Aaron James
Professor of Philosophy, Department of Philosophy
PH.D., Harvard University
Fax: (949) 824-6520
Email: aaron.james@uci.edu
University of California, Irvine
96 Humanities Instructional Building
Mail Code: 4555
Irvine, CA 92697
Research Interests
Ethics (foundations and moral theory), Political Philosophy
Academic Distinctions
Awarded ACLS's Burkhardt fellowship in 2008, for study (2009-10) at the Center for Advanced Study in the Behavioral Sciences, Stanford University. Visiting Professor at NYU, Department of Philosophy, in fall of 2013. Visiting Scholar at ANU summer 2016.
Research Abstract
I've recently written a book for a general audience with finance and law ace Robert Hockett (Cornell law) entitled Money From Nothing: Why We Should Learn to Stop Worrying About Debt and Love the Federal Reserve (Melville, anticipated pub. Sept. 2020). I have new academic papers on money and related topics, which are noted below.
In political philosophy, I've written a book on fairness in the global economy, from a social contract perspective (Fairness in Practice: A Social Contract for a Global Economy, OUP, 2012). I've also written about John Rawls's constructive method, its neglected realist and interpretive aspects, and its application to social structures within and across major domestic institutions (such as international trade).
I'm planning two academic books on money. A first book is on money's social and normative foundations, especially in "what we owe each other" and how we account for it. A second book is on money's role and management in the global economy, especially in view of central banking. The latter extends my practice-based analysis in _Fairness In Practice_ to "associative obligations" generated by the state system and their upshot for public finance, social insurance, and climate adaptation.
In moral theory I have an ongoing interest in contractualism, especially in view of risk.
Also in ethics I work on rationalism and the foundations of moral and practical judgment, with particular interest in constructivism (what it is, how it might explain objectivity, and whether it could provide a foundational theory). Having now written about surfing (see below), I'm increasingly interested in the exercise of skill, embodiment, attunement and what they mean for practical reason and the foundations of value.
If life is long enough, I'm hoping to set out my grand "low rationalist" vision in several, related books:
1. For All Debts, Public and Private: Morality, Money, Polity
2. Money In Practice: Fair Finance in a Global Economy
3. The Talent of Reason: Embodied Reasoning, Attunement, and the Exercise of Skill
4. Reason In Practice: How We Construct Objective Values
In the meanwhile, I’m at work on another pop book, co-authored (more on that soon).
Academic Publications
Fairness in Practice: A Social Contract for a Global Economy, New York: Oxford University Press, 2012
"Rethinking Money and Trade." For the Palgrave Handbook of International Political Theory, edited by David Riedy.
"Preparing for Mass Unemployment: Precautionary Basic Income" Edited by Matthew Liao. Oxford University Press, 2020.
"Why We Must Lift the Resource Curse," for a volume on Leif Wenar's _Blood Oil_, eds. Laurie Shrage and Naomi Zack, with Rowman and Littlefield, 2018.
"Sovereignty and Associative Obligations," for Sovereignty and the New Executive, Claire Finkelstein and Sharon Lloyd, eds., Oxford University Press, 2018
"Constructivism, Intuitionism, Ecumenism," Oxford Handbook of Distributive Justice, ed. Serena Olsaretti, 2018
"Investor Rights as Nonsense -- On Stilts." In Just Financial Markets?, ed. Lisa Herzog, Oxford: Oxford University Press 2017
"Fortune and Fairness in Global Economic Life," Journal of Moral Philosophy, 14.3 2017
"How Cynical Can Ideal Theory Be?," Journal of International Political Theory vol. 12 no. 2 118-133, June 2016
"Fairness in Trade," for Global Political Theory Today, eds. David Held and Pietro Maffettone, Polity Press, 2016.
"The Distinctive Significance of Systemic Risk," Ratio Juris, Volume 30, Issue 3 2016
"How To Construct Global Justice," San Diego L. Rev. 52, 1013, Fall 2015
“A Theory of Fairness in Trade,” Moral Philosophy and Politics Vol 1, Issue 2 2014. A special issue on fairness in trade, guest edited by David Miller.
