- University Park, Pennsylvania, United States
Ben Jones
Pennsylvania State University, School of Public Policy, Faculty Member
- Pennsylvania State University, Rock Ethics Institue, Faculty Memberadd
- Philosophy, Political Science, Ethics, Social Sciences, Public Policy, Religion and Politics, and 22 morePolitical Theory, History of Political Thought, Christian Ethics, Political Philosophy, Just War Theory, Criminal Justice, Dirty hands, Moral and Political Philosophy, Realism (Political Science), Early Modern Political Thought, Political Realism, Apocalyptic Eschatology, Eschatology and Apocalypticism, Thomas Hobbes, History Of Political Thought (Political Science), Hobbes, Normative Ethics, Libertarianism, Political Theology, Death Penalty, Apocalypticism, and Eschatologyedit
Apocalypse, it seems, is everywhere. Preachers with vast followings proclaim the world's end and apocalyptic fears grip even the non-religious amid climate change, pandemics, and threats of nuclear war. But as these ideas pervade popular... more
Apocalypse, it seems, is everywhere. Preachers with vast followings proclaim the world's end and apocalyptic fears grip even the non-religious amid climate change, pandemics, and threats of nuclear war. But as these ideas pervade popular discourse, grasping their logic remains elusive. Ben Jones argues that we can gain insight into apocalyptic thought through secular thinkers. He starts with a puzzle: Why would secular thinkers draw on Christian apocalyptic beliefs--often dismissed as bizarre--to interpret politics? The apocalyptic tradition proves appealing in part because it theorizes a special relation between crisis and utopia. Apocalyptic thought points to crisis as the vehicle to bring the previously impossible within reach, thus offering apparent resources for navigating challenges in ideal theory, which tries to imagine the best and most just society. By examining apocalyptic thought's appeal and risks, this study arrives at new insights on the limits of ideal theory and utopian hope.
Research Interests: Political Philosophy, Political Theory, Utopian Studies, Eschatology and Apocalypticism, Thomas Hobbes, and 9 moreHistory of Political Thought, Political Theology, John Rawls, Machiavelli, Religious Studies, Friedrich Engels, Philosophy and Religious Studies, Ideal and Non-Ideal Theory, and History of Philosophy
From George Floyd to Breonna Taylor, the brutal deaths of Black citizens at the hands of law enforcement have brought race and policing to the forefront of national debate in the United States. In The Ethics of Policing, Ben Jones and... more
From George Floyd to Breonna Taylor, the brutal deaths of Black citizens at the hands of law enforcement have brought race and policing to the forefront of national debate in the United States. In The Ethics of Policing, Ben Jones and Eduardo Mendieta bring together an interdisciplinary group of scholars across the social sciences and humanities to reevaluate the role of the police and the ethical principles that guide their work. With contributors such as Tracey Meares, Michael Walzer, and Franklin Zimring, this volume covers timely topics including race and policing, the use of aggressive tactics and deadly force, police abolitionism, and the use of new technologies like drones, body cameras, and predictive analytics, providing different perspectives on the past, present, and future of policing, with particular attention to discriminatory practices that have historically targeted Black and Brown communities. This volume offers cutting-edge insight into the ethical challenges facing the police and the institutions that oversee them. As high-profile cases of police brutality spark protests around the country, The Ethics of Policing raises questions about the proper role of law enforcement in a democratic society.
Research Interests:
Police killings of individuals with mental illness have prompted calls for greater funding of mental health services to shift responsibilities away from the police. Such investments can reduce police interactions with vulnerable... more
Police killings of individuals with mental illness have prompted calls for greater funding of mental health services to shift responsibilities away from the police. Such investments can reduce police interactions with vulnerable populations but are unlikely to eliminate them entirely, particularly in cases where individuals with mental illness have a weapon or are otherwise dangerous. It remains a pressing question, then, how police should respond to these and other vulnerable aggressors with diminished culpability (VADCs). This article considers and ultimately rejects three potential approaches from the ethics of defensive force literature. It looks to improve on them by developing what I call the fusion account, which explains how vulnerability and diminished culpability fit together to provide moral grounds for extra protections from deadly force. The article’s final sections explore the policy implications of the fusion account for police administrators, officers, and the law.
