Stanford University

International Development

FSI researchers consider international development from a variety of angles. They analyze ideas such as how public action and good governance are cornerstones of economic prosperity in Mexico and how investments in high school education will improve China’s economy.

They are looking at novel technological interventions to improve rural livelihoods, like the development implications of solar power-generated crop growing in Northern Benin.

FSI academics also assess which political processes yield better access to public services, particularly in developing countries. With a focus on health care, researchers have studied the political incentives to embrace UNICEF’s child survival efforts and how a well-run anti-alcohol policy in Russia affected mortality rates.

FSI’s work on international development also includes training the next generation of leaders through pre- and post-doctoral fellowships as well as the Draper Hills Summer Fellows Program.

Rising international stars: 2010 Draper Hills Summer Fellows on Democracy and Development

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New Draper Hills Summer Fellows come to Stanford to study linkages between democracy, development, and the rule of law

Rising leaders from a diverse group of nations in transition, including China, Russia, Ukraine, Syria, Iran, Iraq, Pakistan, Egypt, Kenya, Zimbabwe, Mozambique, and Nigeria arrived on campus on July 25 for a three-week seminar as Draper Hills Summer Fellows on Democracy and Development. Initiated by FSI's Center on Democracy, Development, and the Rule of Law (CDDRL) six years ago, the program has created a network of some 139 leaders from 62 transitioning countries.  This year's exceptional class of  23 fellows includes a deputy minister of Ukraine, current and former members of parliament (including a deputy speaker), leading attorneys and rule of law experts, civic activists, journalists, international development practitioners, and founders of non-governmental organizations (NGOs). (One fellow needed to withdraw because he was named to the Cabinet of the new Philippine president, Noynoy Aquino).

Draper Hills Summer Fellows are innovative, courageous, and committed leaders, who strive to improve governance, enhance civic participation, and invigorate development under very challenging circumstances"
- Larry Diamond"Draper Hills Summer Fellows are innovative, courageous, and committed leaders, who strive to improve governance, enhance civic participation, and invigorate development under very challenging circumstances," says CDDRL Director Larry Diamond. "This year's fellows are an inspiring group. They have come here to learn from us, but even more so from one another. And we will learn much from them, about the progress they are making and the obstacles they confront as they work to build democracy, improve government accountability, strengthen the rule of law, energize civil society, and enhance the institutional environment for broadly shared economic growth."

The three-week seminar is taught by an interdisciplinary team of leading Stanford faculty. In addition to Diamond, faculty include FSI Senior Fellow and CDDRL Deputy Director Kathryn Stoner; Stanford President Emeritus Gerhard Casper; FSI Deputy Director and political science Professor Stephen D. Krasner; Olivier Nomellini Senior Fellow Francis Fukuyama; professor of political science, philosophy, and law Joshua Cohen; professor of pediatrics and Stanford Health Policy core faculty Paul H. Wise; visiting associate professor Beth van Schaack; FSI Senior Fellow Helen Stacy; Walter P. Falcon, deputy director, Program on Food Security and the Environment; Erik Jensen, co-director of the Stanford Law School's Rule of Law Program; Avner Greif, professor of economics; Rick Aubry, lecturer in management, Stanford Graduate School of Business; and Nicholas Hope, director, Stanford Center on International Development.

Other leading experts who will engage the fellows include President of the National Endowment for Democracy Carl Gershman, United States Court of Appeals Judge Pamela Rymer, International Center on Nonviolent Conflict founding chair Peter Ackerman, Omidyar Network partner Matt Halprin, Conservation International's Olivier Langrand, executives of leading Silicon Valley companies, such as Google and Facebook, and media and nonprofit organizations in the Bay Area.  Michael McFaul, a Stanford political science professor and former CDDRL director, who now serves on the National Security Council as President Obama's chief advisor on Russia, will come to campus to teach a session on U.S. foreign policy in the Obama administration.

