Papers
Sketching a New Public Philosophy: The Theory of Republican Modernity
Published in Where Do We Go from Here? Mark Major, ed. (Lexington Books, 2010)
This essay develops an argument for a more radical form of public philosophy based on the lines of republican political theory. It is a critique of the limitations of both liberal and communitarian theories of politics and develops what I call "republican modernity" as a paradigm for developing new institutions and a new kind of progressive politics.
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Islam, Rights, and Ethical Life: The Problem of Political Modernity in the Arab World
Theoria: A Journal of Social and Political Theory (forthcoming)
This paper considers the roots of the dissonance between political modernity and Islamic societies. It argues that primacy has to be give to the analysis of different paradigms of “ethical life” which are ways in which ethical-political categories are organized within society. A distinction is made between “nomocentric” and “rights-based” paradigms of ethical life, the former associated with a system of moral duties and the latter with a system of political and ethical rights accorded to the individual. I argue that the emphasis on a nomocentric paradigm of ethical life has the effect of suppressing the development of a rights-based ethical and political discourse in large enough sectors of the society to effect a progressive change toward political modernity. I further analyze the ways in which forces of social and economic modernization play a role in antagonizing the relation between modernity and the more traditional forms of ethical life which predominate in Islamic society and political/ethical thought.
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Democracy, Public Reason, and Suburban Life
Mudot: Magazine of Urban Documentation and Theory, 2009.
This paper constructs a theory relating forms of democratic public reason to spatial structures. I develop a theory of forms of social consciousness which result from the ways that spatial structures impede or allow for certain forms of intersubjectivity. I then relate these ideas to theories of democratic politics, consciousness, and values.
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The Radical Critique of Economic Inequality in Early American Political Thought
New Political Science, 2008.
This paper examines the ideological roots and historical development of an early radical economic egalitarian tradition in American political thought. It concentrates on a group of thinkers and social critics that were active from the 1820s through the beginning of the Civil War. Inspired by republican themes, they forged a radical critique of the emerging capitalist order and a skepticism of economic modernity. By reworking the republican political notion of an equality of social relations as an essential context for individual liberty, these radical critics posed a challenge to the emerging capitalist order. They would also be unique in the way that they analyzed the workings of this new economic system arguing that it was a mechanism that would systematically reproduce economic inequality eroding republican forms of government and society making them a distinct voice in America’s egalitarian tradition.
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Reworking Republican Freedom: A Critique of the Neo-Republican Concept of Domination
Under editorial review, Political Theory.
This paper presents a critique of Philip Pettit’s concept of “freedom as non-domination” and provides an alternative theory of both domination and republican political freedom. I argue that Pettit’s understanding of domination is insufficient when it comes to theorizing and confronting modern forms of domination and that this hampers his concept of republican freedom and its political relevance under the conditions of modernity. In the end, his account of domination is more akin to liberal theory than he would perhaps admit. In its place, I propose a more thorough concept of domination and, through this analysis, rework the concept of republican freedom in order to place the republican tradition within the context of modernity itself. From this, I argue that republicanism can take its place as a more attractive alternative to liberal theory.
America's Conservative Landscape: The New Conservatism and the Reorientation of American Democracy
From Confronting the New COnservatism: The Rise of the New Right in America, Michael J. Thompson, ed. (NYU Press, 2007)
This essay develops a thesis explaining the rise of the new right in American politics. It argues that unlike previous forms of conservatism, this "new conservatism" is defined by its embrace of certain doctrines from liberal theory. It also argues that the "new conservatism" is grounded in certain changes in social structure, preventing the development of more progressive forms of political consciousness and social movements.
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