CSPT News: United States

For almost 10 years, the University of Tulsa and the University of Bucharest, Faculty of Philosophy, have had an exchange of professors. In 2003, the participants were Jay Geller from our history department and Viorel Vizureanu. In Bucharest, Geller gave two talks: "200 Years of German Liberalism, or the Travails of Liberalism in an Illiberal Land" and "German Politics, Reparations, and the Legacy of the Holocaust." While the first talk was geared towards scholars of philosophy, the second talk had a wider audience. Geller spoke of the difficulties a society faces when making the transition from a totalitarian regime to a democratic one, particularly when large segments of society have not come to terms with the past or remain latent supporters of the discredited regime. The Tulsa visitor to Bucharest for this spring was Paul Rahe, also from our history department. He gave two public lectures at the Faculty of Philosophy, "Montesquieu's Discovery of the Modern Republic" and "Montesquieu's Critique of the Modern Republic."

Viorel Vizureanu was the Romanian visitor in 2003, combining his trip with a tour of the United States, including stops in Dallas, Chicago, and New York. At the University of Tulsa, he engaged in research in the library and gave two public talks. The first lecture, "The Forms of Forgetfulness of Being in Heidegger's Work," drew a largely faculty audience who then had a lively conversation on Heidegger with Vizureanu. The second lecture, "Nietzsche and the Philosophical Significance of Early German Romanticism," drew over 40 members of the academic and general public, who listened to the Romanian scholar trace the parallels between Nietzschean thought and German Romanticism.

The main theory event in Indian Territory this year was a three day visit in April by Michael Walzer, Institute for Advanced Studies at Princeton. His first talk, "Humanitarian Intervention," was given at a faculty and student luncheon at the law school. That evening he gave a public lecture sponsored by the political science department, "What's Wrong with Terrorism?" The following evening he gave another public lecture, this time as part of an endowed lectureship in the religion department, "What It Means to be an American Jew." Each of these presentations was followed by questions and discussion.
--Eldon J. Eisenach, Tulsa

Boston

The Liberty Fund is publishing a major series of "Natural Law and Enlightenment Classics" under the general editorship of Knud Haakonssen. The series, of more than fifty volumes, will present a large number of early modern natural lawyers, including also their historical, theological, and political works, and a wide selection of Enlightenment works in moral philosophy, politics and jurisprudence with special emphasis on the Scottish Enlightenment. The series includes the first critical edition of the complete works and correspondence of Francis Hutcheson. The first four volumes to be released are: Natural Rights on the Threshold of the Scottish Enlightenment The Writings of Gershom Carmichael, edited by James Moore (Concordia University) and Michael Silverthorne (McGill University); Nathaniel Culverwell, An Elegant and Learned Discourse of the Light of Nature, edited by Robert A. Greene (University of Massachusetts, Boston) and Hugh MacCallum (University of Toronto), foreword by Robert A. Greene; Samuel Pufendorf, Of the Nature and Qualification of Religion in Reference to Civil Society, translated by Jodocus Crull, edited and with an Introduction by Simone Zurbuchen (Center for European Enlightenment Studies, Potsdam); and Samuel Pufendorf, The Divine Feudal Law: Or, Covenants with Mankind, Represented, translated by Theophilus Dorrington, edited and with an Introduction by Simone Zurbuchen.
-- Knud Haakonssen, Boston

Cactus Chapter

After a one year hiatus, the Cactus Chapter, comprising the political theorists at Arizona State University (Tempe) and the University of Arizona (Tucson), will hold their annual political theory mini-conference in Tucson on April 13. One graduate student and one faculty member from each university will present a paper. Douglas Long, University of Western Ontario, presented two papers at ASU, January 29 and 31: "Mill and Coleridge on the Imagination" and "'A Host of Scotch Sophists': Jeremy Bentham and the Scottish Enlightenment." Terence Ball (ASU) was named the first Public Ethics Scholar of the Lincoln Center for Applied Ethics at Arizona State University, in which capacity he gave the inaugural lecture, "Duties Beyond Borders: The Expanding Ethical Universe," in the Center's series of Public Scholar Lectures - just published as Occasional Paper #1 by the Lincoln Center. He also presented a paper at a conference on the theme "Must Political Theory Be Historical?"at Texas A & M University, March 2, 2002, and delivered the keynote address at the ECPR-sponsored conference on Rhetoric and Conceptual Change, Tampere, Finland, June 27-29, 2001. He is also putting the finishing touches on two projects for Cambridge University Press: an edition of The Federalist for the Cambridge Texts in the History of Political Thought series; and, with Richard Bellamy as co-editor, the Cambridge History of Political Thought in the Twentieth Century. Richard Dagger (ASU) presented "Republicanism and the Politics of Place" at the Conference on Civic Virtue and Pluralism, Tilburg University (Catholic University of Brabant), Tilburg, The Netherlands, November 23, 2001. The papers from the conference were published as a special issue of Philosophical Explorations (vol. 4, no. 3, 2001). Avital Simhony (ASU) and her co-editor, David Weinstein of Wake Forest, organized a panel for the American Political Science Association meeting in San Francisco to coincide with the publication of their book, The New Liberalism (Cambridge University Press, 2001). The theme of the book is that the political thinking of such "new liberals" as T. H. Green, L. T. Hobhouse, and J. A. Hobson demonstrates that liberalism is not as irreparably individualist as its communitarian critics hold. Professor Simhony has also joined the editorial board of a new series of monographs on T. H. Green. Imprint Academic, which publishes History of Political Thought, is including the Green series as part of a larger series of monographs on the British Idealists.
-- Richard Dagger, Arizona State

