PHILIP PETTIT

Philip Pettit was born in Ireland in 1945. He took a B.A. and an M.A. from the National University of Ireland at Dublin (previously University College, Dublin), and a Ph.D. from Queen's University, Belfast. He has taught at Queen's University (1967-68), University College, Dublin (1968-1971) and Trinity Hall, Cambridge (1972-75). After returning for a short period to University College, Dublin, he was appointed Professor of Philosophy at the University of Bradford (1976). He moved to the Research School of Social Sciences, Australian National University, in 1983, where he was Professor of Social and Political Theory. Since September 2002 he has been Professor of Politics at Princeton University.

Philip Pettit works in two broad areas: the foundations of economics and the social sciences, where this includes issues of psychology and metaphysics as well as methodology; and moral and political theory: the theory of what values our social institutions should realize and of how they can be best organized to promote such values. In both areas he works sometimes in more purely philosophical mode, sometimes in a mode that engages with economic and related methods; and in both areas, he works sometimes on his own, sometimes in collaboration with colleagues in philosophy, economics, political science and law.

Some publications

Philip Pettit's books include:

Not Just Deserts: A Republican Theory of Criminal Justice, with John Braithwaite, Oxford University Press, 1990.

Rawls: A Theory of Justice and its Critics, with Chandran Kukathas, Polity Press, 1990.

The Common Mind: An Essay on Psychology, Society and Politics, Oxford University Press, 1993. (Paperback edition, with new chapter, 1996.)

A Companion to Contemporary Political Philosophy, co-edited with Robert E.Goodin, Blackwell,1993.

Republicanism: A Theory of Freedom and Government, Clarendon Press, 1997.

Three Methods of Ethics: A Debate, with Marcia W.Baron and Michael Slote, Oxford, Blackwell, 1997.

A Theory of Freedom: From the Psychology to the Politics of Agency, Polity Press, 2001.