The demanding, but compelling curriculum will devote the first week of the seminar to defining the fundamentals of democracy, good governance, economic development, and the rule of law.  In the second week, faculty will turn to democratic and economic transitions and the feedback mechanisms between democracy, development, and a predictable rule of law. This week will include offerings on liberation technology, social entrepreneurship, and issues raised by development and the environment.  The third week will turn to the critical - and often controversial - role of international assistance to foster and support democracy, judicial reform, and economic development, including the proper role of foreign aid.

Our program helps to create a broader community of global activists and practitioners, intent on sharing experiences to bring positive change to some of the world's most troubled countries and regions"
- Kathryn Stoner-Weiss The fellows themselves also lead discussions, focused on the concrete challenges they face in their ongoing work in political and economic development. "Fellows come to realize that they are often engaged in solving similar problems - such as endemic corruption in different country contexts," says Kathryn Stoner-Weiss. "Our program helps to create a broader community of global activists and practitioners, intent on sharing experiences to bring positive change to some of the world's most troubled countries and regions."

The program has received generous gifts from donors William Draper III and Ingrid Hills.  Bill Draper made his gift in honor of his father, Maj. Gen. William H. Draper, Jr., a chief advisor to Gen. George Marshall and chief diplomatic administrator of the Marshall Plan in Germany, who confronted challenges comparable to those faced by Draper Hills Summer Fellows in building democracy, a market economy, and a rule of law, often in post-conflict conditions. Ingrid von Mangoldt Hills, made her gift in honor of her husband, Reuben Hills, president and chairman of Hills Bros. Coffee and a leading philanthropist. The Hills project they ran for 12 years improved the lives of inner city children and Ingrid saw in the Summer Fellows Program a promising opportunity to improve the lives of so many people in developing countries.

Thanking the program's benefactors, Larry Diamond says, "The benefit to CDDRL faculty and researchers is incalculable, and we are deeply grateful for the vision and generosity of Bill Draper and Ingrid Hills." As he and Kathryn Stoner-Weiss state, "The Draper Hills Summer Fellows Program allows us to interact with a highly, talented group of emerging leaders in political and economic development from diverse countries and regions. They benefit from exposure to the faculty's cutting edge work, while we benefit from a cycle of feedback on whether these ideas work in the field."  Like CDDRL, which bridges academic theory and policy, the Draper Hills Summer Fellows Program, they note, "is an ideal marriage between democratic and development theory and practice."

For additional details on the program or to request permission to attend a session, please contact program coordinator Audrey McGowan, audrey.mcgowan@stanford.edu.

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Brute Luck, Justice, and Hypothetical Reciprocity

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Joseph Mazor is a Post Doctoral Scholar at Stanford's Center for Ethics in Society.  He completed his Ph.D in the interdisciplinary Political Economy and Government Program at Harvard University in June of 2009.  While at Harvard, Joseph served as a Graduate Fellow in the Project on Justice, Welfare, and Economics and at the Center for Ethics.  He spent the 2009-2010 academic year as a Post Doctoral Research Associate at Princeton's University Center for Human Values.  Joseph wrote his dissertation on natural resource property rights, and his broader research interests include distributive justice, environmental justice, and deliberative democracy.  

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Liberation Technology

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(excerpt) In March 2003, police in Guangzhou (Canton), China, stopped 27-year- old Sun Zhigang and demanded to see his temporary living permit and identification. When he could not produce these, he was sent to a detention center. Three days later, he died in its infirmary. The cause of death was recorded as a heart attack, but the autopsy authorized by his parents showed that he had been subjected to a brutal beating.

Sun’s parents took his story to the liberal newspaper Nanfang Dushi Bao (Southern Metropolis Daily), and its investigation confirmed that Sun had been beaten to death in custody. As soon as its report appeared on April 25, “newspapers and Web sites throughout China republished the account, [Internet] chat rooms and bulletin boards exploded with out- rage,” and it quickly became a national story. The central government was forced to launch its own investigation and on June 27, it found twelve people guilty of Sun’s death.

