MEDFORD/SOMERVILLE, Mass. – Tufts University will present political philosopher, Harvard Professor of Government and best-selling author Michael J. Sandel as the 13th speaker in the Richard E. Snyder President's Lecture Series on November 3 at 4:30 p.m. in the Cabot Intercultural Center, on Tufts University's Medford/Somerville campus. Members of the news media who would like to attend should contact Alexander Reid at 617-627-4173 for a reserved seat.
Defying easy classification in his political views, Sandel is known for drawing on influential thinkers from Aristotle to Emmanuel Kant to John Rawls to debate the ethics surrounding controversial issues such as abortion, torture of suspected terrorists and the recent U.S. government bailout. He is the author of a New York Times bestselling book named "Justice: What's the Right Thing to Do?"
At Harvard, Sandel teaches one of the university's most popular undergraduate courses – "Justice." It has enrolled over 15,000 students. Public television stations across the country aired a 12-episode PBS documentary of this course last year.
At Tufts, Sandel's unconventional views will be the basis of his discussion" Justice: What's the Right Thing to Do?"
Sandel's thought-provoking opinions are exactly what Richard E. Snyder had in mind when he established the President's Lecture Series at Tufts. The series -- endowed by Snyder, who is the former chairman and CEO of Simon and Schuster and a 1955 Tufts graduate -- is designed to bring to Tufts speakers who challenge conventional wisdom in their professional work.
Sandel is the author of "Liberalism and the Limits of Justice" (1998), "Democracy's Discontent" (1998) and "Public Philosophy: Essays on Morality in Politics" (2006). His writings have been translated into 15 foreign languages.
Sandel is the Anne T. and Robert M. Bass Professor of Government at Harvard University. A recipient of the Harvard-Radcliffe Phi Beta Kappa Teaching Prize, he has lectured throughout North America, Europe, Japan, China, India, Korea, Australia and New Zealand.
He has been a visiting professor at the Sorbonne (Paris) and delivered the Tanner Lectures on Human Values at Oxford University. He has served on the President's Council on Bioethics, a national body appointed by the president to examine the ethical implications of new biomedical technologies.
The recipient of three honorary degrees, Sandel is a member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences and the Council on Foreign Relations. A summa cum laude, Phi Beta Kappa graduate of Brandeis University with the class of 1975, Sandel received his doctorate from Oxford University in 1981, where he was a Rhodes Scholar.
Tufts University, located on three Massachusetts campuses in Boston, Medford/Somerville, and Grafton, and in Talloires, France, is recognized among the premier research universities in the United States. Tufts enjoys a global reputation for academic excellence and for the preparation of students as leaders in a wide range of professions. A growing number of innovative teaching and research initiatives span all Tufts campuses, and collaboration among the faculty and students in the undergraduate, graduate and professional programs across the university's schools is widely encouraged.
