Summary

About

Our Mission
Policy Innovation through Normative Analysis and Critical Reflection
Since 1976, the mission of the Institute is to create policy innovations through normative analysis and critical reflection; our work engages academics, policy makers, and the public on pressing normative issues in public policy to make a lasting and beneficial impact on society.

Our Leadership
Pioneers in Public Philosophy
The Institute’s leadership has actively pursued the Institute’s mission since its founding. The Institute has had seven directors.

Dr. Peter Brown (McGill) 1976–1981

Dr. Henry Shue (Oxford) 1981–1984

Dr. Douglas MacLean (UNC) 1984–1989

Dr. Mark Sagoff (Mason) 1989–1995

Dr. William Galston (Brookings) 1995–2005

Dr. Mark Sagoff  (Mason) 2005–2011

Dr. Andrew Light (Mason) 2011–Present

The Institute has also been a home to over 50 fellows and faculty members, many of whom are pioneers in public policy and the field of public philosophy.

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Contact

Locations

George Mason University
Robinson Hall B465
4400 University Drive, 3F1
Fairfax, VA, 22030, USA

Web Links

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Projects

We deliver policy innovations through interdisciplinary projects that engage the normative dimensions of public policy. Our goal is to make a lasting, positive impact on public policy and society.

CRISPR and Biosecurity

Source: Web page

A partnership between Mason and Stanford University, this project’s overarching goal is to study critical biosecurity issues related to genome editing technologies.

Some of the greatest advances in the biosciences have come in technologies that enable scientists to predictably and precisely modify the genomes of living organisms. These techniques are collectively known as genome editing. Genome editing is poised to make major contributions to life sciences research, medicine, public health, agriculture, and the biomanufacturing industry. But by using these same innovations and breakthroughs for malicious purposes, genome editing can also expand and transform the security landscape.

This project  will generate policy options and recommendations on how to assess the benefits and risks of this powerful and promising technology, how to manage the demands of promoting innovation and preventing misuse, and how to adapt current, or create new, governance mechanisms to achieve these objectives.  We seek to inform deliberations in the life sciences, regulatory, and security policy communities, as well as the broader scientific community and public stakeholders, on the appropriate measures to promote and safeguard this promising and powerful new technology.

Genocide Studies & Prevention

A collaborative project for special issues

Institute members Dr. Shannon Fyfe and Dr. Douglas Irvin-Erickson are spearheading four special issues of Genocide Studies and Prevention: An International Journal, where they serve on the Editorial Board. Each of the special issues will be preceded by a virtual workshop where scholars and practitioners will be able to share and receive insight on their projects and/or manuscripts. This project is supported by the Institute for Philosophy and Public Policy, the Department of Philosophy at George Mason University, and the Jimmy and Rosalynn Carter School for Peace and Conflict Resolution.

See the call for papers on the journal’s website here or below:

The Limits of Legal Responses to Genocide and Mass Atrocity

Guest Editors: Paul Morrow and Shelley Inglis (University of Dayton)

This workshop is also supported by the University of Dayton’s Human Rights Center.

The 20th century saw the growth of legal institutions aimed at providing accountability for, and ultimately curtail, mass atrocity crimes. Yet as the years have passed, and genocide and other atrocity crimes have continued to occur, the link between law and the causes of atrocities has come into question. As the body of critical scholarship produced by historians, social scientists, and legal scholars grows, many experts have concluded that laws and legal institutions cannot prevent genocide and other mass atrocities. This special issue and workshop are intended to address the question of whether it is time to give up on law and the rule of law as means to prevent mass atrocities. If so, why have legal efforts at prevention failed, and what alternatives should be pursued? If not, how should shortcomings of existing legal norms and institutions be addressed, and what kinds of additional prevention frameworks should be adopted?

Download the call here

Evidence-Based Approaches to Preventing Genocide

Guest Editors: Kristina Hook and Jamie Wise

This special issue will feature papers focused on translating empirical research into applied insights for policy and practitioner communities working in the genocide and mass atrocity prevention field. We envision a range of topics, including early warning, preventative diplomacy, peacekeeping challenges, transitional justice, and more. We also welcome applied case studies, including but not limited to China, Russia-Ukraine, Myanmar (Burma), Cameroon, Nigeria, and beyond. This special issue will be targeted and promoted within the policy and practice communities, as well as for academic audiences, so applied, evidence-based insights are also welcome.

