Michael A. Mosher

Michael Mosher

Professor of Political ScienceDepartment ChairChapman Hall 212
918-631-2349
michael-mosher@utulsa.edu

My interests focus upon the history of political philosophy with an emphasis upon the enlightenment philosophe and founding father of the social sciences, Baron Charles-Louis de Montesquieu and his many disciples and critics, including Jean-Jacques Rousseau, Edmund Burke, James Madison, G. W. F. Hegel, Alexis de Tocqueville, and Emile Durkheim. I have also published studies regarding contemporary concerns with civil society, rights and justice. Currently I am working with others on a book (at Cambridge University Press, Sankar Muthu ed.) that looks at the issues of empire in the context of the history of modern Western political thought.

Education and Degrees Earned

  • B.A. with great honor, Political Science, University of California at Berkeley,1966
  • M.A., Political Science, Harvard University, 1970
  • P.D., Political Science, Harvard University, 1976

Previous Teaching Experience

  • Harvard University
  • Keio University (Tokyo)
  • Providence College
  • Tohoku University
  • Tokyo University
  • Tsuda University
  • University of Colorado
  • University of Washington
  • Yale University

Previous Relevant Work Experience

  • Member, School of Social Science, Institute for Advanced Study, Princeton
  • Fulbright Scholar: Tokyo University, Tsuda Womens’ University, Tohoku University
  • Resident Research Fellow (one semester each): Centre d’Études et de Recherches Internationales (CERI), Sciences Po, Paris, France;
  • University of California (San Diego) ;
  • iversity of Manchester (England) ;
  • Wesleyan University,
  • Assistant to the President for International Programs, TU;
  • organizer, TU Global Perspectives conferences (5)
  • Course Director; Northwest Inter-institutional Collegiate Study Abroad Program, Avignon, France
  • Editor, Conference for the Study of Political Thought (CSPT) Newsletter
  • CSPT East European Project, Tirana, Albania
  • Journalism: Japan Times, Seattle Sun (film critic), Tulsa Tribune, Tulsa World
  • Museum Exhibit: “Montesquieu: the Man, the Mind, and the Spirit.” , Gunston Hall, Virginia
    Community Involvement,
  • Habitat for Humanity volunteer, Tulsa, OK

Professional Affiliations

  • American Political Science Association
  • International Conference for the Study of Political Thought
  • Foundations of Political Thought

Courses Taught at TU

  • American Political Thought (POL 3043)
  • European Politics (POL 2023)
  • History and Philosophy of Science (HON 2013)
  • Issues in European Political Development (POL 3183)
  • Liberalism and Democracy (POL 3143)
  • Politics and Culture of Japan (POL 3353)
  • Enlightenment and Its Critics (HON 2003)
  • Western Political Thought I: From the Greek Polis to the Modern State (PHIL 2083)
  • Western Political Thought II From the English Revolution to the Russian Revolution (PHIL 2093)
  • Women and Democracy on Film (POL 2153)

Awards & Recognition

  • Colloquium keynote address, Department of Philosophy, University of Bucharest, Romania
  • Member with Fellowship Award, School of Social Science, Institute for Advanced Study, Princeton
  • 2 Fulbright Awards
  • Harvard Graduate Prize Traveling Fellow, Paris
  • Harvard University Invited speaker: Seminar in the History of Political Ideas, King’s College, Cambridge University
  • National Endowment for the Humanities Grants (5)
  • Political Theory Colloquium, University of California, Berkeley
  • Post-Doctoral Clark Fellow, Clark Memorial Library, UCLA
  • Harvard Graduate Prize Fellow
  • Woodrow Wilson Fellow

Publications


  • “Are Civil Societies the Transmission Belts of Ethical Tradition?” Concluding chapter of Alternative Conceptions of Civil Society, Simone Chambers and Will Kymlicka eds. (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2001)

  • “Boundary Revisions: the Deconstruction of Moral Personality in Rawls, Nozick, Sandel, and Parfit,” Political Studies, Vol. 39 No. 2, June 1991

  • “Free Trade, Free Speech, and Free Love: Montesquieu and The Reform of the Monarchy in France, 1748-1771 in Monarchisms in the Age of Enlightenment: Liberty, Patriotism, and the Common Good,” eds. Hans Blom, John Christian Laursen, and Luisa Simonutti, (University of Toronto Press in association with the University of California Press, 2007)

  • “Montesquieu on Conquest: Three Cartesian Heroes and Five Good Enough Empires,” Revue Montesquieu, No° 8, 2006

  • Montesquieu’s Science of Politics: Essays on the Spirit of Laws, with David Carrithers and Paul Rahe eds. (Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield, 2001)

  • “Nihonteki Riso to Hegeru Seijiron” [Japanese Ideals and Hegel’s Political Argument] in Gendai Nihon no Paburiku Firosofi [Public Philosophy in Modern Japan], Naoshi Yamawaki ed., (Tokyo: Shinseisha, 1998), pp. 80-99

  • “On the Originality of Francois Ferret: A Commemorative Note,” Political Theory, Vol. 26 No. 3, June 1998

  • “The Judgmental Gaze of European Women: Gender, Sexuality, and the Critique of Republican Rule,” Political Theory, Vol. 22 No. 1, February 1994

  • “The Skeptic’s Burke: Reflections on the Revolution in France, 1790-1990,” Political Theory, Vol. 9 No. 3, August 1991

  • “What Montesquieu Taught—‘Perfection does not Concern Men or Things Universally,’” Chapter 1, Modernity in Question: Montesquieu and His Legacy, ed. Rebecca Kingston, SUNY Press, 2008