Benjamin McKean is a political theorist whose research concerns global justice, populism, and the relationship between theory and practice. His research has been published in American Political Science Review, Political Theory, Journal of Politics, Critical Review of International Social and Political Philosophy, and elsewhere. His book Disorienting Neoliberalism: Global Justice and the Outer Limit of Freedom (Oxford University Press, 2020) argues that people subject to unjust institutions and practices should be disposed to solidarity with the others who are also subject to them, even when those relations cross state borders. A neoliberal global economy characterized by inequality, financialization, and transnational supply chains creates a widely shared interest in resisting injustice, grounded in the way that existing institutions impair freedom. Identifying this interest as the basis for solidarity provides a new perspective not only on the possibility of achieving global justice, but on the nature and limits of contemporary egalitarian liberalism. He is also at work on a second book project on the inadequacy of existing political concepts for addressing climate change. Before coming to Ohio State, he received his PhD from the Princeton University Department of Politics and was a Harper-Schmidt Fellow in the Society of Fellows in the Liberal Arts at the University of Chicago.
Books
Disorienting Neoliberalism: Global Justice and the Outer Limit of Freedom (Oxford University Press, 2020)
https://global.oup.com/academic/product/disorienting-neoliberalism-9780190087807?cc=us&lang=en&
Selected Peer-Reviewed Publications
"Toward an Inclusive Populism? On the Role of Race and Difference in Laclau’s Politics" Political Theory Volume 44 Issue 6 (2016): 797-820
http://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1177/0090591716647771
"What Makes a Utopia Inconvenient? On the Advantages and Disadvantages of a Realist Orientation to Politics" American Political Science Review Volume 110, Issue 4 (November 2016): 876-888
https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/american-political-science-review/article/div-classtitlewhat-makes-a-utopia-inconvenient-on-the-advantages-and-disadvantages-of-a-realist-orientation-to-politicsdiv/642E576C82E942C8218916B1F2B2CB67
"Ideal Theory After Auschwitz? The Practical Uses and Ideological Buses of Political Theory as Reconciliation" The Journal of Politics Volume 79, Number 4 October 2017
http://www.journals.uchicago.edu/doi/abs/10.1086/692589
Selected Writing for a Popular Audience
"Is it possible to have populism without racism?" The Monkey Cage
“Chains of Domination, Chains of Solidarity: Benjamin L. McKean on Justice, Solidarity, Supply Chains” interview with Chanda Prescod-Weinstein, Public Books May 26, 2023
“What COVID-19 tells us about global supply chains” OUP Blog October 25th, 2020
https://blog.oup.com/2020/10/what-covid-19-tells-us-about-global-supply-chains/
Selected Presentations
"Democratizing Global Supply Chains" George Mason University's Philosophy, Politics, and Economics program, April 18, 2017
Disorienting Neoliberalism Book Launch, Ohio State Political Theory Workshop, October 20, 2020