“Replies to Critics,” Canadian Journal of Philosophy, Vol 44, Issue 2, March 2014, 286-304. A special issue on
Fairness in Practice, with discussions by Christian Barry, Charles Beitz, A.J. Julius, and Kristi Olson. At: http://www.tandfonline.com/eprint/qQSpWUKPzvqUKv5zgAqS/full
"Why Practices?" Raison Politiques, 51, Summer 2013
"Contractualism's (Not So) Slippery Slope." Legal Theory, Vol 18, issue 03, 2012, pp. 263-292. At:
http://journals.cambridge.org/repo_A867FcA4
"Constructing Protagorean Objectivity." Constructivism in Practical Philosophy, eds. James Lenman and Yonatan Shemmer, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2012
"Political Constructivism." For the Blackwell Companion to Rawls, eds. David Reidy and Jon Mandle, Wiley-Blackwell, 2013
"Constructivism, Moral." The International Encyclopedia of Ethics, ed. Hugh LaFollette (Blackwell)
"Contractualism and Political Liberalism." For the Routledge Companion to Social and Political Philosophy, eds. Gerald Gaus and Fred D’Agostino, New York: Taylor and Francis, 2013
"Moral Assurance Problems in Global Context," for Hobbes Today: Insights for the 21st Century, ed. Sharon Lloyd, Cambridge University Press, 2012
"The Significance of Distribution," Reasons and Recognition: Essays on the Philosophy of T. M. Scanlon, eds. R. Jay Wallace, Rahul Kumar, and Samuel Freeman, New York: Oxford University Press, 2011
"Global Economic Fairness: Internal Principles," Global Justice and International Economic Law: Opportunities and Challenges, Cambridge University Press, 2012
"Rawlsian Justice in a Common Globe," Sustainability and Security within Liberal Societies, eds. Stephen Gough and Andrew Stables, New York: Routledge, 2008
"Legal and Other Governance In Second Person Perspective," Loyola Law Review 40, no 2, 2006
"Equality in a Realistic Utopia," Social Theory and Practice 32, no 4, 2006
"Constructivism about Practical Reasons," Philosophy and Phenomenological Research 74 no 2, 2007
"Constructing Justice for Existing Practice: Rawls and the Status Quo," Philosophy and Public Affairs 33 no 4, 2005
"The Objectivity of Values: Invariance without Explanation," The Southern Journal of Philosophy 44 no 4, 2006
"Distributive Justice without Sovereign Rule: The Case of Trade," Social Theory and Practice 31 no 4, 2005
“Rights and Circularity in Scanlon’s Contractualism,” Journal of Moral Philosophy 1.3 (2004) 369-377
“Power in Social Organization as the Subject of Justice,” Pacific Philosophical Quarterly 86, 2005: 25-49
Work in Progress
"Money, Recognition, and the Outer Limits of Obliviousness"
“I Owe You”
"The Fairness Argument for International Money"
"Money as Promise: Innes and the 'Fundamental Nature of a Financial Transaction'"
Further paper projects (some in gestation stage):
Rawls, Lerner, and the "Tax and Spend" Booby-Trap
Money as a Currency of Justice
How Money Corrupts
Ideational Structure
"Taxation" by Monetary Policy: Distribution for Lovers of Liberty
What We Owe Each Other: Accounting and Accountability
Should Basic Income Replace Social Insurance?
Academic Miscellany
"APA Comments on Leif Wenar's Blood Oil"
"Sparing the Poor: APA Comments for Darrel Moellendorf."
"Multi-Functionalism about Human Rights: APA Comments for James Nickel."
"Multi-Functionalism about Human Rights: APA Comments for Charles Beitz."
"Deflating Fact-Insensitivity"
Other Very (Very) Important Things
Money From Nothing: Why We Should Learn to Stop Worrying About Debt and Love the Federal Reserve, with Robert Hockett (Melville, anticipated pub. Sept. 2020)
Surfing with Sartre
by Doubleday/Penguin Random House, 2017. Also by Lemniscaat (Netherlands), New Century Publishing (Taiwan), and Pegasus (Turkey). A treatise on what surfer know-how says about questions for the ages (about freedom, control, flow, happiness, being, transcendence, society, the meaning of life) and why all this means we must actually do something about climate change, namely: work less and go surfing instead, in a shorter workweek and more efficient style of capitalism.
Assholes: A Theory
a bestseller by Doubleday, USA, 2012. Also by Brealey (UK/commonwealth), Rizzoli (Italy), Riemann (Germany), Psichogios (Greece), Chungrim (South Korea), Citic (China), Tanapaev (Estonia), Pegasus (Turkey), and Port - excerpt (Russia)
Assholes: A Theory of Donald Trump
by Doubleday/Penguin Random House, 2016. Also by Random House Verlagsgruppe (Germany), Rizzoli (Italy), Malpaso (Spain), Korea Economic & Business Daily (Korea), Rock-Paper-Scissors (China). An essay on the appeal and the danger of one conspicuous figure in contemporary public life, with lessons from the social contract tradition of Hobbes and Rousseau -- or, why America most certainly should not play Republic Roulette.