Sun’s case was seen as a watershed—the first time that a peaceful outpouring of public opinion had forced the Communist Chinese state to change a national regulation.

Optimists discern in these events a striking ability of the Internet— and other forms of “liberation technology”—to empower individuals, fa- cilitate independent communication and mobilization, and strengthen an emergent civil society. Pessimists argue that nothing in China has funda- mentally changed. The Chinese Communist Party (CCP) remains firmly in control and beyond accountability. The weiquan movement has been crushed. And the Chinese state has developed an unparalleled system of digital censorship.

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Democracy and development expert Francis Fukuyama joins FSI

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Francis Fukuyama, one of the world's most prominent experts on democracy, development, and governance has joined Stanford University's Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies (FSI) as the Olivier Nomellini Senior Fellow, effective July 2010.  He will reside in FSI's Center on Democracy, Development, and the Rule of Law, and fully engage in the center's research, teaching, and policy missions, CDDRL Director Larry Diamond announced.

I am thrilled to be joining Larry Diamond, Stephen D. Krasner, Kathryn Stoner and other colleagues in CDDRL's research, teaching, and policy engagement," said Fukuyama.  "CDDRL is world renowned for its interdisciplinary programs which bridge academic research and policy analysis - and we need break-through thinking in both to advance political and economic development."
- Francis Fukuyama

Fukuyama comes to FSI from the Paul H. Nitze School of Advanced International Studies (SAIS), Johns Hopkins University, where he was the Bernard L. Schwartz Professor of International Political Economy and director of the International Development Program at SAIS.

"We are thrilled that Frank is joining CDDRL and our quest to understand how countries advance politically and economically and the role governance plays in these interrelated challenges," said Diamond. "His path-breaking work on democracy, governance, and state building, his probing intellect, and his passionate commitment to advance theoretical and practical understanding of development - in all its dimensions - will be wonderful assets to our center and students, to the Freeman Spogli Institute, and to Stanford University."

Fukuyama has written widely on political and economic development. His best-known book, The End of History and the Last Man (Free Press, 1992) made the bestseller lists in the United States, France, Japan, and Italy and was awarded the Los Angeles Times' Book Critics Award and the Premio Capri for the Italian edition.  Fukuyama is also the author of America at the Crossroads: Democracy, Power, and the Neoconservative Legacy (2006), State-Building: Governance and World Order in the 21st Century (2004), Our Posthuman Future: Consequences of the Biotechnology Revolution (2002), The Great Disruption: Human Nature and the Reconstitution of Social Order (1999) and Trust: The Social Virtues and the Creation of Prosperity (1995).  His new book The Origins of Political Order will be published in March 2011.

"We are delighted to welcome Frank Fukuyama at this dynamic time for FSI, particularly as we launch a new Global Underdevelopment Action Fund, to seed action-oriented, multidisciplinary faculty research projects in support of global development," said FSI Director Coit D. Blacker. "Frank's exemplary scholarship and teaching, and his dedication to the expansion of democracy and development, are an inspiration to Stanford faculty and students, and to leaders in transitioning countries the world over."

Dr. Fukuyama served as a member of the President's Council on Bioethics from 2001-2005. He holds an honorary doctorate from Connecticut College, Doane College, and Doshisha University (Japan). He is a member of the Board of Trustees of the Rand Corporation, and sits on the editorial or advisory boards of The American Interest, the Journal of Democracy, the Inter-American Dialogue, and the New America Foundation.

Fukuyama received a BA in classics from Cornell University and a PhD in political science from Harvard. He was a member of the political science department of the Rand Corporation in 1979-80, from 1983 to 1989 and in 1995-96. In 1981-82 and again in 1989, Fukuyama was a member of the Policy Planning Staff of the U.S. Department of State, specializing first in Middle East affairs and then as Deputy Director for European political-military affairs. From 1996-2000, Fukuyama was the Omer L. and Nancy Hirst Professor of Public Policy at George Mason University.