Download the call here

Humanitarianism and Tech Governance

Guest Editors: Alpaslan Özerdem, Ziad Al Achkar, and Elana Sokol

With the rise of digital technologies and the ability to collect large quantities of data, new digital processes and tools are deployed to tackle the most pressing challenges in society. These new tools and capabilities raise questions about regulations, ethics, standard operating procedures, transparency, privacy, ownership, and power asymmetries. As such, the genocide prevention, humanitarian, and peace-building space are grappling with what tech governance should look like to unlock the potential of technologies while still preserving the values and principles they champion. For this reason, we have issued this call for papers to further the discussion and debates about this critical issue, identify case studies that could be modeled upon, and help move the conversation from theory to practice.

Download the call here

Virtual workshop session on Wednesday, March 29th, from 9:30 to 10:50 AM EST as part of the Carter School Peace Week.

If you can attend and participate, kindly please confirm with Elana Sokol and Ziad Al Achkar by Sunday, January 29th

Ethics and Brain Injury

A project that addresses complex and multifaceted ethical issues elate to neuroimaging, brain injury, and consciousness. 

Brain injury is an international health problem that places a significant burden on patients, their families, and health care systems. Globally, it is estimated that 50-60 million traumatic brain injury cases occur annually. In the U.S., it is estimated that 3.5 million traumatic brain injuries occur per year with an annual cost burden of at least $76.5 billion. Improvements in neurocritical care have increased survival rates following severe brain injury, but outcome remains variable. Following a period of coma, some patients make a good recovery, while others progress into a vegetative state, minimally conscious state, or die. Diagnosis is difficult and errors occur often. Advancements in functional magnetic resonance imaging  and electroencephalography  can provide a solution.

These technologies can improve the accuracy of diagnosis and could revolutionize our understanding of severe brain injury and the nature of human consciousness. Yet the use of these technologies also raises complex ethical and policy issues. This project seeks to investigate ethical and policy issues in the use of functional neuroimaging and electroencephalography to assess brain-injured patients. This project builds upon a Canadian Institutes for Health Research-funded project entitled, The Ethics of Neuroimaging after Serious Brain Injury.

Coming Home Dialogues

The Coming Home project offers military veterans the opportunity to explore the moral, psychological, and spiritual impacts of war on the warrior as she or he returns home.

The Coming Home project offers military veterans the opportunity to explore the moral, psychological, and spiritual impacts of war on the warrior as she or he returns home. The project coordinates dialogues between veterans, using sources in philosophy, history, poetry, and literature to spur discussion. Trained facilitators lead each discussion, and source material ranges from antiquity to the present, with a focus on World War I and the recent wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. Coming Home is a partnership between the Institute and the U.S. Naval Academy’s Stockdale Center for Ethical Leadership

Climate Change

The Institute maintains an active research portfolio on climate change policy across a broad array of specific topics.

Climate Change Policy
The Institute maintains an active climate change portfolio that  engages a broad array of organizations, governments, and scholarly disciplines in such areas as the architecture of international climate agreements, climate finance, clean energy transitions (especially in the electricity and building sectors), mitigation of short-lived climate pollutants, adaptation, enhancing carbon sinks, climate and security, and climate engineering. Our work primarily focuses on the U.S., China, and India, and the international mechanisms that have been created in the past 25 years to create a system of global climate governance. From 2013-2016 Institute Director Andrew Light served in the Obama Administration, working on the negotiations that created the Paris Agreement on Climate Change, as Senior Adviser and India Counselor to the U.S. Special Envoy on Climate Change, and in Secretary Kerry’s Office of Policy Planning in the U.S. Department of State.

This work has been collaborative, working with various Washington, D.C. think tanks and NGOs. Active projects include the production of a major report on governance of Solar Radiation Management, finalizing the creation of a global mechanism for annual assessment of progress toward the targets under the Paris Agreement (the “Global Stocktake”), implementing the Kigali Amendment on a global phase-down of HFCs under the Montreal Protocol, and a study of the creation and future of the Warsaw Mechanism on Loss and Damage under the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change.

