Former Fellow

Seyla Benhabib

Eugene Meyer Professor of Political Science and Philosophy at Yale University

Research project:
“Democratic Sovereignty and Transnational Law”

After Seyla Benhabib dealt with the theoretical foundation of human rights during her first stay as a fellow of the Cluster of Excellence at the Forschungskolleg in 2010, she is now exploring the question of whether democracies can still be described as sovereign in the face of transnational orders. In particular, the question of how universal principles of human rights can be reconciled with democratic civil rights comes to the fore. Her current research is to be incorporated into a new book. In it, the philosopher wants to show that transnational norms of human rights ultimately strengthen rather than weaken democratic sovereignty.

Events (selection):

4 June 2014, 7.30 pm
Lecture as part of the centenary celebrations of Goethe University Frankfurt am Main

“Der ethisch-politische Horizont der Kritischen Theorie: Gestern und heute”
Venue: Goethe University Frankfurt am Main
Campus Westend, HZ 5
Organizer: Cluster of Excellence “The Formation of Normative Orders”

13 June 2014
Lecture at the retreat of the Principal Investigators of the Cluster of Excellence “
The Formation of Normative Orders”
“From the ‘Right to Have Rights’ to the ‘Critique of Humanitarian Reason’ against the Cynical Turn in Human Rights Discourse”
Location: Forschungskolleg Humanwissenschaften der Goethe-Universität Frankfurt am Main
Organizer: Cluster of Excellence “The Formation of Normative Orders”

June 30, 2014, 7.30 pm
“Die Ungehaltenen”
Reading with Deniz Utlu. Introduction by Seyla Benhabib. An evening about literature, migration and human dignity
Location: Galerie Bernhard Knaus Fine Art
Niddastr. 84, 1st floor, Frankfurt am Main

  • Biografische Angaben

    Seyla Benhabib has been a member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences since 1995. From 2006 to 2007, she was president of the American Philosophical Association (Eastern Division). She is a member of the editorial advisory board of the journal "Ethics & International Affairs" and co-editor of "Blätter für deutsche und internationale Politik". In addition to teaching at Harvard University and the New School for Social Research, among others, she has undertaken numerous research stays in Europe. In 2009, for example, she accepted an invitation to the Wissenschaftskolleg zu Berlin. As a member of the Scientific Advisory Board, the philosopher has special ties to the Cluster of Excellence. Among the prizes Seyla Benhabib has been awarded is the Ernst Bloch Prize in 2009, which the jury recognized as a "world-class political philosopher". In 2012, she received the Dr. Leopold Lucas Prize from the University of Tübingen. The Tübingen Faculty of Protestant Theology, which awards this prize, emphasized that at the heart of Seyla Benhabib's thinking is the discourse-ethical justification and implementation of a "human right to hospitality". On May 19, she was awarded the Meister Eckhart Prize at the University of Cologne. Here, the jury honored Seyla Benhabib's intellectual advances in establishing a transnational understanding of law. Like few philosophers, she is facing up to the new responsibility that is emerging in the age of "post-national constellations". The laudatory speech was given by Rainer Forst, Professor of Political Theory and Philosophy and Co-Speaker of the Cluster of Excellence.
  • Publikationen

    Critique, Norm and Utopia. A Study of the Normative Foundations of Critical Theory, New York: Columbia University Press 1986 (dt.: Kritik, Norm und Utopie, Fischer Verlag 1992). Situating the Self. Gender, Community and Postmodernism in Contemporary Ethics, Cambridge: Polity Press 1992 (dt.: Selbst im Kontext, Suhrkamp Verlag 1995). zusammen mit Judith Butler, Drucilla Cornell and Nancy Fraser: Feminist Contentions: A Philosophical Exchange, London: Routledge 1994 (dt.: Der Streit um Differenz, Fischer Verlag 1993). The Reluctant Modernism of Hannah Arendt, Lanham, Maryland 1996; neu veröffentlicht in 2002 (dt.: Hannah Arendt und die melancholische Denkerin der Moderne, Suhrkamp Verlag 2006). The Claims of Culture. Equality and Diversity in the Global Era, Princeton University Press 2002. The Rights of Others. Aliens, Citizens and Resident, Cambridge University Press 2004 (dt.: Die Rechte der Anderen, Suhrkamp Verlag 2008). Another Cosmopolitanism. Hospitality, Sovereignty and Democratic Iterations, Oxford University Press in 2006 (dt.: Kosmopolitismus und Demokratie, Campus Verlag 2008). Dignity in Adversity. Human Rights in Troubled Times, Polity Press 2011. Equality and Difference. Human Dignity and Popular Sovereignty in the Mirror of Political Modernity (Lucas prize Lecture in English and German: Mohr Siebeck Publishers, 2013). The Democratic Disconnect. Citizenship and Accountability in the Transatlantic Community, with David Cameron et. al., Transatlantic Academy, Washington DC, 2013.