Research Interests: Criminal Law, Criminal Justice, Philosophy, Political Philosophy, Ethics, and 12 moreApplied Ethics, Political Theory, Political Science, Distributive Justice, Vulnerability, Mental Illness, Police and criminal justice ethics, Policing, Police and Policing, Criminology and Criminal Justice, Use of Deadly Force, and Public Policy
In many jurisdictions in the United States and elsewhere, the law governing deadly force by police and civilians contains a notable asymmetry. Often civilians but not police are bound by the imminence requirement-that is, a necessary... more
In many jurisdictions in the United States and elsewhere, the law governing deadly force by police and civilians contains a notable asymmetry. Often civilians but not police are bound by the imminence requirement-that is, a necessary condition for justifying deadly force is reasonable belief that oneself or another innocent person faces imminent threat of grave harm. In U.S. law enforcement, however, there has been some shift toward the imminence requirement, most evident in the use-of-force policy adopted by the Department of Justice in 2022. This article defends that shift and argues that the ethical case for the imminence requirement in policing is stronger than Shannon Brandt Ford suggests in a recent article. Though the imminence requirement's impacts on policing and public safety require ongoing study, the principle of equality before the law and the Doctrine of Doing and Allowing both provide moral grounds for this requirement, especially given the lack of evidence that the status quo helps protect life.
Research Interests:
One prominent argument in international law and religious thought for abolishing capital punishment is that it violates individuals' right to life. Notably, this right-to-life argument emerged from normative and legal frameworks that... more
One prominent argument in international law and religious thought for abolishing capital punishment is that it violates individuals' right to life. Notably, this right-to-life argument emerged from normative and legal frameworks that recognize deadly force against aggressors as justified when necessary to stop their unjust threat of grave harm. Can capital punishment be necessary in this sense-and thus justified defensive killing? If so, the right-to-life argument would have to admit certain exceptions where executions are justified. Drawing on work by Hugo Bedau, I identify a thought experiment where executions are justified defensive killing but explain why they cannot be in our world. A state's obligations to its prisoners include the obligation to use nonlethal incapacitation (ONI), which applies as long as prisoners pose no imminent threat. ONI precludes executions for reasons of future dangerousness. By subjecting the right-to-life argument to closer scrutiny, this article ultimately places it on firmer ground.
Research Interests:
This article offers a normative analysis of some of the most controversial incidents involving police--what I call police-generated killings. In these cases, bad police tactics create a situation where deadly force becomes necessary,... more
This article offers a normative analysis of some of the most controversial incidents involving police--what I call police-generated killings. In these cases, bad police tactics create a situation where deadly force becomes necessary, becomes perceived as necessary, or occurs unintentionally. Police deserve blame for such killings because they choose tactics that unnecessarily raise the risk of deadly force, thus violating their obligation to prioritize the protection of life. Since current law in the United States fails to ban many bad tactics, police-generated killings often are treated as "lawful but awful." To address these killings, some call on changes to departmental policies or voluntary reparations by local governments, yet such measures leave in place a troubling gap between ethics and law. I argue that police-generated killings merit legal sanctions by appealing to a relevant analogy: self-generated self-defense, where the person who engages in self-defense started the trouble. The persistent lack of accountability for police-generated killings threatens life, police legitimacy, and trust in democratic institutions. The article closes by identifying tools in law and policy to address this challenge.
Research Interests: Criminal Law, Criminal Justice, Constitutional Law, Philosophy, Political Philosophy, and 13 moreEthics, Applied Ethics, Political Theory, Political Science, Politics, Police, Philosophy of Criminal Law, Policing Studies, Police and criminal justice ethics, Public Law, Police and Policing, Self Defense, and Public Policy
This article identifies an argument in Hobbes’s writings often overlooked but relevant to current philosophical debates. Political philosophers tend to categorize his thought as representing consent or rescue theories of political... more
This article identifies an argument in Hobbes’s writings often overlooked but relevant to current philosophical debates. Political philosophers tend to categorize his thought as representing consent or rescue theories of political authority. Though these interpretations have textual support and are understandable, they leave out one of his most compelling arguments—what we call the lesser evil argument for political authority, expressed most explicitly in Chapter 20 of Leviathan. Hobbes frankly admits the state’s evils but appeals to the significant disparity between those evils and the greater evils outside the state as a basis for political authority. More than a passing observation, aspects of the lesser evil argument appear in each of his three major political works. In addition to outlining this argument, the article examines its significance both for Hobbes scholarship and recent philosophical debates on political authority.
