Joshua Cohen

Who is Joshua Cohen?

Joshua Cohen is an American philosopher specializing in political philosophy. He is Marta Sutton Weeks Professor of Ethics in Society and professor of political science, philosophy, and law at Stanford University. At Stanford, Cohen is also one of the program leaders for the Program on Liberation Technologies at Stanford's Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies. Much of his work concerns philosophy of law, political philosophy, democratic theory, especially deliberative democracy, and global justice. He has written on freedom of expression, electoral finance, and new models of democratic governance. He also teaches at Stanford's d.school, and his 2012 Comte Lectures at LSE discussed the issues he teaches about: mobile for development and human-centered design. Previously a professor of political science and philosophy at MIT from 1990-2007, he was educated at Yale University and Harvard University, where he earned his PhD under the direction of John Rawls.

He has been editor of Boston Review since 1991, and co-editor of many short anthologies based on articles first published in the magazine. He also frequently takes part in video discussions with other media personalities, for the site BloggingHeads.tv.