Steven Kelts
Title — Assistant Professor of Political Science Director, Politics and Values Program
Office — Monroe 415
Office Hours — M 1:30-2:30
Phone — (202) 994-7582; Fax: (202) 994-7743
E-mail — kelts@gwu.edu
Education
Ph.D., Stanford University, 2002
Background
Professor Kelts specializes in theories of liberty. His research spans historical and contemporary philosophies of self-government, especially non-liberal conceptions of liberty (e.g. republican, multicultural or egalitarian). He teaches the history of political thought, focusing on ideas of freedom and equality.
He has also written and taught on specialized topics like censorship (both the Roman institution and the current obscenity rulings of the U.S. Supreme Court), multicultural ethics, and the role of moral values in the modern state.
He is currently completing a book about liberalism's deep roots in egalitarian social morality. He argues that iconic thinkers such as Locke, Madison and Mill thought of rights as commitments that citizens make (and can remake) in their legislature, respecting each other in a spirit of moral equality.