Assholes: A Theory -- a documentary by John Walker, featuring John Cleese, yours truly, and many others (available soon...) http://johnwalkerproductions.com/portfolio/assholes/
"On the Philosophical Interest and Surprising Significance of the Asshole." In the Harvard Review of Philosophy, Volume XXIII 2016
"Why Nothing Exists: A Rigorous Demonstration" In Opción and in Suburbano (both in Spanish)
Blog: On Assholes.com
Charity: Help A Village With.Us
In political philosophy, I've written a book on fairness in the global economy, from a social contract perspective (Fairness in Practice: A Social Contract for a Global Economy, OUP, 2012). I've also written about John Rawls's constructive method, its neglected realist and interpretive aspects, and its application to social structures within and across major domestic institutions (such as international trade).
I'm planning two academic books on money. A first book is on money's social and normative foundations, especially in "what we owe each other" and how we account for it. A second book is on money's role and management in the global economy, especially in view of central banking. The latter extends my practice-based analysis in _Fairness In Practice_ to "associative obligations" generated by the state system and their upshot for public finance, social insurance, and climate adaptation.
In moral theory I have an ongoing interest in contractualism, especially in view of risk.
Also in ethics I work on rationalism and the foundations of moral and practical judgment, with particular interest in constructivism (what it is, how it might explain objectivity, and whether it could provide a foundational theory). Having now written about surfing (see below), I'm increasingly interested in the exercise of skill, embodiment, attunement and what they mean for practical reason and the foundations of value.
If life is long enough, I'm hoping to set out my grand "low rationalist" vision in several, related books:
1. For All Debts, Public and Private: Morality, Money, Polity
2. Money In Practice: Fair Finance in a Global Economy
3. The Talent of Reason: Embodied Reasoning, Attunement, and the Exercise of Skill
4. Reason In Practice: How We Construct Objective Values
In the meanwhile, I’m at work on another pop book, co-authored (more on that soon).
Academic Publications
Fairness in Practice: A Social Contract for a Global Economy, New York: Oxford University Press, 2012
"Rethinking Money and Trade." For the Palgrave Handbook of International Political Theory, edited by David Riedy. "Preparing for Mass Unemployment: Precautionary Basic Income" Edited by Matthew Liao. Oxford University Press, 2020. "Why We Must Lift the Resource Curse," for a volume on Leif Wenar's _Blood Oil_, eds. Laurie Shrage and Naomi Zack, with Rowman and Littlefield, 2018. "Sovereignty and Associative Obligations," for Sovereignty and the New Executive, Claire Finkelstein and Sharon Lloyd, eds., Oxford University Press, 2018 "Constructivism, Intuitionism, Ecumenism," Oxford Handbook of Distributive Justice, ed. Serena Olsaretti, 2018 "Investor Rights as Nonsense -- On Stilts." In Just Financial Markets?, ed. Lisa Herzog, Oxford: Oxford University Press 2017 "Fortune and Fairness in Global Economic Life," Journal of Moral Philosophy, 14.3 2017 "How Cynical Can Ideal Theory Be?," Journal of International Political Theory vol. 12 no. 2 118-133, June 2016 "Fairness in Trade," for Global Political Theory Today, eds. David Held and Pietro Maffettone, Polity Press, 2016. "The Distinctive Significance of Systemic Risk," Ratio Juris, Volume 30, Issue 3 2016 "How To Construct Global Justice," San Diego L. Rev. 52, 1013, Fall 2015 “A Theory of Fairness in Trade,” Moral Philosophy and Politics Vol 1, Issue 2 2014. A special issue on fairness in trade, guest edited by David Miller. “Replies to Critics,” Canadian Journal of Philosophy, Vol 44, Issue 2, March 2014, 286-304. A special issue on Fairness in Practice, with discussions by Christian Barry, Charles Beitz, A.J. Julius, and Kristi Olson. At: http://www.tandfonline.com/eprint/qQSpWUKPzvqUKv5zgAqS/full
"Why Practices?" Raison Politiques, 51, Summer 2013 "Contractualism's (Not So) Slippery Slope." Legal Theory, Vol 18, issue 03, 2012, pp. 263-292. At: http://journals.cambridge.org/repo_A867FcA4
