51ƷCenter for Global Humanities presents “Remaking the American Polity”
While liberals and conservatives are sharply divided on practically every major policy issue in today’s hyper-polarized America, most of us will agree that our government and our politics are not functioning optimally. We face many daunting challenges that a less-divided government might more aptly be addressing – from economic inequality and homelessness to addiction and deaths of despair to the growing urban-rural divide to the ubiquitous presence of electronic devices distracting us from our real-world relationships.
Perhaps the liberal project has failed. And it is time for us to transition away from self-serving liberal elitism and toward a postliberal order that serves the common good.
This is the argument scholar Patrick Deneen will make when he visits the 51Ʒ Center for Global Humanities to present a lecture titled “Remaking the American Polity” on Monday, April 29 at 6 p.m. at the WCHP Lecture Hall in Parker Pavilion on the 51ƷPortland Campus for the Health Sciences.
Deneen is a professor of political science and holds the David A. Potenziani Memorial Chair of Constitutional Studies at the University of Notre Dame. His teaching and writing interests focus on the history of political thought, American political thought, liberalism, conservatism, and constitutionalism. His books include three edited volumes on democracy and five books, including such titles as The Odyssey of Political Theory, Why Liberalism Failed, and Regime Change: Toward a Postliberal Future. His works have been translated into more than two dozen languages, and he has been awarded research fellowships from Princeton University, the Earhart Foundation, and the Institute for Advanced Study at the University of Virginia. He has delivered invited lectures around the world.
After reviewing the limitations and pitfalls of liberalism—which inherently pits progressives and conservatives against one another—Deneen will share his vision for a better path forward. In doing so, he will appeal to some of the oldest lessons of Western thought, advocating for a more just regime founded not through the Marxist elimination of class but through the creation of a “mixed constitution” that serves both the best interests of the few and the many.
This will be the fifth and final event of this spring semester at the Center for Global Humanities, where lectures are always free, open to the public, and streamed live online.