jonathan trejo-mathys

JONATHAN TREJO-MATHYS
DEPARTMENT ADDRESS: Philosophy Department · Boston College
21 Campanella Way · Chestnut Hill, MA 02467
EMAIL: jonathan.trejo-mathys@bc.edu · TELEPHONE: (617) 552-3864
EDUCATION
Northwestern University, Evanston, IL, 2002-2009
Ph.D. Philosophy (Dec. 31, 2009). Thesis:
Inheritance, Sovereignty, & Promise: Political Authority & Obligation in an Age of Global Transformations
Committee: Cristina Lafont (chair), Thomas McCarthy, Charles Mills, Charles Taylor
Johann Wolfgang Goethe Universität, Frankfurt am Main, Germany, 2006-7
Research supervised by Prof. Dr. Axel Honneth.
Universidad-Complutense, Madrid, Spain, Fall 2001
University of Sheffield, Sheffield, England, 1999-2000
DePaul University, Chicago, IL, 1997-2002
B.A. Philosophy and English (Highest Honors), Minor in Spanish, June 2002
AREAS OF
SPECIALIZATION
Social and Political Philosophy; Habermas and the Frankfurt School tradition of ‘Critical
Social Theory’
AREAS OF
COMPETENCE
Ethics, Philosophy of Law, Philosophy of Social Science, 19th-20th C. European Philosophy
GRANTS,
FELLOWSHIPS,
· Postdoctoral Fellow, “Justitia Amplificata: Rethinking Justice, Global and Applied”,
Institute for Advanced Studies in the Humanities, J.W. Goethe Universität, 2010-11
& AWARDS
· Stipendee, National Endowment for the Humanities Seminar, “Liberal Democracy and the Global
Order”, co-directed by Christopher Wellman and Andrew Altman, St. Louis, June 1-25, 2010
· J. William Fulbright Scholarship (full research grant), 2006-7
· Deutscher Akademischer Austausch Dienst (DAAD) Research Grant, 2006-7
(full research grant; declined)
· Berliner Luftbrücke Stipendium (“Berlin Airlift” Scholarship), Steuben-Schurz Gesellschaft,
Frankfurt am Main, 2006-7
· DAAD Summer Language Course Grant, Berlin, 2005
· Alpha Lambda Delta Graduate Fellowship, 2002-3
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JONATHAN TREJO-MATHYS
ARTICLES
‘**’ = peer-reviewed
· “Neokantianism and the Philosophy of Law”, in The Legacy of Neo-Kantianism, eds. Andrea Staiti and
Nicolas de Warren, under contract with Cambridge University Press for publication in 2014
** “Authority, Legitimacy and Epistemic Accounts of Democratic Law”, Ratio Juris: An International
Journal of Jurisprudence and Philosophy of Law – (forthcoming)
** “Towards a Critical Theory of the WTO: Thinking with Rawls beyond Rawls”, Constellations: An
International Journal of Critical and Democratic Theory – (forthcoming)
** “Towards a Discourse-Theoretical Account of Political Authority and Obligation in the PostNational Constellation”, Philosophy and Social Criticism, v. 38, n. 6 (July 2012), 537-567
** “Normativity, Religion and Modernity in Habermas’ Social Theory”, The Journal of Scriptural
Reasoning, v. 10, n. 2 (December 2011).
(http://etext.lib.virginia.edu/journals/ssr/issues/volume10/number2/)
** “Rorty on Liberal Democracy and Religion: An Internal and Habermasian Critique”, Contemporary
Pragmatism, v. 8, n. 1 (June 2011), 97-114
· “The Idea of a Critical Social Theory: Past, Present and Future”, Civitas, v. 8, n. 1 (Jan.-April. 2008),
19-45
· “Transcendentalism and Critical Theory: Two Phases in the Development of Western Social
Criticism”, Kinesis: Graduate Journal in Philosophy, Fall 2007
REVIEWS
· “Identifying Recognition in the Age of Neoliberalism”, review essay on Emmanuel Renault's Mepris
sociale: ethique et politique de la reconnaissance (Paris: Le Passant, 2004), Philosophy & Social Criticism, v.
36, n. 9 (November 2010): 1143-1148
· Review of Erneuerung der Kritik: Axel Honneth im Gespräch, eds. M. Basaure and J. Reemtsma (Frankfurt
am Main: Campus 2009), in Forschung Frankfurt, n. 2, 2009 (in German)
· Review of Axel Honneth's Verdinglichung: eine annerkennungs-theoretische Studie (Suhrkamp: Frankfurt
am Main, 2005), in Philosophy & Social Criticism, v. 33, n. 6, (2007): 781-786
TRANSLATIONS
· Hartmut Rosa, Social Acceleration: A New Theory of Modernity, (Columbia University Press, 2014) –
German original: Beschleunigung: Die Veränderung der Zeitstrukturen in der Moderne (Frankfurt am Main:
Suhrkamp, 2005)
· Mauro Basaure, “Foucault and the ‘Anti-Oedipus’ Movement: psychoanalysis as disciplinary power”,
History of Psychiatry, v. 20, n. 3 (2009): 340-359 – German original: “Foucault und Psychoanalyse:
Grammatik eines Missverstehens” (ms.)
