Curriculum Vitae

Thomas A Spragens

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313 Perkins Library
Durham, NC 27708

+1 919 660 4313 (office)

(email)

Education

PhD	Duke University	1968
A.B. with High Honors and Distinction	Wesleyan University	1963

Areas of Research: 17th, 18th, 19th, and 20th Century

Professional Experience / Employment History

Duke University: Professor, Department of Political Science, 1981-present

: Associate Professor, Department of Political Science, 1975-1981

: Assistant Professor, Department of Political Science, 1968-1974

Awards, Honors, and Distinctions: National Merit Scholar
Phi Betta Kappa
Elaine and David Spitz Book Prize, Conference for the Study of Political Thought, 2001
Rockefeller Foundation Humanities Fellowship, 1977-1978
National Endowment for the Humanities Fellowship for Younger Humanists, 1974
Summer Research Award, Duke Research Council, 1971
Danforth Graduate Fellow, 1963-1968
Finalist for Rhodes Scholarship, 1963

Professional Service

Dept Officer: Acting Chairman, Department of Political Science, 1978-1979; Director of Undergraduate Studies, Department of Political Science, 1971-1974

Dept Committees: Member, Graduate Admissions Committee, 2006 - present; Chair, Graduate Admissions Committee, 2003-2004; Member, Graduate Admissions Committee, 2002-2003; Chair, Ad-Hoc Committee on Malachi Hacohen Secondary Appointment, 2002-2003

A&S Council: Member, Arts and Sciences Council Curriculum Committee, 1999-2000; Member, Academic Council, 1996-1999, 2001-2003; Chairman, Faculty Affairs Committee, Arts and Science Council, 1994-1996; Chairman, Arts and Sciences Council, 1991-1993

University Committee: Member, Interdisciplinary Islamic Studies Search Committee, 2006 - present; Chair, University Recreation Facility Advisory Committee, 2000-present; Chair, Committee of Review for Director of Athletics, 2003; Chair, Committee of Review for Dean of the Divinity School, 2001; Member, University Recreation Facility Advisory Committee, 1999-present; Member, Executive Steering Committee, NCAA Certification Self-Study, 1996-1997; Faculty Representative, Alumni Association Board of Directors, 1991-1995; Founding Chairman, Arts and Sciences Council, 1991-1993; Member, Residential Life Task Force, 1989-1990; Chairman, Committee on the Senior Year, 1989-1990; Adviser, Trinity Scholars (N.C. merit scholarship), 1989-1992; Member, University Committee on Admissions and Financial Aid, 1988-1990; Member, President's Committee on Discrimination, 1988-1990; Chairman, Athletic Council, 1987-1996; Chairman, President's Committee on Residential Life, 1984-1986; Trustee, Ad hoc Committee on Student-Faculty Relations, 1983-1984; Member, Athletic Council, 1983-1996; Trustee, Student Affairs Committee, 1982-1985; Chairman, Curriculum Committee of the Undergraduate Faculty Council, 1976-1977; Faculty Fellow, Few Federation, 1974-1977

University Services: Associate Dean, Arts and Sciences and Trinity College, 1988-1990; Faculty Representative, ACC amd NCAA, 1987-1996

Other: Member, Professional Association Membership, present
APSA, SPSA, American Society of Political and Legal Philosophy; Reviewer, Review for Journals, present
APSA, Journal of Politics, Political Theory, Social Science Quarterly, Annals, Ethics, Review of Politics, Polity.; Reviewer, Manuscript Reviewer, present
Harvard University Press, University of Chicago Press, Princeton University Press, Cornell University Press, University of North Carolina Press, Duke University Press, St. Martin's Press, Cambridge University Press, Yale University Press, University of Florida Press, Kansas University Press, University of Wisconsin Press, Westview Press, Univesity of Virginia Press, Northern Illinois University Press, Rowman and Littlefield Pubishers, Lexington Books.; Chair, Foundations of Political Theory Section selection Committee for Best First Book Award, 2001; Member, Executive Committee and Steering Committee, NCAA Certification Self-Study, 1996-1997; Co-editor, Board of Editors, The Responsive Community, 1993-present; Member, Board of Editors, The Responsive Community, 1990-93; President, Atlantic Coast Confernce, 1990-1991; Member, APSA David Spitz Prize Committee, 1989; Vice President, Atlantic Coast Conference, 1989-1990; Secretary-Treasurer, Atlantic Coast Conference, 1988-1989; Member, Board of Editors, Journal of Politics, 1977-79, 1981-84, 993-1996

Selected Recent Invited Talks: "Contemporary Theories of Liberalism", University of Rochester Symposium on Contemporary Liberal Theory, April 1987

