Why Political Theory Needs History: Dismantling the Liberal-Republican Distinction to Understand the Promise of American Democracy Although political scientists continue to distinguish a so-called Anglo-American liberal tradition from a so-called republican tradition, the distinction makes no sense in the context of American intellectual history. Kloppenberg will first discuss misunderstood figures such as John Adams, James Madison, and James Wilson to show the centrality of democracy for the most important political thinkers of the founding period, then fast forward to John Rawls, often considered the archetypal liberal, to show that after writing A Theory of Justice and Political Liberalism, Rawls moved, in his understudied late work, in the direction of social democracy. James T. Kloppenberg was born in Denver and educated at Dartmouth (A.B. 1973) and Stanford (M.A. 1976, Ph.D. 1980). He and his wife Mary have lived in Wellesley, MA, since 1980. In recognition of his teaching, he ha
A global Technate is imminent. Technocracy is upon us and we need to resist it. Over the last couple of years the question of technocratic governance has become a talking point in Western society. The debate concerns the degree to which qualified.
In his sweeping survey of America’s post-9/11 military campaigns, journalist Jeremy Scahill follows in the tradition of Herodotus and Thucydides. That’s not a good thing.
<p style="margin-left:0in; margin-right:0in">“It’s much better to develop one’s mental toolbox, one’s skills, rather than necessarily master huge bodies of knowledge.”</p>
Adherence to scientism has been repaying handsomely, economically as well as culturally, whereas betting on anti-scientistic dogmas threatens the growth of knowledge.