Henry S. Richardson

Who is Henry S. Richardson?

Henry S. Richardson JD MPP PhD is an American philosopher, author, Senior Research Scholar at the Kennedy Institute of Ethics and Professor of Philosophy at Georgetown University.

His main work has centred on practical reasoning. His first book, Practical Reasoning about Final Ends, focussed on individual reasoning, whilst his second book, Democratic Autonomy: Public Reasoning about the Ends of Policy, which won the Herbert A. Simon Best Book Award in Public Administration, and the David Easton Award in the Foundations of Political Theory, dealt with collective reasoning.

In recent years Richardson's research has concentrated on bioethics. He has twice been a Visiting Scholar at the Department of Bioethics at the National Institutes of Health.

In July 2008 he was appointed as Editor to the academic journal Ethics. Since 2010, through his work as a member of the World Commission on the Ethics of Scientific Knowledge and Technology, he has acted as an advisor to the Director General of UNESCO on ethical issues relating to science and technology.

He will begin a two-year tenure as President of the Human Development and Capability Association in September 2014.