· Michele Salonia, “Suffering from Exclusion: On the Critical Impulse of the Theory of Recognition”,
in Christian Lazzeri et Soraya Nour, eds., De l'Inclusion. Reconnaissance et identification sociale.
(Nanterre: Presses Universitaires Paris X, 2008) – German original: “Negative Erfahrungen” (ms.)
EDITED VOLUMES
· With Barbara Buckinx and Timothy Waligore, Domination Across Borders: Conceptual, Historical and
Institutional Perspectives, including contributions from Philip Pettit, James Bohman, Rainer Forst,
Charles Mills, Thomas McCarthy, and others – under final review at Cambridge University Press
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JONATHAN TREJO-MATHYS
PRESENTATIONS
· “Whose nature? Which validity? Naturalism, Inferentialism, and Discourse Ethics”, 20th Annual
Critical Theory Roundtable, Centre for Ethics, University of Toronto (September 2012)
· “Authority and Law in Habermas and Luhmann; or, On the Very Idea of Systems Theory with a
Critical Intent”, MANCEPT Workshops in Political Theory, University of Manchester, (September
2012)
· “Kant, Habermas and the Duty to Promote a Global Legal Order of Human Rights”, Conference on
Philosophy and the Social Sciences, Charles University, Prague (May 2011)
· “Authority vs. Coercion-Based Accounts of Human Rights in the Global Order”, International StockTaking Conference of ‘Beyond Territoriality: Globalisation and Transnational Human Rights
Obligations’, a research network program of the European Science Foundation, Antwerp University,
Belgium (May 2011)
· “Epistemic Proceduralism and Democratic Authority: Estlund vs. Habermas”, 2nd Annual Dutch
Conference on Practical Philosophy, University of Groningen, Netherlands (October 2010)
· “Political Obligation and Global Transformations”, 16th Annual Critical Theory
Roundtable, Fordham University, NY (September 2008)
· “Transcendentalism and Critical Theory: Two Phases in the Development of Western Social
Criticism”, 10th Annual Building Bridges Conference, Southern Illinois University, Carbondale, IL (Oct.
2007)
· “Adorno’s Concept of Mimesis and the Normative Foundations of Social Criticism”, 30th annual
Philosophy and the Social Sciences Conference, Charles University, Prague, Czech Republic (May
2007)
· “Die Dialektik der Prinzipien: zur Verteidigung des Prinzips der Zustimmung”, Colloquium on Social
and Political Philosophy of Prof. Axel Honneth, (May 2007) and Colloquium on Medieval and
Practical Philosophy of Prof. Matthias Lutz-Bachmann, (June 2007) Goethe Universität, Frankfurt am
Main
· “Transnational Democracy: How Do We Get There?”, Loyola University Graduate Student Conference
on Politics, Discourse, and Justice (March 2006)
· “Axel Honneth’s Social Theory and the Fate of Recognition”, 13th Annual Critical Theory
Roundtable, Dartmouth College, Hanover, NH (Nov. 2005)
· “Tell Me What You’re Worth: Normativity, Language and Alterity in Habermas and Levinas”, Loyola
University Graduate Student Conference on Intersubjectivity (March 2005)
· “The Paradigm of Consciousness and the Consciousness of Self in William James’ Philosophy of
Mind”, invited presentation, 4th Annual Donald G. Wester Conference, Oklahoma State University
(April 2004)
COMMENTARY/
MODERATION
· Moderator, “Critical Theory and Culture” Panel, American Philosophical Association, Eastern
Division Meeting, Washington, D.C. (December 2011)
· “Reply to Michael Macomber's 'Are All Young Poets Naïve? Questioning the
Possibility of Erroneous Judgments of Taste in Kant's Critique of Judgment'”, 1st Annual
Northwestern University Graduate Philosophy Conference (Jan. 2006)
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JONATHAN TREJO-MATHYS
PROFESSIONAL
American Philosophical Association
ASSOCIATIONS
Society for Phenomenology and Existential Philosophy
Global Justice Network
LANGUAGES
German (fluent), Spanish (fluent), French (reading), Greek (very basic reading)
REFERENCES
Cristina Lafont, Professor of Philosophy, Northwestern University
(clafont@northwestern.edu)
Thomas McCarthy, Emeritus Professor of Philosophy, Northwestern University
(t-mccarthy@northwestern.edu)
Charles Mills, John Evans Professor of Moral and Intellectual Philosophy, Northwestern University
(c-mills@northwestern.edu)
Jürgen Habermas, Emeritus Professor of Philosophy, Goethe Universität, Frankfurt
Ringstrasse 8B, Starnberg 82319, Germany
Charles Taylor, Emeritus Professor of Philosophy, McGill University, Montreal
(cmt1111111@aol.com)
Rainer Forst, Professor of Political Science and Philosophy, Goethe Universität, Frankfurt
(forst@em.uni-frankfurt.de)
Stefan Gosepath, Professor of Philosophy, Free University of Berlin
(stefan.gosepath@fu-berlin.de)
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JONATHAN TREJO-MATHYS
DISSERTATION ABSTRACT:
Inheritance, Sovereignty, and Promise:
Authority and Obligation in an Age of Global Transformations
Political philosophers from Hobbes to Rawls have attempted to show that, provided certain conditions are met,
there can be legitimate political authorities whose laws each citizen or subject ought to obey (and whose institutions
they ought to support) for moral reasons, and not simply out of fear of punishment or for personal advantage. It has
been traditionally assumed that these authorities will have the form of territorial national states and that the
obligations they administer are bounded by national borders. Yet actual economic, social, and political
interconnectedness imply that, contrary to this assumption, the scope of political authority and obligation should not
be limited in this way: transnational forms of authority and obligation are taking shape.
