Santagata Lecture: Harvard Scholar Examines Disappearing Island Nations and Common Ownership of the Earth

Story posted February 09, 2010

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Mathias Risse, associate professor of public policy and philosophy at Harvard University's John F. Kennedy School of Government, will deliver the College's Kenneth V. Santagata Memorial Lecture at 7:30 p.m. Tuesday, February 16, 2010, in Main Lounge, Moulton Union.

Risse will give a talk titled "The Right to Relocation: Disappearing Island Nations and Common Ownership of the Earth." The lecture is open to the public and admission is free. For more information call 725-3257.

What moral claims do small island nations whose existence is threatened by global climate change have to international aid? Highlighting the intersection of environmental and social issues, Risse will introduce implications for a range of problems that have recently preoccupied the global community, including immigration, obligations to future generations, climate change, and human rights.

Mathias Risse works mostly in social and political philosophy and in ethics. His primary research areas are contemporary political philosophy (in particular questions of international justice, distributive justice, and property) and decision theory (in particular, rationality and fairness in group decision making.

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Mathias Risse.

Risse's current book-in-progress is titled The Grounds of Justice: An Inquiry about the State in Global Perspective. His articles have appeared in journals such as Ethics; Philosophy and Public Affairs; Nous; The Journal of Political Philosophy; and Social Choice and Welfare.

Risse studied philosophy, mathematics, and mathematical economics at the University of Bielefeld, the University of Pittsburgh, the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, and Princeton University. He earned his B.A., B.S. and M.S. in mathematics at Bielefeld, and his M.A. and Ph.D. in philosophy at Princeton.

Before going to Harvard he taught in the Department of Philosophy and the Program in Ethics, Politics and Economics at Yale University.

Mathias Risse's Bowdoin talk is sponsored by the Kenneth V. Santagata Memorial Lecture Fund and the Department of Philosophy as part of the Joseph McKeen Center's Seeking the Common Good Series: Innovation for Change.

Bowdoin College's Santagata Memorial Lecture Fund was established in 1982 by family and friends of Kenneth V. Santagata, Bowdoin class of 1973, to provide one lecture each semester from among the fields of arts, humanities, or social sciences. The lecturers are recognized authorities in their fields who present new, novel, or non-conventional approaches to their subjects.

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