James Lindley Wilson
@jameslwilson.bsky.social
Political Science prof at University of Chicago. Democratic theory, egalitarianism, global justice. Will hammer like button on any dog pics.
No need to kill--just come to Chicago (the amazing Chicago Diner):
November 5, 2025 at 10:06 PM
No need to kill--just come to Chicago (the amazing Chicago Diner):
This was early American democracy.
October 28, 2025 at 3:34 PM
This was early American democracy.
tfw when you try out for a job because you want to zip-tie 12-year-olds who "look foreign" and you find out you have to answer exam questions about limits to your right to seize.
October 23, 2025 at 2:13 PM
tfw when you try out for a job because you want to zip-tie 12-year-olds who "look foreign" and you find out you have to answer exam questions about limits to your right to seize.
Chicago a few minutes before official start
October 18, 2025 at 5:14 PM
Chicago a few minutes before official start
All the Greatest Generation, World War II talk in Rawls' "Law of Peoples" hits different when almost all the people, military and civilian, who fought Nazism are gone, and we have, so far, not adequately lived up to our collective duty to replace them.
October 9, 2025 at 2:31 PM
All the Greatest Generation, World War II talk in Rawls' "Law of Peoples" hits different when almost all the people, military and civilian, who fought Nazism are gone, and we have, so far, not adequately lived up to our collective duty to replace them.
Pro-democracy sign at the University of Chicago Institute of Politics, in flagrant violation of the university administration's strict interpretation of institutional neutrality. Are authoritarian or apathetic members of the campus community being silenced?
![A photo of the front of the University of Chicago's Institute of Politics, reading "Democracy: [verb] Get involved."](https://cdn.bsky.app/img/feed_thumbnail/plain/did:plc:jfw43gquuke6h44njm2a34uj/bafkreigyxcc3zpwh25tvvwbxbgexgpsmp6jezlsex4srfyereysx6nro2e@jpeg)
October 2, 2025 at 2:33 PM
Pro-democracy sign at the University of Chicago Institute of Politics, in flagrant violation of the university administration's strict interpretation of institutional neutrality. Are authoritarian or apathetic members of the campus community being silenced?
I think this is a typo for "books that I would absolutely recommend everyone run out and buy for themselves and their friends."
(It's a good interview, about a good book!)
(It's a good interview, about a good book!)
September 5, 2025 at 3:23 PM
I think this is a typo for "books that I would absolutely recommend everyone run out and buy for themselves and their friends."
(It's a good interview, about a good book!)
(It's a good interview, about a good book!)
Which is related to the fact that she doesn't really engage with the work of other political theorists. (This from a review of her latest book by Jonathan Quong in Ethics.) So she doesn't want to talk it out with them, and therefore is not engaging with work suggesting a different view of politics.
May 6, 2025 at 3:00 PM
Which is related to the fact that she doesn't really engage with the work of other political theorists. (This from a review of her latest book by Jonathan Quong in Ethics.) So she doesn't want to talk it out with them, and therefore is not engaging with work suggesting a different view of politics.
Rousseau, getting to the point in Schumpeter where after he spends pages arguing that the "classical doctrine of democracy" is trash, Schumpter says the doctrine "will actually fit the facts with a sufficient degree of approximation" in some cases, including Switzerland:
April 28, 2025 at 3:15 PM
Rousseau, getting to the point in Schumpeter where after he spends pages arguing that the "classical doctrine of democracy" is trash, Schumpter says the doctrine "will actually fit the facts with a sufficient degree of approximation" in some cases, including Switzerland:
Frederick Douglass:
"To say now that America was right, and England wrong, is exceedingly easy...but there was a time when to pronounce against England..tried men's souls...To side with the right, against the wrong...and with the oppressed against the oppressor! here lies the merit."
"To say now that America was right, and England wrong, is exceedingly easy...but there was a time when to pronounce against England..tried men's souls...To side with the right, against the wrong...and with the oppressed against the oppressor! here lies the merit."
![But, your fathers, who had not adopted the fashionable idea or this day, of the infallibility of government, and the absolute character of its acts, presumed to differ from the home government in respect to the wisdom and the justice of some of those burdens and restraints. They went so far in their excitement as to pronounce the measures of government unjust, unreason-able, and oppressive, and altogether such as ought not to be quietly submitted to. I scarcely need say, fellow-citizens, that my opinion of those measures fully accords with that of your fathers. Such a declaration of agreement on my part would not be worth much to anybody. It would, certainly, prove nothing, as to what part I might have taken, had I lived during the great controversy of 1776. [Highlighting starts here] To say now that America was right, and England wrong, is exceedingly easy. Everybody can say it; the dastard, not less than the noble brave, can flippantly discant on the tyranny of England towards the American Colonies. It is fashionable to do so; but there was a time when to pronounce against England, and in favor of the cause of the](https://cdn.bsky.app/img/feed_thumbnail/plain/did:plc:jfw43gquuke6h44njm2a34uj/bafkreibg45pj6eib42ksvrirsla4ev3llorlszjfslsggtux6jj24xo5u4@jpeg)
April 18, 2025 at 5:30 PM
Frederick Douglass:
"To say now that America was right, and England wrong, is exceedingly easy...but there was a time when to pronounce against England..tried men's souls...To side with the right, against the wrong...and with the oppressed against the oppressor! here lies the merit."
"To say now that America was right, and England wrong, is exceedingly easy...but there was a time when to pronounce against England..tried men's souls...To side with the right, against the wrong...and with the oppressed against the oppressor! here lies the merit."
Then why do you make it look so fun?
April 15, 2025 at 1:17 PM
Then why do you make it look so fun?
Bart Simpson tried to warn us about Gen X
April 9, 2025 at 3:29 PM
Bart Simpson tried to warn us about Gen X
Cromwell to the Irish:
April 7, 2025 at 6:12 PM
Cromwell to the Irish:
Some vindication of your epistemic habits:
April 7, 2025 at 4:12 PM
Some vindication of your epistemic habits:
Shorter Booker:
April 2, 2025 at 1:27 PM
Shorter Booker:
Greece is where now?
March 31, 2025 at 3:47 PM
Greece is where now?
He says similar things throughout the early chapters, but I was thinking of this in ch 4:
March 31, 2025 at 3:17 PM
He says similar things throughout the early chapters, but I was thinking of this in ch 4:
A good indication that your framework is pretty shallow is citing this idea from Mill without pointing out that Mill thinks it's perfectly valid to "remonstrate" with people who have objectionable ideas, and to refuse to associate with them.
March 29, 2025 at 4:58 PM
A good indication that your framework is pretty shallow is citing this idea from Mill without pointing out that Mill thinks it's perfectly valid to "remonstrate" with people who have objectionable ideas, and to refuse to associate with them.
Someone needs to ask the NYU admin if "being perceived as anti-governmental" runs afoul of their "clear guidelines."
March 29, 2025 at 2:19 PM
Someone needs to ask the NYU admin if "being perceived as anti-governmental" runs afoul of their "clear guidelines."
Exactly right.
November 5, 2024 at 12:16 PM
Exactly right.