"I am thrilled to be joining Larry Diamond, Stephen D. Krasner, Kathryn Stoner and other colleagues in CDDRL's research, teaching, and policy engagement," said Fukuyama.  "CDDRL is world renowned for its interdisciplinary programs which bridge academic research and policy analysis - and we need break-through thinking in both to advance political and economic development."

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Francis Fukuyama

Encina Hall, C148
616 Jane Stanford Way
Stanford, CA 94305

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Olivier Nomellini Senior Fellow at the Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies
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Francis Fukuyama is the Olivier Nomellini Senior Fellow at Stanford University's Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies (FSI), and a faculty member of FSI's Center on Democracy, Development and the Rule of Law (CDDRL). He is also Director of Stanford's Ford Dorsey Master's in International Policy, and a professor (by courtesy) of Political Science.

Dr. Fukuyama has written widely on issues in development and international politics. His 1992 book, The End of History and the Last Man, has appeared in over twenty foreign editions. His book In the Realm of the Last Man: A Memoir will be published in fall 2026.

Francis Fukuyama received his B.A. from Cornell University in classics, and his Ph.D. from Harvard in Political Science. He was a member of the Political Science Department of the RAND Corporation, and of the Policy Planning Staff of the US Department of State. From 1996-2000 he was Omer L. and Nancy Hirst Professor of Public Policy at the School of Public Policy at George Mason University, and from 2001-2010 he was Bernard L. Schwartz Professor of International Political Economy at the Paul H. Nitze School of Advanced International Studies, Johns Hopkins University. He served as a member of the President’s Council on Bioethics from 2001-2004. He is editor-in-chief of American Purpose, an online journal.

Dr. Fukuyama holds honorary doctorates from Connecticut College, Doane College, Doshisha University (Japan), Kansai University (Japan), Aarhus University (Denmark), the Pardee Rand Graduate School, and Adam Mickiewicz University (Poland). He is a non-resident fellow at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. He is a member of the Board of Trustees of the Rand Corporation, the Board of Trustees of Freedom House, and the Board of the Volcker Alliance. He is a fellow of the National Academy for Public Administration, a member of the American Political Science Association, and of the Council on Foreign Relations. He is married to Laura Holmgren and has three children.

(October 2025)

Global Populisms

A new project examining the global surge in populist movements and what it means for established democratic rules and institutions.
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d.school class sees Stanford students develop ICT solutions to healthcare challenges in Kenya

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This Spring quarter, while our seminar series took a break, Terry Winograd and Joshua Cohen taught a new course at the Hasso Plattner Institute of Design (the d.school): Designing Liberation Technologies.

During this class, small interdisciplinary teams focus on a term-long design project, taking advantage of the design process structures and methods that have been developed in the d.school. This year's course developed as a collaboration between Stanford, the University of Nairobi and Nokia Africa Research Center.  The focus area was finding ICT solutions to the healthcare needs of people living in Kibera slum outside Nairobi.

Under the guidance of Jussi Impiö at Nokia and the Computer Science faculty, 27 students from the University of Nairobi Computer Science department conducted need finding studies at a number of health-related sites, including clinics, hospitals, community health workers, community leaders, and government offices. They read background materials, made observations, and talked with a wide variety of stakeholders. Their reports became the basis of the Stanford teams' initial understanding of users and needs. Communication with the group in Nairobi was also maintained throughout the course, using a Facebook group to facilitate discussions, as well as several teleconference sessions.

Working in small teams, 20 Stanford students from a wide range of disciplines worked over 10 weeks to develop initial design concepts to respond to some of the needs that had been identified. Click on the title of each project to view their final presentations:

