uk/jobs. For more information, please go here: http://tinyurl.com/7ewlj3o.

The Master’s program of the Philosophy Department at Georgia State University in Atlanta, Georgia is accepting applications from qualified students for its three Neurophilosophy Fellowships, its Legal/Political Philosophy Scholarship, its German Philosophy Scholarship, and its Assistantships. All funding packages cover two years of full tuition.  Fellowships and scholarships provide $15,000/year, and Assistantships provide $5,000-$10,000/year.

Initial application deadline: February 1, 2012.

The M.A. program at GSU is highly ranked by the Philosophical Gourmet Report, and it has had great success in placing its students in well-regarded Ph.D. programs. More information about the department and on application procedures can be found at http://www.gsu.edu/philosophy.

Flyer attached below.

Thank you for your help in distributing this information.

ma-flier-2012.pdf

ARTICLES

- The Mutual Dependence of Institutions and Citizens’ Dispositions in Liberal Democracies

Jeremy Neil (Houston Baptist University)

- Legalizing Selective Conscientious Objection

George Clifford

- The Extension and Limits of the Duty to Rescue

Per Bauhn (Linnaeus University)

- Moral Judgments, Emotions, and some Expectations from Moral Motivation

Mar Cabezas (University of Salamanca)

- Ontology and the Paradox of Future Generations

Dennis Earl (Coastal Carolina University)

- Darwall Versus Raz on Practical Authority

Mark McBride (National University of Singapore)

- David Friedman’s Model of Privatized Justice

Ionu? Sterpan (University of Bucharest)

- Rawlsian Compromises in Peacebuilding: A Rejoinder to Begby

Alejandro Agafonow (ESSCA School of Management, LUNAM Université)

- MacIntyre on Personal Identity

Lia Mela (University of Patras)

BOOK REVIEWS

- Gillian Brock, Global Justice: A Cosmopolitan Account

Reviewed by Dara Salam

Public Reason is an open access peer-reviewed journal of political and moral philosophy. Public Reason publishes articles, book reviews, as well as discussion notes from all the fields of political philosophy and ethics, including political theory, applied ethics, and legal philosophy. The Journal encourages the debate around rationality in politics and ethics in the larger context of the discussion concerning rationality as a philosophical problem.

Public Reason is committed to a pluralistic approach, promoting interdisciplinary and original perspectives as long as the ideal of critical arguing and clarity is respected. The journal is intended for the international philosophical community, as well as for a broader public interested in political and moral philosophy. It aims to promote philosophical exchanges with a special emphasis on issues in, and discussions on the Eastern European space. Public Reason publishes two issues per year, in June and December.

Happy New Year!

Mircea Tobosaru

Assistant Editor (Public Reason)

Middlebury College invites applications for a dissertation fellowship for the academic year 2012-13. We are seeking graduate students with a clear commitment and ability to advance educational diversity, either through the nature of their scholarly work, or through their ability to model success in fields where their own backgrounds and experiences may be underrepresented. Fellows will receive mentorship from faculty committed to excellence in scholarship and in undergraduate education. Fellows will be hosted by an appropriate department or program, and will be expected to teach one one-semester course. Fellows may apply to extend their affiliation with Middlebury to a second year. The annual stipend for the position is $30,000. Ph.D. candidates must have completed all doctoral work except the dissertation by the end of the current academic year. Applicants must be U.S. citizens, U.S. Legal Permanent Residents or otherwise authorized to work in the U.S. (e.g., non-U.S. citizen Ph.D. students would need to have employment authorization from their home institution that will allow them to receive a stipend from Middlebury College).

Middlebury College is using Interfolio to collect all application materials. Email and paper applications will not be accepted.  The application deadline is January 18, 2012.  Through Interfolio, please submit the following: C.V., three confidential letters of recommendation, one of which must be from your dissertation advisor, dissertation abstract, one-page [approximately 250 words] work plan for completion of dissertation, personal statement, and official graduate transcripts. More information can be found at interfolio.

Middlebury College is an Equal Opportunity Employer committed to recruiting a diverse faculty to complement its increasingly diverse student body.

For more information, please go here.

The MANCEPT Workshops in Political Theory 2012 is an annual conference in political theory, organised under the auspices of the Manchester Centre for Political Theory, University of Manchester. The conference in 2012 will be the ninth event in the series and will take place on Wednesday September 5th until Friday September 7th 2012 at the Arthur Lewis Building, University of Manchester.Over the last eight years, participants from over twenty countries have come together in a series of workshops concerned with issues in political theory/philosophy widely construed. Last year the workshops had more than 200 delegates attending, and the conference is now established as a leading international forum dedicated to the discussion of research in political theory.

Applications for convening a workshop are now being accepted and more information about the event can be found here:
http://manceptworkshops2012.wordpress.com/

If you are interested in convening a workshop or require any further information please e-mail the Workshop convenor Chris Mills at:
manceptworkshops2012@gmail.com

10:30 - 4:00.

The department of Politics and International Relations is delighted to host a one-day workshop on Lea Ypi’s new book Global Justice and Avant-Garde Political Agency (Oxford University Press, 2012). In the book, Ypi argues for an engaged, ‘activist’ brand of political theory, uniting the concerns of ideal and non-ideal theory, and applies the method of activist political theory to the global justice debate.

The workshop comprises critical responses to the book by Stuart White (University of Oxford), David Owen (University of Southampton) and David Miller (University of Oxford), with a reply by Lea Ypi (London School of Economics).

The event organiser is Chris Armstrong (Southampton). There is no charge for attendance, but if you would like to attend please let Chris know in advance (email ca’at’soton.ac.uk).

CALL FOR PAPERS

The sixth annual meeting of the Felician Ethics Conference will be held at the Rutherford Campus of Felician College on Saturday, April 21, 2012, 9 am - 6 pm

223 Montross Ave
Rutherford, NJ 07070

Plenary:

“Abortion and Resurrection”

Dr. Douglas Lackey
Baruch College and Graduate Center, City University of New York

Submissions on any topic in moral philosophy (broadly construed) are welcome, not exceeding 25 minutes’ presentation time (approximately 3,000 words). Please send submissions via email in format suitable for blind review by Feb. 15, 2012 to: felicianethicsconference [@] gmail.com. Please submit fully completed papers, not abstracts or proposals. And please do not double-submit to other conferences on the same or otherwise conflicting dates.

Registration fee is $20 for faculty, and $10 for adjuncts and graduate students. Free to all members of the Felician College community (current students, faculty, staff, sisters).

If necessary, surface mail can be sent to:

Irfan Khawaja, Conference Coordinator
Dept. of Philosophy
Felician College
262 S. Main St.
Lodi, NJ 07644

If you have any questions, please contact Irfan Khawaja, (201) 559-6000 (x6288), or felicianethicsconference [@] gmail.com.

Contact: Professor Paschalis Kitromilides (e-mail: pkitrom@eie.gr).

For more information go to http://europoliticalthought.wordpress.com.

–
Dr. Evangelia Sembou
Convenor, Political Thought Specialist Group of the Political Studies Association of the United Kingdom
http://www.psa.ac.uk/spgrp/39/polthought.aspx