Fellows 2018

Laura Valentini

Associate Professor of Political Science at the London School of Economics and Political Science

Resident at the Forschungskolleg Humanwissenschaften:

January−February 2018

Research topic at the Forschungskolleg Humanwissenschaften:

»Morality and Social Construction«

Project outline:

When and why are socially constructed norms, such as legal and conventional norms, genuinely morally binding? My project, titled Morality and Social Construction, addresses this question. It traces the moral significance of socially constructed norms to the agential commitments that underpin them. It explains why those commitments ought to be respected, provided the content of the corresponding norms is consistent with persons’ equal moral status. This marks the difference between genuinely morally binding norms and bad ideological ones, which reflect and crystallize unjust power relations. The project explores the implications of this conclusion for three core questions in moral, legal, and political philosophy: the grounding of moral rights, the obligation to obey the law, and the demands of justice in the face of cultural pluralism. (Laura Valentini)

Funding of the stay:

»Justitia Amplificata. Rethinking Justice − Applied and Global«

Scholarly profile of Laura Valentini

Laura Valentini is Associate Professor at the London School of Economics and Political Science (LSE). Prior to joining the LSE, she was a Lecturer in Political Philosophy at UCL. Laura Valentini has held visiting positions at the Australian National University, the Swedish Collegium for Advanced Study, the University of Uppsala, and Harvard University. In 2015, she was awarded a Philip Leverhulme Prize in Politics and International Relations.

Website:
Please find more information about Laura Valentini here.

Main areas of research:

Contemporary political theory, democratic theory, international justice/human rights, freedom

Selected publications:

»Dignity and Human Rights: A Reconceptualization«, in: Oxford Journal of Legal Studies, vol. 4, no. 1, 2017, pp. 862-885.
(with Christian List), »Freedom as Independence«, in: Ethics, vol. 126, no. 4 (2016), pp. 1043-1074.
»Social Samaritan Justice: When and Why Needy Fellow Citizens Have a Right to Assistance«, in: American Political Science Review, vol. 109, no. 4 (2015), pp. 735-749.
»No Global Demos, No Global Democracy? A Systematization and Critique«, in: Perspectives on Politics, vol. 12, no. 4 (2014), pp. 789-807.
Justice in a Globalized World: A Normative Framework, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2011.

Laura Valentini

Scholarly profile of Laura Valentini

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