  • mNote: an online archive for community health worker notes. This application empowers community health workers by preserving the flexibility and control they appreciate in their current paper notebooks, but adding digital knowledge management capabilities.
  • M-MAJI ("mobile water"): an electronic information system that allows people to use their mobile phones to identify clean water sources in their community. The application seeks to decrease the time and money spent searching for water, improve water quality, and foster vendor accountability by providing a mechanism for user feedback.
  • Babybank: a dedicated savings plan designed specifically for pregnant women in the slums of Nairobi. By leveraging a popular cell phone payment system, M-Pesa, the application aims to make savings easier, so that expecting mothers can afford the services that will keep themselves and their babies healthy.
  • Mazanick: an application to provide support and advice to pregnant women via SMS, with the aim of helping motivate them to attend prenatal appointments.
  • PillCheck (Kifaa cha Tenbe): a mobile application to help people in Kibera find information on the availability and pricing of malaria drugs quickly.
  • PatientMap :a system to make the waiting process in clinics more transparent, and to increase patient trust in the medical system.

This summer, two follow up trips are planned, with Nairobi students due to spend several weeks at Stanford, while a number of students from the Stanford group will visit Nairobi to explore possibilities for developing their projects further. Building on the success and lessons learnt so far, the Designing Liberation Technologies course will be open to a new set of students next academic year. 

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Dan Banik

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Professor Dan Banik is a Consulting Scholar at CDDRL and is currently completing a study examining the impacts of development aid from Norway and China on poverty reduction in Malawi and Zambia. He is a professor of political science and research director at the University of Oslo’s Centre for Development and Environment (SUM). He is also holds a visiting professor at China Agricultural University in Beijing.

Prof. Banik has conducted research in India, China, Bangladesh, Malawi, Uganda, Ethiopia, Tanzania, South Africa and Mexico, and directs the interdisciplinary research program 'Poverty and Development in the 21st Century (PAD)' at the University of Oslo. He has previously served as the head of the Norwegian-Finnish Trust Fund in the World Bank for Environmentally and Socially Sustainable Development (TFESSD) and on the Board of the Norwegian Crown Prince and Crown Princess's Foundation. His books include ‘The Democratic Dividend: Political Transition, Poverty and Inclusive Development in Malawi (with Blessings Chinsinga, Routledge 2016), ‘The Legal Empowerment Agenda: Poverty, Labour and the Informal Economy in Africa’ (2011, Ashgate), ‘Poverty and Elusive Development’ (2010, Scandinavian University Press) and ‘Starvation and India’s Democracy’ (2009, Routledge).

Prof. Banik is married to Vibeke Kieding Banik, who is a historian at the University of Oslo.

 

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Patrick Meier and Evgeny Morozov to join the Program as Visiting Scholars

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We are pleased to be able to announce that the Program on Liberation Technology will have two new visiting scholars from September 2010 - Patrick Meier and Evgeny Morozov.

Patrick Meier is a fourth-year PhD Candidate at The Fletcher School of Law & Diplomacy and Co-Director of the Program on Crisis Mapping and Early Warning at the Harvard Humanitarian Initiative. His dissertation research analyzes the impact of the information revolution on the balance of power between repressive rule and civil resistance. He is particularly interested in how repressive regimes and resistance groups use information communication technologies to further their own strategic and tactical goals. Patrick serves as Director of Crisis Mapping and Strategic Partnerships at Ushahidi and co-founded the International Network of Crisis Mappers. He is also on the Board of Advisors of  DigiActive and Digital Democracy, two leading digital activism and democracy initiatives. Patrick blogs at iRevolution and Early Warning.

Evgeny Morozov is a leading thinker and commentator on the political impact of the Internet and a well known opponent of internet utopianism.  He is a contributing editor to Foreign Policy and runs the magazine's Net Effect blog about the Internet's impact on global politics. Evgeny is currently a Yahoo! fellow at the Institute for the Study of Diplomacy at Georgetown University. Prior to his appointment to Georgetown, he was a fellow at the Open Society Institute, where he remains on the board of the Information Program. Before moving to the US, Evgeny was based in Berlin and Prague, where he was Director of New Media at Transitions Online, a media development NGO active in 29 countries of the former Soviet bloc. He is writing a book about the Internet and democracy, to be published this fall by PublicAffairs.

We are looking forward to welcoming Patrick and Evgeny to the Stanford community in a few months time. 