"Constructing Protagorean Objectivity." Constructivism in Practical Philosophy, eds. James Lenman and Yonatan Shemmer, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2012 "Political Constructivism." For the Blackwell Companion to Rawls, eds. David Reidy and Jon Mandle, Wiley-Blackwell, 2013 "Constructivism, Moral." The International Encyclopedia of Ethics, ed. Hugh LaFollette (Blackwell) "Contractualism and Political Liberalism." For the Routledge Companion to Social and Political Philosophy, eds. Gerald Gaus and Fred D’Agostino, New York: Taylor and Francis, 2013 "Moral Assurance Problems in Global Context," for Hobbes Today: Insights for the 21st Century, ed. Sharon Lloyd, Cambridge University Press, 2012 "The Significance of Distribution," Reasons and Recognition: Essays on the Philosophy of T. M. Scanlon, eds. R. Jay Wallace, Rahul Kumar, and Samuel Freeman, New York: Oxford University Press, 2011 "Global Economic Fairness: Internal Principles," Global Justice and International Economic Law: Opportunities and Challenges, Cambridge University Press, 2012 "Rawlsian Justice in a Common Globe," Sustainability and Security within Liberal Societies, eds. Stephen Gough and Andrew Stables, New York: Routledge, 2008 "Legal and Other Governance In Second Person Perspective," Loyola Law Review 40, no 2, 2006 "Equality in a Realistic Utopia," Social Theory and Practice 32, no 4, 2006 "Constructivism about Practical Reasons," Philosophy and Phenomenological Research 74 no 2, 2007 "Constructing Justice for Existing Practice: Rawls and the Status Quo," Philosophy and Public Affairs 33 no 4, 2005 "The Objectivity of Values: Invariance without Explanation," The Southern Journal of Philosophy 44 no 4, 2006 "Distributive Justice without Sovereign Rule: The Case of Trade," Social Theory and Practice 31 no 4, 2005 “Rights and Circularity in Scanlon’s Contractualism,” Journal of Moral Philosophy 1.3 (2004) 369-377 “Power in Social Organization as the Subject of Justice,” Pacific Philosophical Quarterly 86, 2005: 25-49Work in Progress
"Money, Recognition, and the Outer Limits of Obliviousness" “I Owe You” "The Fairness Argument for International Money" "Money as Promise: Innes and the 'Fundamental Nature of a Financial Transaction'"Further paper projects (some in gestation stage):
Rawls, Lerner, and the "Tax and Spend" Booby-Trap
Money as a Currency of Justice
How Money Corrupts
Ideational Structure
"Taxation" by Monetary Policy: Distribution for Lovers of Liberty
What We Owe Each Other: Accounting and Accountability
Should Basic Income Replace Social Insurance?
Academic Miscellany
"APA Comments on Leif Wenar's Blood Oil" "Sparing the Poor: APA Comments for Darrel Moellendorf." "Multi-Functionalism about Human Rights: APA Comments for James Nickel." "Multi-Functionalism about Human Rights: APA Comments for Charles Beitz." "Deflating Fact-Insensitivity"Other Very (Very) Important Things
Money From Nothing: Why We Should Learn to Stop Worrying About Debt and Love the Federal Reserve, with Robert Hockett (Melville, anticipated pub. Sept. 2020)
Surfing with Sartre
by Doubleday/Penguin Random House, 2017. Also by Lemniscaat (Netherlands), New Century Publishing (Taiwan), and Pegasus (Turkey). A treatise on what surfer know-how says about questions for the ages (about freedom, control, flow, happiness, being, transcendence, society, the meaning of life) and why all this means we must actually do something about climate change, namely: work less and go surfing instead, in a shorter workweek and more efficient style of capitalism.
Assholes: A Theory
a bestseller by Doubleday, USA, 2012. Also by Brealey (UK/commonwealth), Rizzoli (Italy), Riemann (Germany), Psichogios (Greece), Chungrim (South Korea), Citic (China), Tanapaev (Estonia), Pegasus (Turkey), and Port - excerpt (Russia)
Assholes: A Theory of Donald Trump
by Doubleday/Penguin Random House, 2016. Also by Random House Verlagsgruppe (Germany), Rizzoli (Italy), Malpaso (Spain), Korea Economic & Business Daily (Korea), Rock-Paper-Scissors (China). An essay on the appeal and the danger of one conspicuous figure in contemporary public life, with lessons from the social contract tradition of Hobbes and Rousseau -- or, why America most certainly should not play Republic Roulette.
Assholes: A Theory -- a documentary by John Walker, featuring John Cleese, yours truly, and many others (available soon...) http://johnwalkerproductions.com/portfolio/assholes/
"On the Philosophical Interest and Surprising Significance of the Asshole." In the Harvard Review of Philosophy, Volume XXIII 2016 "Why Nothing Exists: A Rigorous Demonstration" In Opción and in Suburbano (both in Spanish)Blog: On Assholes.com
Charity: Help A Village With.Us
Other Experience
Profile Photo: James Hammack
Link to this profile
Last updated
07/15/2020