School of Philosophy,                                                                               Department of Philosophy,

Wuhan University,                                                 The University of Sydney,

Wuhan, 430072 Hubei, China.                                                                 Sydney, NSW 2006, Australia.

Skype: thomas_besch                                              thomas.besch@sydney.edu.au

thomas.besch@whu.edu.cn

https://whu-cn.academia.edu/ThomasBesch

________________________________________________________

AREA OF SPECIALIZATION

Political Philosophy, Moral Philosophy.

AREAS OF COMPETENCE

History of Social and Political Philosophy, Introductory Logic, Epistemology.

EDUCATION

DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY (DPHIL), Philosophy, University of Oxford (2005). MAGISTER (equivalent to MPhil), Philosophy, University of Hamburg (1996). ZWISCHENPRÜFUNG (equivalent to BA), Philosophy, University of Hamburg (1992).

ACADEMIC EMPLOYMENT

LUOJIA PROFESSOR IN PHILOSOPHY, School of Philosophy, Wuhan University (Sep 2015– present).

Involves designing and teaching undergraduate, MA and PhD classes in Western Political Philosophy.

HONORARY RESEARCH ASSOCIATE, Department of Philosophy, The University of Sydney (Jan 2015–present).

RESEARCH FELLOW, Department of Philosophy, The University of Hradec Kralove, Czech Republic (Jan–Aug 2015).

LECTURER IN POLITICAL PHILOSOPHY (equivalent to US Asst. Prof.), Department of Philosophy, The University of Sydney (Jul 2007–Dec 2014).

Designed and taught undergraduate and graduate classes, provided administrative service, and engaged in undergraduate and graduate supervision. Various Hons, MA and MPhil completions; two PhD completions (Ben Cross, Stuart Wong).

SENIOR RESEARCH ASSOCIATE, Balliol College, University of Oxford (Jun–Oct 2006).

INSTRUCTOR IN PHILOSOPHY, Department of Philosophy, Bilkent University, Turkey (Sep 2000– Jun 2007).

Designed and taught 2^nd year Great Books courses in social and political philosophy (while completing my Oxford doctorate).

LECTURER IN LOGIC, Somerville College, University of Oxford (Jan–Jun 2000). Taught introductory logic to 2^nd year students.

WARDEN OF JOWETT, Balliol College, University of Oxford (Sep 1999–Sep 2000).

Oversaw Balliol’s 3^rd year students in a disciplinary and counselling function in concert with the Dean of College.

DISSERTATION

On Practical Constructivism and Reasonableness. Supervisors: Prof. Kinch Hoekstra, Prof. James P. Griffin. Available at https://whu-cn.academia.edu/ThomasBesch

PUBLICATIONS

Book

Besch, TM 1998, Über John Rawls’ politischen Liberalismus, Peter Lang, Frankfurt.

A monograph on Rawls’s post-1985 political philosophy. I reconstruct Rawls as advancing a non-ideal theory version of an internal conception of political liberalism, discuss core problems of this approach, and argue for a conception of legitimacy that helps to overcome these problems. (In German; available at: https://whu-cn.academia.edu/ThomasBesch)

Articles and Book Chapters

Besch, TM 2018, ‘On Discursive Respect’, under revision for Dialogue: Canadian Philosophical Review (conditionally accepted April 2018).

Besch, TM & Lee, JS 2018, ‘On Critical Reflection on Toleration in Social Work’, forthcoming in European Journal of Social Work (accepted 10 May 2018).

Besch, TM 2017, ‘Public Justification, Inclusion, and Discursive Equality’, Dialogue: Canadian Philosophical Review. Doi:10.1017/S0012217317000646

Besch, TM 2017, ‘Schmidtz on Moral Recognition Rules: a Critique’, Theoria: A Swedish Journal of Philosophy and Psychology, vol. 83, no. 2, pp. 138–153.

Besch, TM & Lee, JS 2017, ‘On Toleration in Social Work’, European Journal of Social Work. DOI: 10.1080/13691457.2017.1286460

Besch, TM 2015, ‘On the Right to Justification and Discursive Respect’, Dialogue: Canadian Philosophical Review, vol. 54, no. 4, pp. 703-726.