Publications

Books

T.A. Spragens, The Transformation and Decline of American Liberalism (forthcoming).
T.A. Spragens, Civic Liberalism: Reflections on Our Democratic Ideals (1999), Lanham, Maryland: Rowman and Littlefield Publishers (Winner of the 2001 Elaine and David Spitz Prize for "best English language work of its year on the subject of liberal and/or democratic theory, broadly defined.".).
T.A. Spragens, Reason and Democracy (1990), pp. xi-281, Durham, N.C.: Duke University Press.
T.A. Spragens, The Irony of Liberal Reason (1981), pp. vii-443, Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
T.A. Spragens, Understanding Political Theory (1976), pp. vii-155, New York: St. Martin's.
T.A. Spragens, The Dilemma of Contemporary Political Theory: Toward a Postbehavioral Science of Politics (1973), pp. ix-181, New York: Dunellen Co. (foreward by Morton A. Kaplan.).
T.A. Spragens, The Politics of Motion: The World of Thomas Hobbes (1973), pp. 224, Lexington, Kentucky: University Press of Kentucky (Published in Great Britain by Croom-Helm, Ltd., with a foreword by Anthony Flew..).

Chapters in Books

T.A. Spragens, Beyond Bigotry and Nihilism: Moral Judgment in Pluralist Democracies, in Naming Evil, Judging Evil, edited by Ruth Grant (2006), University of Chicago Press.
T.A. Spragens, Theories of Justice, Rights, and Duties: Negotiating the Interface Between Normative and Empirical Theory, in Human Rights and Duties: Psychology's Contributions, the Law's Commentary, edited by Norman J. Finkel and Fathali M. Moghaddam (2005), Washington, D.C.: American Psychological Association.
T.A. Spragens, Legislating Morality in Liberal Democracies, in The Communitarian Reader: Beyond the Essentials, edited by Amitai Etzioni, Andrew Volmert, and Elanit Rothschild (2004), Rowman and Littlefield (Lanham, Maryland).
T.A. Spragens, Between Bigotry and Nihilism: Moral Judgment in Pluralist Democracies, in Speak No Evil: Moral Judgment in the Modern Age, edited by Ruth Grant (forthcoming), University of Chicago Press (Chicago, Illinois).
T.A. Spragens, Legislating Morality in Liberal Democracies, in The Communitarian Reader: Beyond the Essentials, edited by Amitar Etzioni, Andrew Volmert, and Elanit Rothschild (2004), Lanham, Maryland: Rowan and Littlefield Publishers.
T.A. Spragens, Church and State in Liberal America: Locke and Tocqueville Revisited, in Politics, Reason, and the Human Good, edited by Robert P. Hunt (2003).
T.A. Spragens, Rationality in Liberal Politics, in Political Theory and Partisan Politics, edited by Adolf Gundersen and Ruth Shively (2000), Albany, N.Y: SUNY Press.
T.A. Spragens, Communitarian Liberalism, in New Communitarian Thinking, edited by Amitai Etzioni (1995), Charlottesville: University of Virginia Press.
T.A. Spragens, The Limitations of Libertarianism, Parts 1 and 2, in Responsive Community, vol. 2, Issues 1 and 2 (Winter 1991 and Spring 1992) (Reprinted in Terence Ball and Richard Dagger, eds., Ideals and Ideologies: A Reader, 3rd edition (New York: Longman, 1999)..).
T.A. Spragens, Reconstructing Liberal Theory: Reason and Liberal Culture, in Liberals on Liberalism, edited by A. J. Damico (1986), Totowa, N.J.: Rowman and Littlefield Publishers.
T.A. Spragens, Justification, Practical Reason, and Political Theory, in Justification, vol. NOMOS no. XXVIII (1986), New York and London: New York University Press.
T.A. Spragens, David Hume's Experimental Science of Morals and the Natural Law Tradition, in The Ethical Bases of Political Life, edited by Francis Canavan (1983), Durham, N.C.: Duke University Press.

Journal Articles

T.A. Spragens, Populist Perfectionism: The Other American Liberalism, Social Philosophy and Policy (forthcoming Spring 2007).
T.A. Spragens, Democratic Reasonableness, Contemporary Review of International Social and Political Philosophy (forthcoming Fall 2007/Spring 2008).
T.A. Spragens, Communitarianism: Epitaph for a Monument to a Successful Reminder, The Responsive Community, vol. 14 no. 2/3 (Spring/Summer 2004).
T.A. Spragens, Justice, Consensus, and Boundaries: Assessing Political Liberalism, Political Theory, vol. 31 no. 4 (August 2003).
T.A. Spragens, Is the Enlightenment Project Worth Saving?, Modern Age, vol. 43 no. 1 (Winter, 2001).
T.A. Spragens, The Bounds of Civic Morality, The Responsive Community, vol. 11 no. 4 (Fall, 2001), pp. 41-47.
T.A. Spragens, The Antinomies of Social Justice, The Review of Politics, vol. 55 no. 2 (Spring, 1993).
T.A. Spragens, The Politics of Inertia and Gravitation: The Function of Exemplar Paradigms in Social Theory, Polity (Spring, 1973).

Last modified: 2006/12/12