Political theorists in Ireland

This is an evolving listing of political theorists working in the broad area of political theory in Ireland.

Dublin City University          

School of Law and Government

Eoin Daly    Eoin.Daly@dcu.ie

Research interests: Rawls; education; Rousseau; republicanism; non-domination; religion; Philip Pettit; Law       

NUI Galway  

Child and Family Research Centre

Allyn Fives    ajfives@yahoo.co.uk; allyn.fives@nuigalway.ie

    Research interests: the concept of reasonableness in Rawls’s later work; moral pluralism; public reason; MacIntyre’s work on virtues and goods; the moral and political status of young people; civic education; global distributive justice

NUI Galway

School of Law

Tom Hickey   tompshickey@gmail.com

Research interests: political philosophy; religious and cultural diversity; citizenship and civic education; constitutional law and human rights law   

NUI Galway  

Department of Philosophy

Richard Hull           Richard.Hull@nuigalway.ie

    Research interests: political theory, ethics, biomedical ethics, disability issues, new genetic technologies

NUI Galway  

School of Sociology and Political Science    

Mark Haugaard

Pete Morriss     Pete.morriss@nuigalway.ie

Research interests: contemporary analytic political philosophy, particularly applied to selected policy issues; power and freedom

Oliver Feeney    oliver.p.feeney@nuigalway.ie

    Research interests: social and political implications of new genetic technologies; biology and politics; non-ideal theory and the ethos of social solidarity

NUI Maynooth          

Philosophy Department        

Mette Lebech    Mette.Lebech@nuim.ie

    Research interests: theory and phenomenology of the state; state, ethics, morality; human dignity

Queen’s University Belfast  

School of Politics, International Studies and Philosophy

John Barry

Keith Breen    k.breen@qub.ac.uk

    Research interests: Arendt, Habermas and MacIntyre; the philosophy/ethics of work; coercion and democratic politics.

Vincent Geoghegan  v.geoghegan@qub.ac.uk

    Research interests: utopianism, post-secularism, Ernst Bloch, socialism, Irish Political Thought

Jonathan L. Gorman  j.gorman@qub.ac.uk

    Research interests: the philosophies of history; law, morality and politics

Cillian McBride c.mcbride@qub.ac.uk

Research interests: recognition, political autonomy, deliberative democracy, legitimacy, republicanism, political liberalism

Susan McManus

Shane O’Neill       s.oneill@qub.ac.uk

Research interests: critical social theory; justice; democracy; equality; conflict resolution

Queen’s University Belfast  

School of Law

John  Morison     j.morison@qub.ac.uk

Research interests: democracy, e-democracy and e-government; constitutions and conflict; transnational governance

Rory O’Connell      r.oconnell@qub.ac.uk

Research interests: human rights theory; human rights and democracy; equality

Ciarán O’Kelly       c.okelly@qub.ac.uk

Research interests: corporate governance; accountability and corporate personhood

Sara Ramshaw       s.ramshaw@qub.ac.uk

Research interests: justice as improvisation, Derrida, critical legal theory

St Mary’s University College Belfast


Research interests: Feminist theory (especially Judith Butler and Julia Kristeva); radical democracy; identity, embodiment and affect; political philosophies of conflict, violence and remembrance. 

St Patrick's College Drumcondra    

Education Department          

Joe Dunne    Joe.Dunne@spd.dcu.ie

Research interests: Citizenship and civic education; Aristotle, MacIntyre and Arendt

Jones Irwin  jones.irwin@spd.dcu.ie

Research interests: education and politics; anarchism; postmodernism; multiculturalism; political cinema; Freire; Derrida; situationism; Ranciere; Breillat; Zizek   

Trinity College Dublin          

Department of Philosophy

 Antti Kauppinen    a.kauppinen@gmail.com; kauppina@tcd.ie      

Research interests: equality, recognition, human rights, republicanism, and exploitation   

 Trinity College Dublin          

Department of Politics

Peter Stone          pstone@tcd.ie

Research interests: Contemporary political theory, with particular interest in theories of justice, democratic theory, rational choice theory, and the philosophy of social science

University College Cork       

Department of Government

Laurence Davis    l.davis@ucc.ie  ldavis@oceanfree.net

Research interests: utopian political thought; anarchism; democratic and revolutionary theory; the political theory of social change; the political theories of art, work, and love.

School of Sociology and Philosophy 

Vittorio Bufacchi   V.Bufacchi@ucc.ie

Research interests: social injustice; human rights; violence; torture

Jason Dockstader  J.Dockstader@ucc.ie

Research interests: history of political philosophy, especially early modern (Machiavelli, Hobbes, Spinoza); political realism

Alfred Moore

Cara Nine         c.nine@ucc.ie

Research interests: territorial rights, global justice, climate change, legitimate political authority, global moral responsibility, moral arbitrariness in political theory, property rights     

Desmond Clarke      clarkedesmond@gmail.com

Research interests: nationalism; causation in law; church & state

University College Dublin    

Earth Institute           

 Maire Brophy    maire.brophy@ucd.ie

Research interests: republicanism, international political theory, human rights, conflict and war, humanitarian intervention, the state and sovereignty

University College Dublin    

School of Philosophy

 Gerard Casey   gerard.casey@ucd.ie

Research interests: libertarian anarchism as a challenge to the legitimacy of the state

Maeve Cooke

 University College Dublin    

School of Politics and International Relations        

Graham Finlay        graham.finlay@ucd.ie

Research interests: international justice; human rights; migration; citizenship and development education; history of political thought, especially John Stuart Mill

Iseult Honohan     iseult.honohan@ucd.ie

Research interests: republican political theory, diversity, citizenship and immigration

Attracta Ingram     Attracta.ingram@ucd.ie

Research interests:  legal and political and social theory, with special interests in cosmopolitanism, nationalism,  Rawls, and human rights. 

Kieran Oberman  Kieran.oberman@ucd.ie

Research interests:the ethics of immigration policy; just war theory, international distributive justice, and the ethics of charitable giving

University College Dublin    

School of Social Justice        

 John Baker   john.baker@ucd.ie

Research interests: equality studies, especially theory of equality and democratic theory 

Katherine O’Donnell   katherine.odonnell@ucd.ie       

Research interests: political thought of Edmund Burke, feminist cultural theory, queer theory      

 University College Dublin

School of Sociology

Sinisa Malesevic        sinisa.malesevic@ucd.ie

Research interests: war and organised violence, nationalism and theories of ideology

University of Limerick

Department of Politics and Public Administration

Andrew Shorten     andrew.shorten@ul.ie

Research interests: theories of justice; liberalism; multiculturalism; nationalism; citizenship; pluralism; toleration.

Owen Worth owen.worth@ul.ie

Research interests: Gramsci, neo-Gramsican approaches to international politcs; hegemony; Marxism

 University of Ulster  

School of Criminology, Politics and Social Policy

Fidelma Ashe         f.ashe@ulster.ac.uk

Research interests: feminist theory, critical studies of masculinities and contemporary political theory      

 University of Ulster  

School of Law

Eugene Mc Namee e.mcnamee@ulster.ac.uk

Research interests: genocide, bio-politics, international law/criminology, post-colonialism, political anthropology, constitutionalism and culture