Part One of my dissertation contends that transnational political authority and obligation are justified using a
convergence argument. In the first three chapters, I set out three paradigms or basic ways of looking at the political
condition and the fundamental task of politics: conflict, mutuality, and right. The logic of each paradigm is
illustrated by means of exemplary theorists I take to embody them in different ways. Accordingly, Chapter One
presents political order as a solution to endemic, life-threatening conflict in the fashion of Hobbes. Chapter Two
elaborates two variants of a view of political order as cooperation for mutual benefit, guided by principles of either
social utility, as with Hume, or fairness, as with Rawls. Finally, Chapter Three models politics as a solution to
the problem of avoiding injustice in a complex world in two different versions, namely, Locke’s consensual politics
of natural rights and Kant’s global politics of right. Each paradigm favors a leading value in whose light the
legitimacy of political authorities, as well as the obligations they enforce on their citizens and subjects, is assessed:
respectively, (1) basic security and order, (2) reasonable reciprocity of benefits or welfare, and (3) rights or justice.
The convergence on the justification of transnational authorities and obligations from such different starting points
creates a strong presumption in favor of their existence as a general type of authority and obligation. Part One aims
to accomplish two things at once: first, to indirectly shift the burden of proof onto nationalists or statists who reject
such strongly political transnational obligations (and often invoke arguments of the exemplary figures to do so), and
second, to be in principle able to persuade persons from a wide array of outlooks within contemporary political
philosophy of its main thesis. The convergence argument, if sound, provides a way to accomplish both tasks at
once.
Part Two seeks to further specify what particular forms of political authority and political obligation are best suited
to the complex, pluralistic environment of world politics. As a first step, Chapter Four introduces Jürgen
Habermas’ discourse theory of law and democracy as the most promising normative political theory available for
this task because of its sophisticated procedural reading of the use of public reason in justifying political action and
legitimately resolving conflicts in substantive values at the domestic level. While accepting certain objections
recently leveled at it, I defend the central normative insights of a slightly modified discourse theory and argue that
just as the three paradigms, though historically limited to the domestic context, normatively extend themselves
beyond it in present circumstances, so the discourse theory also can be extended to the supranational level.
Moreover, just as it provides a workable framework for adjudicating the pluralistic complex of values in domestic
political life, so it offers resources for handling ever greater complexity in transnational politics. In light of this,
Chapter Five then subjects Habermas’ own recent proposals for a legitimate world order to a critical examination.
I suggest alterations that bring the proposal more in line with the intrinsically cosmopolitan logic of the discourse
theory while linking the modified proposal to the recent emergence of multi-principle or pluralistic and ‘respect’
theories of political authority and obligation.
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JONATHAN TREJO-MATHYS
CURRENT RESEARCH
I am currently doing research and writing on a project that develops a broadly democratic theory of
transnational and global political authority and obligation. It will be a multi-leveled account that includes multiple
types of actors, not just individuals and states as in classical theories.
However, the increased complexity of
further actor-types and levels also increases the danger that the theory will be utopian in a bad sense, lacking any
anchor in the empirical world. Hence I shall also seek to connect the theory with social scientific models of the
structure and process of international politics, in particular those of international relations theory. Here I intend to
build on the three paradigms of the political analyzed in my dissertation by linking them with the three most
prominent approaches in international relations theory, realist, liberal institutionalist and constructivist. I will argue
that ultimately the strengths of the realist and liberal institutionalist traditions, both descriptive and normative, can
be incorporated into a Kantian constructivist theory and that Jürgen Habermas’ social and political theory in
conjunction with the historical discourse analyses of Michel Foucault provide the best available framework for this
purpose.
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