Lone Star

Chapter Nineteen of us met at Ed Portis's home in College Station for dinner and discussion on March 1st. Seven Texas universities were represented (Texas A&M, Baylor, Sam Houston State, UT-Dallas, UT-San Antonio, UT-Austin, and U-North Texas), with representatives of five others (SF Austin State, St. Thomas, UT-Arlington, SMU, and U-Houston) expressing interest, but unable to attend. After a barbeque-and-greek-food dinner, we talked about our new chapter, coming to the following conclusions: 1. For now, we'd like to meet for an annual mini-conference in the fall (usually October), under rotating sponsorship. The first of these will take place on one of the first three weekends in October, 2002. We heard a tenative commitment from Baylor to host this meeting, with A&M agreeing to serve as a back-up location, and UT-Dallas looking into hosting future meetings. The specific format of the conference will be up to the host institution, but we suggested some guidelines. Graduate students would be encouraged to attend and to present their work. Formats may vary from informal presentations of works in progress, to discussion papers on an assigned theme, to seminars on a particular work. 2. This first meeting was held in conjunction with the A&M Political Theory Conference, an annual event hosting three outside visitors for an all-day seminar. UT-Austin and other representatives offered to use the events of visiting speakers to sponsor informal chapter meetings. More formal co-sponsorship of outside visitors, as Texas philosophers do with their "Lone Star Tourist" program, was considered and rejected. 3. We decided to sponsor a web site and a listserv to disseminate information on chapter and local university activities. Members agreed to use the listserv responsibly (that is, only for business directly related to the chapter). A&M agreed to sponsor both services for now. The listserv should be running by summer 2002; the web site may take a little longer, as A&M is currently redesigning its entire site. In the meantime, members are encouraged to contribute items for distribution (local events open to members, for example) to ellis@polisci.tamu.edu 4. The current, provisional A&M political theory website (http://www-polisci.tamu.edu/Ellis/Theory/confrence.htm) includes a link to the national CSPT; membership forms were distributed at the meeting, though no formal membership is required to participate in Lone Star chapter events. We adjourned with the happy thought that our next meeting in October will include some actual theoretical substance.
-- Lisa Ellis, College Station

Upstate New York

Our chapter's next meeting will be devoted to the work of John Rawls. We will consider Rawls' most mature statement of his views in Justice As Fairness: A Restatement (Belknap Press, 2001) and compare it with his seminal paper "Justice as Fairness" (Philosophical Review 67, AprIL 1958, pp. 164-194).
The meeting will be held on Friday, May 2 at Hobart & William Smith Colleges in Geneva. We will meet at the cafeteria in the Scandling Center, next to the main library on campus. (We have a private room reserved at the cafeteria; just meet us at the entrance to the cafeteria or inquire about our group.) There is plenty of parking right across the street from the center. We will meet for dinner and chapter business at 6, and then proceed to the discussion at 7. (The dining hall starts closing down by 6:30, so please try to be on time if you desire dinner.)
On a related note, a number of regulars in our chapter also participate in a discussion group devoted to the study of Dante. This group will be holding a joint meeting with our chapter to discuss Dante's classic contribution to political theory, De Monarchia (Translated by Prue Shaw as Monarchy, Cambridge University Press, 1996). This meeting will take place on Saturday, June 14, at 7 PM. We will meet at the China Buffet, 2775 Monroe Avenue, for dinner and discussion. If you plan to attend please RSVP to Tim Madigan at 585-424-3184 or tmadigan@rochester.rr.com.
The Upstate New York Chapter of the Conference for the Study of Political Thought (CSPT) would like to spread the word about a well-known political theorist speaking in Rochester:

Speaker: Isaac Kramnick, Cornell Univerisity. Author of The Godless Constitution: The Case against Religious Correctness.
Topic: "Religion and Politics in America: The Perennial Debate."
Respondent: Christopher Evans, Colgate Rochester Crozer Divinity School.

Date: Wednesday, April 9
Time: 7-8:30 PM
Location: Dugan Center, 15 St. Mary's Place, Rochester

St. Louis

The University of Missouri-St. Louis has for some years been receiving archival materials forfrom CSPT. Any member holding CSPT papers can deposit them at Archives & Manuscripts, Thomas Jefferson Library, Univeristy of Missouri-St. Louis, 8001 Natural Bridge Rd., St. Loius, MO 63131-4499. The papers are currently being cataloged.
-- Lyman Tower Sargent, St. Louis

Virginia

The Spring meeting of the Virginia Chapter will feature Mark Warren, of Georgetown University. Mark will speak on "What Does Corruption Mean in a Democracy?" on Friday, April 12, and there will be a symposium on his new book, Democracy and Association, the following day. Commentators will be Michaelle Browers, of Wake Forest University, and Rom Coles of Duke. A second edition of Stephen White's Edmund Burke: Politics, Modernity and Aesthetics is forthcoming from Roman and Littlefield. He is also editing a special thirtieth anniversary issue of Political Theory on the topic "What is Political Theory?" to appear in August 2002. George Klosko's new book, Jacobins and Utopians: The Political Theory of Fundamental Moral Reform, is forthcoming from University of Notre Dame press
-- George Klosko and Stephen White, University of Virginia