Michael Walzer

Professor Emeritus of Social Science

As a professor, author, editor, and lecturer, Michael Walzer has addressed a wide variety of topics in political theory and moral philosophy: political obligation, just and unjust war, nationalism and ethnicity, economic justice and the welfare state.  His books (among them Just and Unjust Wars, Spheres of Justice, The Company of Critics, Thick and Thin: Moral Argument at Home and Abroad, On Toleration, and Politics and Passion) and essays have played a part in the revival of practical, issue-focused ethics and in the development of a pluralist approach to political and moral life.  For more than three decades Walzer served as co-editor of Dissent, now in its 64th year.  His articles and interviews appear frequently in the world’s foremost newspapers and journals. He is currently working on the fourth volume of The Jewish Political Tradition, a comprehensive collaborative project focused on the history of Jewish political thought.  His book, The Paradox of Liberation: Secular Revolutions and Religious Counterrevolutions, was published in March of 2015, and his new book, A Foreign Policy for the Left, was published in 2018.