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Michael Walzer

February 15, 2024

Michael Laban Walzer[a] (born March 3, 1935) is an American political theorist and public intellectual. A professor emeritus at the Institute for Advanced Study (IAS) in Princeton, New Jersey, he is editor emeritus of Dissent, an intellectual magazine that he has been affiliated with since his years as an undergraduate at Brandeis University. He has written books and essays on a wide range of topics—many in political ethics—including just and unjust wars, nationalism, ethnicity, Zionism, economic justice, social criticism, radicalism, tolerance, and political obligation. He is also a contributing editor to The New Republic. To date, he has written 27 books and published over 300 articles, essays, and book reviews in Dissent, The New Republic, The New York Review of Books, The New Yorker, The New York Times, Harpers, and many philosophical and political science journals.[3]

Michael Walzer
Walzer in 2002
Born
Michael Laban Walzer

(1935-03-03) March 3, 1935 (age 88)
New York City, New York, US
Spouse
Judith Borodovko Walzer
​
​
(m. 1956)​
Academic background
Alma mater
ThesisThe Revolution of the Saints
Doctoral advisorSamuel Beer
Influences
Academic work
Discipline
Sub-discipline
School or tradition
InstitutionsInstitute for Advanced Study
Main interests
Notable works
Notable ideas
Influenced

Early life and education edit

Born to a Jewish family[4] on March 3, 1935, Walzer graduated summa cum laude from Brandeis University in 1956 with a Bachelor of Arts degree in history. He then studied at the University of Cambridge on a Fulbright Fellowship (1956–1957) and completed his doctoral work at Harvard University, earning his Doctor of Philosophy degree in government under Samuel Beer in 1961.[3]

Work edit

Walzer is usually identified as one of the leading proponents of the communitarian position in political theory, along with Alasdair MacIntyre and Michael J. Sandel. Like Sandel and MacIntyre, Walzer is not completely comfortable with this label.[5] However, he has long argued that political theory must be grounded in the traditions and culture of particular societies, and has long opposed what he sees to be the excessive abstraction of political philosophy. His most important intellectual contributions include Just and Unjust Wars (1977), a revitalization of just war theory that insists on the importance of "ethics" in wartime while eschewing pacifism;[6] the theory of "complex equality", which holds that the metric of just equality is not some single material or moral good, but rather that egalitarian justice demands that each good be distributed according to its social meaning, and that no good (like money or political power) be allowed to dominate or distort the distribution of goods in other spheres;[7][8] and an argument that justice is primarily a moral standard within particular nations and societies, not one that can be developed in a universalized abstraction.

In On Toleration, he describes various examples of (and approaches to) toleration in various settings, including multinational empires such as Rome; nations in past and current-day international society; "consociations" such as Switzerland; nation-states such as France; and immigrant societies such as the United States. He concludes by describing a "post-modern" view, in which cultures within an immigrant nation have blended and inter-married to the extent that toleration becomes an intra-familial affair.[9]

Employment edit

Walzer was first employed in 1962 in the politics department at Princeton University. He stayed there until 1966, when he moved to the government department at Harvard. He taught at Harvard until 1980, when he became a permanent faculty member in the School of Social Science at the Institute for Advanced Study.[3]

In 1971, Walzer taught a semester-long course at Harvard with Robert Nozick called "Capitalism and Socialism". The course was a debate between the two philosophers: Nozick's side is delineated in Anarchy, State, and Utopia (1974), and Walzer's side is expressed in his Spheres of Justice (1983), in which he argues for "complex equality".[10]

Walzer is a member of the editorial board of the Jewish Review of Books and an Advisory Editor at Fathom.

Awards and honors edit

In April 2008, Walzer received the prestigious Spinoza Lens, a bi-annual prize for ethics in the Netherlands. He has also been honoured with an emeritus professorship at the prestigious Institute for Advanced Study. He was elected to a Fellowship of the American Academy of Arts & Sciences in 1971,[11] a member of the American Philosophical Society in 1990,[12] and to a Corresponding Fellowship of the British Academy in 2016.[13]

Personal life edit

Walzer is married to Judith Borodovko Walzer. They are parents of two daughters: Sarah Esther Walzer (born 1961) and Rebecca Leah Walzer (born 1966). His grandchildren are Joseph and Katya Barrett and Jules and Stefan Walzer-Goldfeld.

Walzer is the older brother of historian Judith Walzer Leavitt.