Besch, TM 2014, ‘On Discursive Respect’, Social Theory and Practice, vol. 40, no. 2, pp. 207-231.

Besch, TM 2013, ‘On a Reflexive Case for Human Rights’, Journal of East-West Thought, vol. 3, no. 4, pp. 51-64.

Besch, TM 2013, ‘On Political Legitimacy, Reasonableness, and Perfectionism’, Public Reason, vol. 5, no. 1, pp. 58-74.

Besch, TM 2012, ‘Political Liberalism, the Internal Conception, and the Problem of Public Dogma’, Philosophy and Public Issues, vol. 2, no. 1, pp. 153-177.

Besch, TM 2011, ‘Factualism, Normativism, and the Bounds of Normativity’, Dialogue: Canadian Philosophical Review, vol. 50, no. 2, pp. 347-365.

Besch, TM 2011, ‘Kantian Constructivism, the Issue of Scope, and Perfectionism’, European Journal of Philosophy, vol. 19, no. 1, pp. 1-20.

Besch, TM 2010, ‘Diversity and the Limits of Liberal Toleration’ in Duncan Ivison (ed.), The Ashgate Research Companion to Multiculturalism, pp. 75-94. Ashgate, London.

Besch, TM 2008, ‘Constructing Practical Reason’, The Journal of Value Inquiry, vol. 42, no. 1, pp. 55-76.

Works in Progress

Besch, TM (under review), ‘A Note on Reciprocity of Reasons’.

(Available at https://whu-cn.academia.edu/ThomasBesch)

Besch, TM (under review), ‘Political Liberalism and Public Justification: The Deep View’. (Available at https://whu-cn.academia.edu/ThomasBesch)

Besch, TM (under review), ‘On Justification, Idealization, and Discursive Purchase’. (Available at https://whu-cn.academia.edu/ThomasBesch)

Cross, B and Besch, TM (under review), ‘The Inconclusiveness of Public Reason’.

Besch, TM and Lee, JS (in preparation), ‘Religion, Inclusion, and Public Reason’. Besch, TM (in preparation), ‘Political Liberalism and Contextualism’.

PRESENTATIONS

On Robust Discursive Equality. Invited talk, Public Reason Workshop 2018, School of Philosophy, Wuhan University.

On Elements of Justice. Invited talk, Author Meets Critics: Schmidtz’s Elements of Justice, School of Philosophy, Wuhan University, 2018.

Justification, Idealization, and Discursive Purchase. Invited talk, Second Australian Political Theory Conference, The University of Sydney, Sydney, 2018; International Young Philosopher’s Roundtable 2017, Department of Philosophy, The University of New South Wales (UNSW), Australia;

Public Justification, Inclusion, and Discursive Equality. Invited talk, Conference “After Rawls,”

Shanghai Jiao Tong University, Shanghai 2017; Arizona-Wuhan Contemporary Political Philosophy Summer School 2017, School of Philosophy, Wuhan University.

Public Reason and Discursive Equality. Invited talk, School of Philosophy. Wuhan University; Department of Philosophy, UNSW, 2016.

Schmidtz on Moral Recognition Rules. Invited talk, Author Meets Critics: Schmidtz’s Person, Polis, Planet. School of Philosophy, Wuhan University 2016.

Cults and Public Reason. Invited talk, School of Philosophy, Wuhan University, 2016.

On the Right to Justification and Discursive Respect. Invited talk, Department of Philosophy, Boğazici University, Turkey, 2014; Department of Philosophy, UNSW, 2014; Department of Philosophy, Lingnan University, Hong Kong, 2014; Department of Philosophy and Religious Studies, Charles University, Czech Republic, 2015; School of Philosophy, Wuhan University, 2015.

Toleration in Social Work? Guest lecture in “Culture, Identity and Diversity,” School of Social Sciences, UNSW, 2014.

Political Liberalism, the Internal Conception, and the Problem of Public Dogma. Invited talk, Department of Philosophy, The Chinese University of Hong Kong, Hong Kong, 2013; Department of Philosophy, UNSW, 2013; Department of Philosophy, Macquarie University, Australia, 2012.