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Humanity Reconsidered: New Approaches to the History of Humanitarianism [Department of History]

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10:00 - 10:15: Introductory Remarks

J. P. Daughton, Stanford University

Panel 1

10:15 - 12:00: Humanitarian Relief as a Historical and Methodological Challenge

"Assisting Civilian Populations: Notes on an Ongoing Research Project"

  • Davide Rodogno, Graduate Institute of International and Development Studies, Geneva

"Who Qualifies as the Object of Humanitarian Relief? Italian Refugees after World

War II"

  • Pamela Ballinger, Bowdoin College
  • Comment: Priya Satia, Stanford University

 

Panel 2

1:15 - 3:00: In the Wake of War: Rebuilding 1920s Europe

"Foreign Humanitarian Actors in Poland, 1918-1923"

  • Shaloma Gauthier & Francesca Piana, Graduate Institute of International and Development Studies, Geneva

"Post-WWI Humanitarian Efforts in Poland's Eastern Borderlands"

  • Kathryn Ward, Stanford University

"A Sketch of Humanitarian Emergency Relief Operations in Greece during the 1920s"      

  • Davide Rodogno, Graduate Institute of International and Development Studies, Geneva
  • Comment: Robert Crews, Stanford University

 

3:00 - 3:15: Coffee Break

Panel 3

3:15 - 5:00: European "Humanity" in Global Context

"Early Humanitarianism and Local Knowledges: Black Experts and the Conference on the African Child of the Save the Children International Union (Geneva, 1931)"

  • Dominique Marshall, Carleton University

"Humanitarian Internationalism, the South Asian Refugee Regime, and the ‘Kashmir Refugees Fund', 1947-1951"

  • Cabeiri Robinson, University of Washington

"Human Rights and Saharan Prisons in Post-Colonial Mali"

  • Gregory Mann, Columbia University
  • Comment: Liisa Malkki, Stanford University

Sponsored by:

  • Transnational, International, and Global History Program, Department of History
  • Graduate Institute of International and Development Studies, Geneva
  • The Mediterranean Studies Forum
  • Stanford Humanities Center

BOARD ROOM, STANFORD HUMANITIES CENTER

Conferences

The Promise of Information and Communications Technology

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On April 19, the Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies convened a special conference on Technology, Governance, and Global Development, to examine how technical innovation solves, or fails to solve, the problems of chronic global underdevelopment. Experts from business, medicine, philanthropy, academia, government and non-governmental organizations, along with young Stanford alumni, addressed technology’s ability to help secure gains in health, economic development, agricultural innovation, food security, and human development.

With a wealth of expertise and on-the-ground experience, panelists tackled central issues and engaged in spirited debate, animated by moderator Phil Taubman. “The Promise of Information and Communications Technology” examined whether technology can transform lives of individuals, even in poorly governed countries, finding encouraging evidence in health and economic development.

Frances C. Arrillaga Alumni Center

Philip Taubman Moderator
Megan Smith Speaker Google.org

Joshua Cohen

Program on Global Justice
Encina Hall West, Room 404
Stanford University
Stanford, CA 94305

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Marta Sutton Weeks Professor of Ethics in Society, and Professor of Political Science, Philosophy, and Law
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Joshua Cohen is a professor of law, political science, and philosophy at Stanford University, where he also teaches at the d.school and helps to coordinate the Program on Liberation Technology. A political theorist trained in philosophy, Cohen has written extensively on issues of democratic theory—particularly deliberative democracy and the implications for personal liberty, freedom of expression, and campaign finance—and global justice. Cohen is author of On Democracy (1983, with Joel Rogers); Associations and Democracy (1995, with Joel Rogers); Philosophy, Politics, Democracy (2010); The Arc of the Moral Universe and Other Essays (2011); and Rousseau: A Free Community of Equals (2011). Since 1991, he has been editor of Boston Review, a bi-monthly magazine of political, cultural, and literary ideas. Cohen is currently a member of the faculty of Apple University.

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