Department of
Political Science

James Ingram

Assistant Professor

KTH 541

905.525.9140, ext. 21271

ingramj@mcmaster.ca

 

James Ingram is the newest faculty member in the Department of Political Science. His main interests are in modern, especially contemporary, continental political theory, from Kant and Rousseau via Marx to Critical Theory, deconstruction, and post-Marxism.

He has recently completed a manuscript that tries to rethink the idea of cosmopolitanism through a critical examination of the failures of top-down universalisms. His current research extends this work by exploring particular areas of especially transnational politics, including human rights, culture, democracy, and representation.

He has also worked extensively as a translator from French (Jacques Derrida, Étienne Balibar, Jacques Rancière) as well as German (Axel Honneth, Reinhart Koselleck, Hauke Brunkhorst).

 

  • Publications
  • Research and Supervision
  • Courses

Selected Publications

“Praktische Idee oder vernünftiger Glaube? Aporien moralisch-politischen Fortschritts und kommende Demokratie” (tr. Markus Wolf), in Politische Philosophie und Dekonstruktion. Beiträge zur politischen Theorie im Anschluss an Jacques Derrida, ed. Andreas Niederberger and Markus Wolf (Berlin: transcript, 2007).

“‘Aufklärung’ – Ist es links?,” Polar: Politik/Theorie/Alltag #3 (Fall 2007).

“The Politics of Claude Lefort’s Political: Between Liberalism and Radical Democracy,” Thesis Eleven 87 (Nov. 2006).

“The Subject of the Politics of Recognition: Hannah Arendt and Jacques Rancière,” in Socialité et reconnaissance. Grammaires de l´humain, ed. Georg Bertram, Robin Celikates, Christoph Laudou, and David Lauer (Paris: l’Harmattan, 2006).

“Can Universalism Still Be Radical? Alain Badiou’s Politics of Truth,” Constellations 12, no. 4 (Dec. 2005).

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Selected Presentations

“How (and how not) to Defend Radical Democracy,” Association for Political Theory, Wesleyan College CT, October 2008.

“Culture after Multiculturalism” workshop organized for the American Political Science Association, Boston, August 2008.

“On the Uses and Disadvantages of Culture for Politics,” International Philosophy Colloquium, “Second Nature,” Evian France, July 2008.

“The Unstable ‘People’ of Democratic Practice,” Canadian Political Science Association, Vancouver, June 2008.

“Democracy as Norm, Democracy as Process,” Western Political Science Association, San Diego, March 2008.

“Radical Democracy, Transformative Politics, and Negative Universalism,” Critical Theory Roundtable, St. Louis, October 2007.

“The Best of Intentions: Cosmopolitical Lessons from Kant’s Perpetual Peace,” Association for Political Theory, London ON, October 2007.

“Between Ethics and Power: Habermasian Cosmopolitics and Kantian Critique,” Canadian Political Science Association, York University, Toronto, June 2006.

“Rights, Law, Sovereignty: On Some Fetishes of the Current Global Disorder,” Columbia University, “Sovereignty and Its Discontents,” New York, December 2005.

“Three Images of the Politics of Human Rights,” Irmgard Coninx Foundation Roundtable on Transnationality, “Reframing Human Rights,” Social Science Research Center, Berlin, October 2005.

“Normative Progress,” International Philosophy Colloquium, “Normativity,” Evian, July 2005.

“The Ambivalence of Lefort’s Political: Between Radical Democracy and Posthistoire,” Society for Existential and Phenomenological Theory and Culture, “Claude Lefort and the Nature of the Political,” London ON, May 2005.

“Normativity and Politics in Cosmopolitical Criticism,” American Political Science Association, Chicago, September 2004.

“Politics against the Social: Recognition in Arendt and Rancière,” International Philosophy Colloquium, “Recognition and Sociality,” Evian, July 2004.

“Toward a Normative Concept of the Political: Hannah Arendt and Jacques Rancière,” Conference on Philosophy and Social Science, Prague, May 2004.

“Pierre Bourdieu and the Ethos of Critical Social Science,” Southern Political Science Association, Savannah GA, November 2002.

“Cultural Relativism, Human Rights, Democracy,” Masterclass on the Future of Democracy, Konstanz Germany, September 2002.

“What is Cosmopolitical Criticism?,” Canadian Political Science Association, Toronto, May 2002.

My main interests are in modern, especially contemporary, continental political theory, from Kant and Rousseau via Marx to Critical Theory, deconstruction, and post-Marxism.

I have recently completed a manuscript that tries to rethink the idea of cosmopolitanism through a critical examination of the failures of top-down universalisms. My current research extends this work by exploring particular areas of especially transnational politics, including human rights, culture, democracy, and representation.

I have also worked extensively as a translator from French (Jacques Derrida, Étienne Balibar, Jacques Rancière) as well as German (Axel Honneth, Reinhart Koselleck, Hauke Brunkhorst).

2O06 – Political Theory (second half)
4P06 – Topics in Political Theory (Imperialism and Postcolonialism in Western Political Thought)
750 – Political Thought (Critical Theories of Freedom)