A Short Question about Justification. Invited talk, Symposium: Encounter with Thomas Pogge, Institute for Democracy and Human Rights, The University of Sydney, 2012.

Discursive Inclusion and the Problem of Hermeticality. Invited talk, Faculty of Social Sciences, Istanbul Technical University, Turkey, 2011.

On Political Legitimacy, Reasonableness, and Perfectionism. Invited talk, Kadish Center for Morality, Law and Public Affairs, The University of California at Berkeley, USA, 2010.

Rawls, Legitimacy, Reasonableness. Invited talk, Department of Philosophy, The University of Sydney, 2010; Department of Philosophy, Boğazici University, 2010.

Political Justification and the Problem of Hermeticality. Invited talk, Symposium: The Normativity of Critique, Department of Philosophy, The University of Sydney, 2010.

On How (Not) to Be a Political Liberal. Talk at the Annual Conference of the Australasian Association of Philosophy, UNSW, 2010.

Toleration and the Paradox of Delineation. Talk at the Annual Conference of the International Society for Justice Research, Flinders University, Australia, 2008.

Kantian Constructivism and Perfectionism. Invited talk, Department of Philosophy, The University of Sydney, 2008.

Tolerating Tolerantly. Invited talk, Department of Philosophy, Boğazici University, 2008. O’Neill on Ethical Standing. Invited talk, Department of Philosophy, Boğazici University, 2006. On Constructing Practical Reason. Invited talk, Kant Working Group, Bilkent University, 2004.

LEADERSHIP AND SERVICE

CONFERENCE CONVENER, INITIATOR and ORGANIZER, Public Reason Workshop (2018). Convened, initiated and organized an international two-day conference on ideas of public reason. School of Philosophy, Wuhan University.

FACILITATOR OF COLLABORATION (since 2016). Initiated and co-coordinate the establishment of School-level and Faculty-level bilateral ties between Wuhan University and Australian universities. This included UNSW, Melbourne University, Latrobe University, the University of Western Sydney, and the Australian Catholic University. In four cases, this resulted in School-level or Faculty-level MoUs governing a range of research and teaching collaborations.

CO-FACILITATOR OF RESEARCH NETWORK on contemporary ideas of public reason. This currently includes researchers at Wuhan University, UNSW, and the University of Duisburg-Essen, Germany. I organize an international workshop on the theme at Wuhan University and co-organize another workshop at the University of Duisburg-Essen in 2018.

CONVENER and INITIATOR, Political Philosophy Reading Group, Wuhan University (since 2016).

REFEREE for The Journal of Value Inquiry, The Journal of Moral Philosophy, Political Studies, Political Studies Review, European Journal of Political Theory, Sophia, Theoria, Res Publica, Dialogue, Social Theory and Practice, Canadian Journal of Philosophy, Utilitas.

REVIEW EDITOR, Encyclopaedia of Political Thought (Wiley-Blackwell, 2014).

REVIEWER for the Czech Science Foundation, GAČR (2011), and for the Estonian Research Council, ETAg (2018).

FIRST-YEAR COORDINATOR, Department of Philosophy, The University of Sydney (2009–13). Coordinated the Department’s large 1^st year units (enrolments exceeded 800 students). Included coordinating the teaching of colleagues; managing postgraduate tutors; pastoral care for tutors and students; managing student results and peer usage of online learning tools (Blackboard/Lectopia/Echo); developing department-level 1^st year policies.

COORDINATOR, COLLOQUIA COMMITTEE and INTERNATIONAL SPEAKERS PROGRAM, Department

of Philosophy, Bilkent University (2006–07). Headed a committee that organized all departmental research events in philosophy, and ran an International Speaker’s Program.

MEMBERSHIPS

Australasian Association of Philosophy (since 2009).

International Society for Justice Research (2008).

American Philosophical Association (since 2007).

GRANTS AND SCHOLARSHIPS

Conference Grant, The University of Sydney (2011).

Special Studies Project Support Grant, The University of Sydney (2010). Research Grant, Bilkent University (2006).

Graduate Scholarship of the German Academic Exchange Service (DAAD) (1997–98).

REFEREES

1. Paul Patton

Scientia Professor of Philosophy, Fellow of the Australian Academy of the Humanities,