Mathais Risse

Mathias Risse is Professor of Philosophy and Public Policy at Harvard Kennedy School of Government. He 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, human rights, and property.) In 2012, he published two books on questions of global justice, On Global Justice (Princeton University Press), which sets out his own proposal for how to think about justice at the global level; and Global Political Philosophy (MacMillan), which is a text book introduction to the field of political philosophy that focuses on ethical questions about globalization. Both books combine foundational philosophical inquiry with relatively applied questions about immigration, climate change, obligations to future generations, institutional reform at the global level, and human rights. 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 received his BA, BS, and MS in mathematics from Bielefeld, and his MA and PhD in philosophy from Princeton. Before coming to Harvard, he taught in the Department of Philosophy and the Program in Ethics, Politics and Economics at Yale.