Books edit

  • The Revolution of the Saints: A Study in the Origins of Radical Politics (Harvard University Press, 1965) ISBN 0-674-76786-1
  • Obligations: Essays on Disobedience, War and Citizenship (Harvard University Press, 1970) ISBN 0-674-63025-4
  • Political Action (Quadrangle Books, 1971) ISBN 0-8129-0173-8
  • Regicide and Revolution (Cambridge University Press, 1974) ISBN 0-231-08259-2
  • Just and Unjust Wars (Basic Books, 1977; second edition, 1992; third edition, 2000, ISBN 0-465-03705-4; fourth edition, 2006, ISBN 0-465-03707-0); fifth edition, 2015.
  • Radical Principles (Basic Books, 1977) ISBN 0-465-06824-3
  • Spheres of Justice (Basic Books, 1983) ISBN 0-465-08189-4
  • Exodus and Revolution (Basic Books, 1985) ISBN 0-465-02164-6
  • Interpretation and Social Criticism (Harvard University Press, 1987) ISBN 0-674-45971-7
  • The Company of Critics (Basic Books, 1988) ISBN 0-465-01331-7
  • Zivile Gesellschaft und amerikanische Demokratie (Rotbuch Verlag, 1992) ISBN 3-596-13077-8 (collection of essays in German collection; the title translates as "Civil Society and American Democracy")
  • What It Means to Be an American (Marsilio Publishers, 1992) ISBN 1-56886-025-0
  • Thick and Thin: Moral Argument at Home and Abroad (Notre Dame Press, 1994) ISBN 0-268-01897-9
  • Pluralism, Justice and Equality, with David Miller (Oxford University Press, 1995) ISBN 0-19-828008-4
  • Toward a Global Civil Society (Berghahn Books, 1995) ISBN 1-57181-054-4
  • On Toleration (Yale University Press, 1997) ISBN 0-268-01897-9
  • Arguments from the Left (Atlas, 1997, in Swedish)
  • Pluralism and Democracy (Editions Esprit, 1997, in French) ISBN 2-909210-19-7
  • Reason, Politics, and Passion (Fischer Taschenbuch Verlag, 1999, in German) ISBN 3-596-14439-6
  • The Jewish Political Tradition, Vol. I: Authority. co-edited with Menachem Lorberbaum, Noam Zohar, and Yair Lorberbaum (Yale University Press, 2000) ISBN 0-300-09428-0
  • Exilic Politics in the Hebrew Bible (Mohr Siebeck, 2001, in German) ISBN 3-16-147543-7
  • War, Politics, and Morality (Ediciones Paidos (es), 2001, in Spanish) ISBN 84-493-1167-5
  • The Jewish Political Tradition, Vol. II: Membership. co-edited with Menachem Lorberbaum, Noam Zohar, and Yair Lorberbaum (Yale University Press, 2003) ISBN 978-0-300-09428-2
  • Arguing About War (Yale University Press, 2004) ISBN 0-300-10365-4
  • Politics and Passion: Toward A More Egalitarian Liberalism (Yale University Press, 2004) ISBN 0-300-10328-X
  • Law, Politics, and Morality in Judaism. edited by Walzer (Princeton University Press, 2006) ISBN 0-691-12508-2
  • Thinking Politically (Yale University Press, 2007) ISBN 978-0-300-11816-2
  • In God's Shadow: Politics in the Hebrew Bible (Yale University Press, 2012) ISBN 978-0-300-18044-2
  • The Paradox of Liberation (Yale University Press, 2015) ISBN 978-0-300-18780-9
  • A Foreign Policy for the Left (Yale University Press, 2018) ISBN 978-0300223873
  • Political Action: A Practical Guide to Movement Politics (New York Review Books Classics, 2019)
  • The Struggle for a Decent Politics: On "Liberal" as an adjective (Yale University Press, 2023)

See also edit

Notes edit

  1. ^ Pronounced /ˈwɔːlzər/.[2]

