Michael Walzer
Also known as Michael Laban Walzer
American political theorist, born 1935; wrote Just and Unjust Wars and Spheres of Justice.
At a glance
Main ideas
Just war, Complex equality, Grounded theory …
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Just and Unjust Wars, Spheres of Justice, Interpretation and Social Criticism …
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- Walzer is a political theorist and professor emeritus at the Institute for Advanced Study in Princeton.
- He is known for reviving just war theory in Just and Unjust Wars (1977) and for the idea of complex equality in Spheres of Justice (1983).
- He is often grouped with communitarians, though he is not fully comfortable with the label.
- He is editor emeritus of Dissent.
Why it matters
- His work on just war and on distributive justice is standard reading in political philosophy.
Key facts
- Born
- 3 Mar 19351
- Education
- BA in history, Brandeis (1956, summa cum laude); Fulbright Fellow at Cambridge from 1956 to 1957; PhD in government, Harvard (1961)1
- Career
- Princeton from 1962 to 1966; Harvard from 1966 to 1980; Institute for Advanced Study from 1980, now professor emeritus1
- Editing
- Editor emeritus of Dissent; contributing editor to The New Republic1
- Honours
- American Academy of Arts and Sciences (1971); American Philosophical Society (1990); Spinoza Lens (2008); Corresponding Fellow of the British Academy (2016)1
- Output
- 27 books and over 300 articles1
Main ideas
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Just war1
Ethics matters in wartime, without pacifism.
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Complex equality1
Each good should be distributed by its own social meaning, and no good, like money, should dominate others.
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Grounded theory1
Political theory must be rooted in particular societies' traditions.
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Toleration1
On Toleration compares regimes of toleration from empires to immigrant societies.
Books to start with
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Connections
Writes
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Sources
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