Please join us for “Democracy: the what, the why and the how” with Dr. Philip Pettit on Tuesday, August 26 at 4:30 pm in the LSC Theatre.     

Dr. Philip Pettit, L.S. Rockefeller University Professor of Politics and Human Values at Princeton University and Distinguished University Professor at Australian National University, explores important questions about our democracy.

What is democracy? Not just an electoral system but a system of citizen controls over government.

Why is it worthwhile? Not because it will guard citizens against disappointment about the content of every law or policy, but because it should guard them against resentment about the source of any such measure.

How is it to be organized? Not by centralizing power in one person or party but by a network of checks and balances that guards against autocracy of any kind.

PHILIP PETTIT is Lawrence S. Rockefeller University Professor of Politics and Human Values at Princeton University, where he has taught political theory and philosophy since 2002, and holds a joint position as Distinguished University Professor of Philosophy at the Australian National University, Canberra.

Born and educated in Ireland, Professor Pettit has published a number of books in ethical and political theory, most recently Just Freedom (2014), The Robust Demands of the Good (2014), The Birth of Ethics (2018), The State (2023), and When Minds Converse: A Social Genealogy of the Human Soul (2025).