References edit

  1. ^ Howard, Michael W. (1986). "Walzer's Socialism". Social Theory and Practice. 12 (1): 103–113. doi:10.5840/soctheorpract198612117. JSTOR 23556625.
  2. ^ Michael Walzer: The Free Market and Morality on YouTube
  3. ^ a b c "Michael Laban Walzer". American Academy of Arts & Sciences. Retrieved 2021-11-29.
  4. ^ Arkush, Allan (August 8, 2012). "Michael Walzer's Secular Jewish Thought". Journal of Modern Jewish Studies. 11 (2): 221–241. doi:10.1080/14725886.2012.684859. S2CID 144959296.
  5. ^ Communitarianism > Notes (Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy)
  6. ^ Cuddihy, John Murray (1978-02-05). "What Is the Good Fight?". The New York Times. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved 2022-02-17.
  7. ^ Spheres of Justice (1983); see criticism, Young Kim, Justice as Right Actions: An Original Theory of Justice in Conversation with Major Contemporary Accounts (Lexington Books, 2015), ch. 11 (ISBN 978-1-4985-1651-8)
  8. ^ Mounk, Yascha (2019-03-14). "Why the College Scandal Touched a Nonpartisan Nerve". The Atlantic. Retrieved 2022-02-17.
  9. ^ Walzer, Michael (1997). On Toleration. New Haven: Yale University Press. ISBN 978-0-300-07600-4.
  10. ^ Interview with E. J. Dionne
  11. ^ "Michael Laban Walzer". American Academy of Arts & Sciences. Retrieved 2022-04-19.
  12. ^ "APS Member History". search.amphilsoc.org. Retrieved 2022-04-19.
  13. ^ "Laureates - Michael Walzer". www.spinozalens.nl. 24 November 2008. Retrieved 2021-11-29.

External links edit

 
Wikiquote has quotations related to Michael Walzer.
  • Dissent Quarterly magazine of politics and culture edited by Michael Walzer
  • Walzer's biography at the Institute for Advanced Study
  • Review of Walzer's Arguing about War in n+1 magazine
  • The Argument about Humanitarian Intervention By Michael Walzer
  • Micha Odenheimer, , Micha Odenheimer speaks with an individual who has carved out a space for himself as a left-wing supporter of Israel, Eretz Acheret Magazine
  • , Barcelona Metropolis, 2010.
  • A Conversation with Michael Walzer Video interview, 2012.
  • Appearances on C-SPAN
  • For an analysis of communitarianism see: Gad Barzilai, Communities and Law: Politics and Cultures of Legal Identities (Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 2003)
  • , 20 September 2012
  • The Jewish Political Tradition, 26 April 2013
  • Perry Anderson's House of Zion: A symposium - Fathom Journal
  • Interview with Dr. Michael Walzer by Stephen McKiernan, Binghamton University Libraries Center for the Study of the 1960s, April 4, 2016
Academic offices
Preceded by
 Tanner Lecturer on Human Values
at Harvard University
1985–1986 		Succeeded by

