Department of Philosophy: People: Core Faculty: Christopher Morris

Christopher W. Morris (PhD, University of Toronto) is Professor of Philosophy and a faculty member of the Committee on Politics, Philosophy, and Public Affairs. He is also a member of the Collective Choice Center. His interests are in moral and political philosophy, applied ethics, legal theory, and the theory of practical rationality. Some of his current research develops the implications of his book An Essay on the Modern State for international affairs and world order and, in particular, legitimacy. Other topics include justice and reasons for action and a number of questions about moral standing.

Before coming to the University of Maryland in the winter of 2002, Morris was Professor of Philosophy at Bowling Green State University and Senior Research Fellow at the Social Philosophy and Policy Center. He was also Research Associate at CREA, a research group based at the Ecole Polytechnique in Paris and, in the fall of 1998, Visiting Research Fellow at the University of Amsterdam.

E-mail: cwmorris@umd.edu

Personal Home Page

Representative Publications

"What's Wrong with Imperialism?", Social Philosophy & Policy 23,1 (Winter 2006), 153-166.

"The Modern State", in The Handbook on Political Theory, edited by Gerald Gaus and Chandran Kukathas (London: Sage Publications, 2004), pp. 195-209.

"Peoples, Nations, and the Unity of Societies," in Cultural Identity and the Nation-State, edited by Carol C. Gould and Pasquale Pasquino (Lanham, Maryland: Rowman & Littlefield, 2001), pp. 19-29.

"The Very Idea of Popular Sovereignty: 'We the People' Reconsidered," Social Philosophy & Policy 17, 1 (Winter 2000), 1-26.

An Essay on the Modern State (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1998).

"Qu'appelle-t-on 'réputation?'", in Les limites de la rationalité, tome 1, Rationalité, Éthique, et Cognition, edited by Jean-Pierre Dupuy and Pierre Livet (Paris: La Découverte, 1997), pp. 155-173. Reprinted, with revisions, under the title "What is this Thing Called 'Reputation?', Business Ethics Quarterly 9, 1 (1999), 87-102.

"A Contractarian Account of Moral Justification," in Moral Knowledge? New Readings in Moral Epistemology, edited by Walter Sinnott-Armstrong and Mark Timmons (New York: Oxford University Press, 1996), pp. 215-242.

"Punishment and Loss of Moral Standing," Canadian Journal of Philosophy 21, 1 (March 1991), 53-79.

"Moral Standing and Rational-Choice Contractarianism," in Contractarianism and Rational Choice: Essays on David Gauthier's MORALS BY AGREEMENT, edited by Peter Vallentyne (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1991), pp. 76-95.

"The Relation between Self-Interest and Justice in Contractarian Ethics," Social Philosophy & Policy 5, 2 (Spring 1988), 119-153.

"A Hobbesian Welfare State?", Dialogue XXVII, 4 (Winter 1988), 653-673.

"Existential Limits to the Rectification of Past Wrongs," American Philosophy Quarterly 21, 2 (April 1984), 175-182.