I am a political theorist working on a range of themes including political satire, the political thought of Edmund Burke, and the history of abolitionism. More recently I am also interested in how the interests of future generations can be represented in democratic politics. I have a BA in politics and philosophy from University College Dublin (2003), a Msc in International Relations from the London School of Economics (2004), and a PhD in Political Science from Northwestern University in Illinois (2013). I was a Fulbright scholar in 2005-6 and from 2009 to 2012 I served as Assistant Editor of Political Theory: an International Journal of Political Philosophy.
Before arriving at DCU in 2023 I taught for two years at the College of William and Mary in Virginia and for eight years at the University of Exeter in the UK. My monograph Uncivil Mirth: Ridicule in Enlightenment Britain was published with Princeton University Press in 2021 and won the Morris D. Forkosch prize for the best first book in intellectual history. My second book, Edmund Burke, was published in 2024 as part of Polity's Classic Thinker series.
Book
| Year | Publication | |
|---|---|---|
| 2021 | (2021) Uncivil Mirth: Ridicule in Enlightenment Britain. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press. | |
| 2024 | (2024) Edmund Burke. Cambridge: Polity. [Link] |
Peer Reviewed Journal
| Year | Publication | |
|---|---|---|
| 2019 | (2019) 'Wollstonecraft and the political value of contempt'. European Journal Of Political Theory, 18 (1):26-46. [DOI] | |
| 2019 | (2019) 'How Contempt Became a Passion'. History of European Ideas, 45 (3):346-362. [DOI] | |
| 2018 | (2018) 'The Hidden Labors of Mary Mottley, Madame de Tocqueville'. Hypatia, 33 (4). [DOI] | |
| 2018 | (2018) 'Ridicule, Censorship, and the Regulation of Public Speech: The Case of Shaftesbury'. Modern Intellectual History, 15 (2):353-380. [DOI] | |
| 2014 | (2014) 'Revisiting Burke’s Critique of Enthusiasm'. History of Political Thought, 35 (2):317-344. |
Book Chapter
Book Review
| Year | Publication | |
|---|---|---|
| 2024 | (2024) Introduction to a Review Symposium on Robin Douglass’s Mandeville’s Fable: Pride, Hypocrisy, and Sociability. https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/01916599.2024.2373668 | |
| 2024 | (2024) Review of Robin Douglass, Mandeville's Fable: Pride, Hypocrisy, and Sociability (Princeton University Press, 2023). https://doi.org/10.1080/17496977.2024.2348246 | |
| 2023 | (2023) Why the socialist Mill will not alarm his liberal readers: a reflection on Helen McCabe’s John Stuart Mill, socialist. [DOI] | |
| 2022 | (2022) Review of Paul Sagar, The Opinion of Mankind: Sociability and the Theory of the State of from Hobbes to Smith. [DOI] | |
| 2021 | (2021) Review of Commerce and Manners in Edmund Burke’s Political Economy by Gregory Collins. [DOI] | |
| 2018 | (2018) Edmund Burke, Imperialist Ideologue?. | |
| 2018 | (2018) Jill Locke, Democracy and the Death of Shame: Political Equality and Social Disturbance. | |
| 2017 | (2017) Review of Richard Bourke, Empire and Revolution: The Political Life of Edmund Burke. | |
| 2015 | (2015) “Radical Moderates,” review of A Virtue for Courageous Minds: Moderation in French Political Thought, 1748-1830 by Aurelian Craiutu. | |
| 2014 | (2014) Review of David Bromwich, The Intellectual Life of Edmund Burke: From the Sublime and Beautiful to American Independence. | |
| 2012 | (2012) Extended Sentiments and Enlarged Interests: Hume’s Politics. [DOI] | |
| 2012 | (2012) Review of Christopher Brooke, Philosophic Pride: Stoicism and Political Thought from Lipsius to Rousseau. |
Research Interests
Early modern political thinkers, especially Edmund Burke, Mary Wollstonecraft, and Alexis de Tocqueville
The politics of ridicule (and other forms of humour), contempt, and civility
Emancipation and abolition in the history of political thought
Intergenerational justice