February 15, 2024
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This article includes a list of general references but it lacks sufficient corresponding inline citations Please help to improve this article by introducing more precise citations July 2008 Learn how and when to remove this template message Michael Laban Walzer a born March 3 1935 is an American political theorist and public intellectual A professor emeritus at the Institute for Advanced Study IAS in Princeton New Jersey he is editor emeritus of Dissent an intellectual magazine that he has been affiliated with since his years as an undergraduate at Brandeis University He has written books and essays on a wide range of topics many in political ethics including just and unjust wars nationalism ethnicity Zionism economic justice social criticism radicalism tolerance and political obligation He is also a contributing editor to The New Republic To date he has written 27 books and published over 300 articles essays and book reviews in Dissent The New Republic The New York Review of Books The New Yorker The New York Times Harpers and many philosophical and political science journals 3 Michael WalzerWalzer in 2002BornMichael Laban Walzer 1935 03 03 March 3 1935 age 88 New York City New York USSpouseJudith Borodovko Walzer m 1956 wbr Academic backgroundAlma materBrandeis University BA University of CambridgeHarvard University PhD ThesisThe Revolution of the SaintsDoctoral advisorSamuel BeerInfluencesIsaiah BerlinCharles TaylorAlbert CamusKarl MarxJohn RawlsNiccolo MachiavelliAcademic workDisciplinePhilosophypolitical studiesSub disciplinePolitical philosophyethicsSchool or traditionAnalytic philosophycommunitarianismsocialism 1 InstitutionsInstitute for Advanced StudyMain interestsHuman rightspolitical ethicsjust war theoryliberalismvalue pluralismsocial criticisminternationalismNotable worksJust and Unjust Wars 1977 Spheres of Justice 1983 Interpretation and Social Criticism 1987 Notable ideasDirty handscomplex equalityInfluencedMichael SandelJean Bethke ElshtainAmy GutmannMichael W DoyleIan ShapiroAxel HonnethRainer Forst Contents 1 Early life and education 2 Work 3 Employment 4 Awards and honors 5 Personal life 6 Books 7 See also 8 Notes 9 References 10 External linksEarly life and education editBorn to a Jewish family 4 on March 3 1935 Walzer graduated summa cum laude from Brandeis University in 1956 with a Bachelor of Arts degree in history He then studied at the University of Cambridge on a Fulbright Fellowship 1956 1957 and completed his doctoral work at Harvard University earning his Doctor of Philosophy degree in government under Samuel Beer in 1961 3 Work editWalzer is usually identified as one of the leading proponents of the communitarian position in political theory along with Alasdair MacIntyre and Michael J Sandel Like Sandel and MacIntyre Walzer is not completely comfortable with this label 5 However he has long argued that political theory must be grounded in the traditions and culture of particular societies and has long opposed what he sees to be the excessive abstraction of political philosophy His most important intellectual contributions include Just and Unjust Wars 1977 a revitalization of just war theory that insists on the importance of ethics in wartime while eschewing pacifism 6 the theory of complex equality which holds that the metric of just equality is not some single material or moral good but rather that egalitarian justice demands that each good be distributed according to its social meaning and that no good like money or political power be allowed to dominate or distort the distribution of goods in other spheres 7 8 and an argument that justice is primarily a moral standard within particular nations and societies not one that can be developed in a universalized abstraction In On Toleration he describes various examples of and approaches to toleration in various settings including multinational empires such as Rome nations in past and current day international society consociations such as Switzerland nation states such as France and immigrant societies such as the United States He concludes by describing a post modern view in which cultures within an immigrant nation have blended and inter married to the extent that toleration becomes an intra familial affair 9 Employment editWalzer was first employed in 1962 in the politics department at Princeton University He stayed there until 1966 when he moved to the government department at Harvard He taught at Harvard until 1980 when he became a permanent faculty member in the School of Social Science at the Institute for Advanced Study 3 In 1971 Walzer taught a semester long course at Harvard with Robert Nozick called Capitalism and Socialism The course was a debate between the two philosophers Nozick s side is delineated in Anarchy State and Utopia 1974 and Walzer s side is expressed in his Spheres of Justice 1983 in which he argues for complex equality 10 Walzer is a member of the editorial board of the Jewish Review of Books and an Advisory Editor at Fathom Awards and honors editIn April 2008 Walzer received the prestigious Spinoza Lens a bi annual prize for ethics in the Netherlands He has also been honoured with an emeritus professorship at the prestigious Institute for Advanced Study He was elected to a Fellowship of the American Academy of Arts amp Sciences in 1971 11 a member of the American Philosophical Society in 1990 12 and to a Corresponding Fellowship of the British Academy in 2016 13 Personal life editWalzer is married to Judith Borodovko Walzer They are parents of two daughters Sarah Esther Walzer born 1961 and Rebecca Leah Walzer born 1966 His grandchildren are Joseph and Katya Barrett and Jules and Stefan Walzer Goldfeld