Charles Beitz


Charles R. Beitz is an American political theorist. He is Edward S. Sanford Professor of Politics at Princeton University specializing in Political Theory, as well as former director of the University Center for Human Values. His philosophical and teaching interests focus on international political theory, democratic theory, the theory of human rights and legal theory.
Beitz received his Ph.D. from Princeton University. From 1987 to 1988 he was a Research Fellow for the International Security Program, Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs, John F. Kennedy School of Government, Harvard University. Before joining the Politics Department at Princeton, Dr. Beitz taught at Swarthmore College and Bowdoin College, where he was also Dean for Academic Affairs. For the academic year 2007-2008, Beitz was a Visiting Professor of Politics for the Program on Global Justice, Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies, Stanford University.
Beitz's work, along with that of Brian Barry, Thomas Pogge and Henry Shue, has been among the most important and influential in the literature concerning global justice. Of significant interest is his promotion of a cosmopolitan translation of John Rawls's Justice as Fairness domestic theory to the international sphere. His most significant work, his 1979 book Political Theory and International Relations, inspired a recent symposium in the journal Review of International Studies in 2005. Contributors to this journal edition include Chris Brown, David Miller, Simon Caney, Catherine Lu and Nicholas Rengger. He was elected a Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences in 2008.

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