Autonomous Systems

A multi-institutional partnership, led by George Mason University and Arizona State University, that explores the ethical, legal, and social implications of autonomous systems. 

Autonomous weapons systems (AWS) are poised to transform U.S. military operations in ways that challenge current policies and strategic planning, while raising foundational questions about the meaning and practice of armed conflict. These emerging technologies are driven by a variety of interconnected advances in machine learning, artificial intelligence, precision munitions, improved sensors, human-machine teaming, and robotics.

AWS provide extraordinary military capabilities. However, the technologies are advancing so rapidly that they threaten to outpace our ability to effectively address their ethical, legal, and social impact. Furthermore, the pace of AWS innovation combined with the broader social impact of these advances may well become a flash point for controversies and crises that could negatively impact US security capabilities and preparedness. Within this context, innovative research on AWS is essential to guide social discourse and policy, and to serve the needs of the U.S. national security community. With a team of scholars from Mason, Arizona State University, New America, US Naval Academy, and US Army War College, this project seeks to inform the policy and development of AWS .

Team

Source: Webpage

We are a team of public intellectuals, from diverse scholarly backgrounds, who bring our academic training to bear on public-policy discourse. Our team is grounded in the the scholarly culture of the university, and we extend our network to government, think tanks, and public-policy organizations in Washington, D.C.

Resident Members

Andrew Light PhD
Director (on leave)

Jesse Kirkpatrick PhD
Acting Director

Shannon Fyfe JD PhD
Faculty Fellow

Andrew Peterson PhD
Faculty Fellow

Mark Sagoff PhD
Distinguished Senior Fellow

Roger Paden PhD
Senior Fellow

Wesley Buckwalter, PhD
Faculty Fellow

Daniel Nicholson, PhD
Faculty Fellow

Sarah W. Denton MA
Research Fellow

Douglas S. Irvin-Erickson PhD
George Mason University

Non-Resident Members

Erik Angner PhD
Stockholm University

Gil Hersch PhD
Virginia Tech University

Eric Katz PhD
New Jersey Institute of Technology

Elizabeth Lanphier PhD
University of Cincinnati

David Morrow PhD
American University

Gwynne Taraska PhD
Climate Advisers

C. Anthony Pfaff PhD
Strategic Studies Institute

Alumni

Since its founding, the Institute has been a home to many scholars who have launched prestigious careers in public philosophy. These scholars, serving as either resident scholars or visiting fellows through the Rockefeller Foundation Humanities Program, have laid the disciplinary foundations for public philosophy. We highlight some of our alumni below. A complete list of our alumni is linked here.

Publications

Journals

The Institute publishes and archives two premier journals in public philosophy. Ethics, Policy, and Environment is the premier journal at the intersection of environmental ethics and environmental policy. The Institute is home to the archive of Philosophy and Public Policy Quarterly, which was started at the Institute in 1981, and is one of the oldest public philosophy journals in the U.S.
Both journals are edited or archived by Institute members.

Philosophy and Public Policy Quarterly
Philosophy and Public Policy Quarterly publishes papers that address the normative and conceptual dimensions of issues of importance and timeliness in public policy. Articles typically are fewer than 5,000 words and are written in a style that will appeal to a broadly informed public.The Quarterly is now an online-only and open-access journal. The inaugural issue since the institute was chartered by George Mason University was published in the spring of 2013.

Archive

Ethics, Policy, and Environment
Ethics, Policy & Environment offers scholarly articles, reviews, critical exchanges, and short reflections on all aspects of environmental ethics, environmental philosophy, and the normative dimensions of environmental policy. Contributors have have engaged a wide range of subjects, such as applied environmental ethics, animal welfare, environmental justice, development ethics, and sustainability. The journal also welcomes analyses of practical applications of environmental, energy technology, regional, and urban policies, as well as theoretically robust discussions of environmental and energy policies. Benjamin Hale (University of Colorado, Boulder) and Andrew Light (George Mason University) serve as the journal’s current editors

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