Walzer is the older brother of historian Judith Walzer Leavitt Books editThe Revolution of the Saints A Study in the Origins of Radical Politics Harvard University Press 1965 ISBN 0 674 76786 1 Obligations Essays on Disobedience War and Citizenship Harvard University Press 1970 ISBN 0 674 63025 4 Political Action Quadrangle Books 1971 ISBN 0 8129 0173 8 Regicide and Revolution Cambridge University Press 1974 ISBN 0 231 08259 2 Just and Unjust Wars Basic Books 1977 second edition 1992 third edition 2000 ISBN 0 465 03705 4 fourth edition 2006 ISBN 0 465 03707 0 fifth edition 2015 Radical Principles Basic Books 1977 ISBN 0 465 06824 3 Spheres of Justice Basic Books 1983 ISBN 0 465 08189 4 Exodus and Revolution Basic Books 1985 ISBN 0 465 02164 6 Interpretation and Social Criticism Harvard University Press 1987 ISBN 0 674 45971 7 The Company of Critics Basic Books 1988 ISBN 0 465 01331 7 Zivile Gesellschaft und amerikanische Demokratie Rotbuch Verlag 1992 ISBN 3 596 13077 8 collection of essays in German collection the title translates as Civil Society and American Democracy What It Means to Be an American Marsilio Publishers 1992 ISBN 1 56886 025 0 Thick and Thin Moral Argument at Home and Abroad Notre Dame Press 1994 ISBN 0 268 01897 9 Pluralism Justice and Equality with David Miller Oxford University Press 1995 ISBN 0 19 828008 4 Toward a Global Civil Society Berghahn Books 1995 ISBN 1 57181 054 4 On Toleration Yale University Press 1997 ISBN 0 268 01897 9 Arguments from the Left Atlas 1997 in Swedish Pluralism and Democracy Editions Esprit 1997 in French ISBN 2 909210 19 7 Reason Politics and Passion Fischer Taschenbuch Verlag 1999 in German ISBN 3 596 14439 6 The Jewish Political Tradition Vol I Authority co edited with Menachem Lorberbaum Noam Zohar and Yair Lorberbaum Yale University Press 2000 ISBN 0 300 09428 0 Exilic Politics in the Hebrew Bible Mohr Siebeck 2001 in German ISBN 3 16 147543 7 War Politics and Morality Ediciones Paidos es 2001 in Spanish ISBN 84 493 1167 5 The Jewish Political Tradition Vol II Membership co edited with Menachem Lorberbaum Noam Zohar and Yair Lorberbaum Yale University Press 2003 ISBN 978 0 300 09428 2 Arguing About War Yale University Press 2004 ISBN 0 300 10365 4 Politics and Passion Toward A More Egalitarian Liberalism Yale University Press 2004 ISBN 0 300 10328 X Law Politics and Morality in Judaism edited by Walzer Princeton University Press 2006 ISBN 0 691 12508 2 Thinking Politically Yale University Press 2007 ISBN 978 0 300 11816 2 In God s Shadow Politics in the Hebrew Bible Yale University Press 2012 ISBN 978 0 300 18044 2 The Paradox of Liberation Yale University Press 2015 ISBN 978 0 300 18780 9 A Foreign Policy for the Left Yale University Press 2018 ISBN 978 0300223873 Political Action A Practical Guide to Movement Politics New York Review Books Classics 2019 The Struggle for a Decent Politics On Liberal as an adjective Yale University Press 2023 See also editHugo Grotius Emer de Vattel Thomas Nagel Richard Rorty John RawlsNotes edit Pronounced ˈ w ɔː l z er 2 References edit Howard Michael W 1986 Walzer s Socialism Social Theory and Practice 12 1 103 113 doi 10 5840 soctheorpract198612117 JSTOR 23556625 Michael Walzer The Free Market and Morality on YouTube a b c Michael Laban Walzer American Academy of Arts amp Sciences Retrieved 2021 11 29 Arkush Allan August 8 2012 Michael Walzer s Secular Jewish Thought Journal of Modern Jewish Studies 11 2 221 241 doi 10 1080 14725886 2012 684859 S2CID 144959296 Communitarianism gt Notes Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy Cuddihy John Murray 1978 02 05 What Is the Good Fight The New York Times ISSN 0362 4331 Retrieved 2022 02 17 Spheres of Justice 1983 see criticism Young Kim Justice as Right Actions An Original Theory of Justice in Conversation with Major Contemporary Accounts Lexington Books 2015 ch 11 ISBN 978 1 4985 1651 8 Mounk Yascha 2019 03 14 Why the College Scandal Touched a Nonpartisan Nerve The Atlantic Retrieved 2022 02 17 Walzer Michael 1997 On Toleration New Haven Yale University Press ISBN 978 0 300 07600 4 Interview with E J Dionne Michael Laban Walzer American Academy of Arts amp Sciences Retrieved 2022 04 19 APS Member History search amphilsoc org Retrieved 2022 04 19 Laureates Michael Walzer www spinozalens nl 24 November 2008 Retrieved 2021 11 29 External links edit nbsp Wikiquote has quotations related to Michael Walzer Dissent Quarterly magazine of politics and culture edited by Michael Walzer Walzer s biography at the Institute for Advanced Study Arguing about War Review of Walzer s Arguing about War in n 1 magazine The Argument about Humanitarian Intervention By Michael Walzer Micha Odenheimer A Connected Critic Micha Odenheimer speaks with an individual who has carved out a space for himself as a left wing supporter of Israel Eretz Acheret Magazine Review of Thinking Politically Barcelona Metropolis 2010 A Conversation with Michael Walzer Video interview 2012 Appearances on C SPAN For an analysis of communitarianism see Gad Barzilai Communities and Law Politics and Cultures of Legal Identities Ann Arbor University of Michigan Press 2003 The Future of Liberal Zionism An interview with Michael Walzer 20 September 2012 The Jewish Political Tradition 26 April 2013 Perry Anderson s House of Zion A symposium Fathom Journal Interview with Dr Michael Walzer by Stephen McKiernan Binghamton University Libraries Center for the Study of the 1960s April 4 2016Academic officesPreceded by Tanner Lecturer on Human Valuesat Harvard University1985 1986 Succeeded byJurgen Habermas Retrieved from https en wikipedia org w index php title Michael Walzer amp oldid 1198678275, wikipedia, wiki, book, books, library,

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