News from the research center

Event
06./07.11.2025 | Frankfurt am Main

Kolja Möller - Volk und Elite

Workshop

Workshop zum "Buch Volk und Elite - Eine Gesellschaftstheorie des Populismus" von Kolja Möller

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Event
31.10.2025/01.11.2025 | Frankfurt am Main

Strafrecht und Kriminalpolitik in den Polykrisen der digitalen Welt

Symposium

Unter der Überschrift „Strafrecht und Kriminalpolitik in den Polykrisen der digitalen Welt“ sollen auf dem XII. Deutsch-Griechischen Strafrechtssymposion die heterogenen Herausforderungen diskutiert werden, mit denen sich das Strafrechtssystem in Zeiten sich häufender und interdependenter Krisen (Klima, Migration) konfrontiert sieht.

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Publication
01.10.2025 | Encyclopedia

Moralisieren

Schmelzle, Cord (2025): „Moralisieren“. In: Pollmann, Anna; Möllmann, Christopher: Schlüsselbegriffe gesellschaftlichen Zusammenhalts. Ein kritisches Vokabular, Wallstein, S. 544–561.

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Publication
01.10.2025 | Anthology

Dis.Ordering Distribution. Infrastructures, Formats and Practices in the Circulation of Culture.

Storz, Cornelia; Hediger, Vinzenz; Krings, Matthias (eds.) (2025): Dis.Ordering Distribution. Infrastructures, Formats and Practices in the Circulation of Culture. Emerald Publishing.

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Event
03.11.2025 | Offenbach

Ich kann, also bin ich? Eine Kritik ableistischer Diskriminierung in unserer Gesellschaft

Lecture

Der Vortrag von Dr. Regina Schidel im Rahmen der Goethe Lectures Offenbach analysiert Ableismus aus philosophischer und sozialtheoretischer Perspektive, und zwar exemplarisch am Fall von Menschen mit kognitiven Einschränkungen/geistiger »Behinderung«. Es werden Ursprünge ableistischen Denkens in der philosophischen Tradition entwickelt, in ihrer gesellschaftlichen Funktionalität untersucht und Möglichkeiten befragt, diese zu überwinden – diese stammen etwa aus kritischer und feministischer Theoriebildung.

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Publication
30.09.2025

Climate Finance, the Right to Promote Sustainable Development and Responsibility

Moellendorf, Darrel (2025): „Climate Finance, the Right to Promote Sustainable Development and Responsibility“. In: Berger, Axel; Brandi, Clara; Kollar, Eszter (eds.): Justice in Global Economic Governance. Normative and Empirical Perspectives on Promoting Fairer Globalisation, Edinburgh University Press, p. 125–133.

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Publication
29.09.2025 | Journal article

Im Visier der Autokraten: Vom Wert der Wissenschaftsfreiheit

Forst, Rainer; Tockner, Klement: Im Visier der Autokraten: Vom Wert der Wissenschaftsfreiheit. In: Blätter für deutsche und internationale Politik. 10/2025, S. 109-117.

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Publication
18.09.2025 | Journal article

Robots and wages: A meta-analysis

Jurkat, Anne; Klump, Rainer; Schneider, Florian (2025): „Robots and wages: A meta-analysis“. In: Structural Change and Economic Dynamics, In Press/Journal Pre-proof.

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Event
19.11.2025 | Frankfurt am Main

Unerwünscht. Die westdeutsche Demokratie und die Verfolgten des NS-Regimes

Book Presentation

Der Vortrag von Prof. Dr. Stefanie Schüler-Springorum schildert die Erfahrungen von überlebenden Juden und Sinti und Roma, von ehemaligen Zwangsarbeitern und Homosexuellen in Westdeutschland in der Nachkriegszeit.

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