Research Interests: Political Philosophy, Legitimacy and Authority, Political Theory, Political Legitimacy, Thomas Hobbes, and 9 moreAuthority and Obligation, Social and Political Philosophy, State of Nature, Political Thought, History of Political Ideas, Leviathan, Ideal and nonideal theory of justice, Thomas Hobbes' Leviathan, and Lesser evils
In 2014, questionable police killings of Eric Garner, Michael Brown, and Tamir Rice sparked mass protests and put policing at the center of national debate. Mass protests erupted again in 2020 after the brutal police killing of George... more
In 2014, questionable police killings of Eric Garner, Michael Brown, and Tamir Rice sparked mass protests and put policing at the center of national debate. Mass protests erupted again in 2020 after the brutal police killing of George Floyd. These and other incidents have put a spotlight on a host of issues that threaten the legitimacy of policing—excessive force, racial bias, over-policing of marginalized communities, historic injustices that remain unaddressed, and new technology that increases police powers. This introduction gives an overview of these ethical challenges facing police today and the democratic institutions that oversee them. It then outlines the various interdisciplinary perspectives—from Black studies, criminology, history, law, philosophy, political science, and sociology—collected in the volume. Together, these contributions aim to clarify the question of which ethical principles should guide police, where current practices fall short, and what strategies hold the most promise for addressing these failures.
Research Interests:
The devastating impact of the COVID-19 (coronavirus disease 2019) pandemic is prompting renewed scrutiny of practices that heighten the risk of infectious disease. One such practice is refusing available vaccines known to be effective at... more
The devastating impact of the COVID-19 (coronavirus disease 2019) pandemic is prompting renewed scrutiny of practices that heighten the risk of infectious disease. One such practice is refusing available vaccines known to be effective at preventing dangerous communicable diseases. For reasons of preventing individual harm, avoiding complicity in collective harm, and fairness, there is a growing consensus among ethicists that individuals have a duty to get vaccinated. I argue that these same grounds establish an analogous duty to avoid buying and eating most meat sold today, based solely on a concern for human welfare. Meat consumption is a leading driver of infectious disease. Wildlife sales at wet markets, bushmeat hunting, and concentrated animal feeding operations (CAFOs) are all exceptionally risky activities that facilitate disease spread and impose immense harms on human populations. If there is a moral duty to vaccinate, we also should recognize a moral duty to avoid most meat. The paper concludes by considering the implications of this duty for policy.
Research Interests:
Those who care about and engage in politics frequently fall victim to cognitive bias. Concerns that such bias impacts scholarship recently have prompted debates--notably, in philosophy and psychology--on the proper relationship between... more
Those who care about and engage in politics frequently fall victim to cognitive bias. Concerns that such bias impacts scholarship recently have prompted debates--notably, in philosophy and psychology--on the proper relationship between research and politics. One proposal emerging from these debates is that researchers studying politics have a professional duty to avoid political activism because it risks biasing their work. While sympathetic to the motivations behind this proposal, I suggest several reasons to reject a blanket duty to avoid activism: (1) even if it reduced bias, this duty would make unreasonable demands on researchers; (2) this duty could hinder research by limiting viewpoint diversity; (3) this duty wrongly implies that academia offers a relative haven from bias compared to politics; and (4) not all forms of political activism pose an equal risk of bias. None of these points suggest that researchers should ignore the risk of bias. Rather, researchers should focus on stronger evidence based strategies for reducing bias than a blanket recommendation to avoid politics.
Research Interests:
Why do thinkers hostile or agnostic toward Christianity find in its apocalyptic doctrines—often seen as bizarre—appealing tools for interpreting politics? This article tackles that puzzle. First, it clarifies the concept of secular... more
Why do thinkers hostile or agnostic toward Christianity find in its apocalyptic doctrines—often seen as bizarre—appealing tools for interpreting politics? This article tackles that puzzle. First, it clarifies the concept of secular apocalyptic thought and its relation to Christianity. I propose that, to avoid imprecision, the study of secular apocalyptic thought should focus on cases where religious apocalyptic thought's influence on secular thinkers is clear because they explicitly reference such thought and its appeal (e.g., Engels's fascination with Christian apocalyptic thought). Second, it argues that the political appeal of apocalyptic thought—and, specifically, what I term cataclysmic apocalyptic thought (CAT)—partly lies in offering resources to navigate persistent challenges in ideal theory. The ideal theorist faces competing goals: formulating an ideal that is utopian and feasible. One potential approach to this challenge is CAT, which embraces a utopian ideal and declares it feasible through identifying crisis as the vehicle to realize it.
Research Interests: Political Philosophy, Political Theory, Marxism, Idealism, Apocalypticism, and 13 morePolitical Science, Eschatology and Apocalypticism, Secularization, Eric Voegelin, Social and Political Philosophy, Eschatology, Contemporary Political Philosophy, Contemporary Political Theory, Book of Revelation, Utopia, Friedrich Engels, Ideal and Non-Ideal Theory, and Thomas Müntzer
In Leviathan, Hobbes outlines the concept of the 'Kingdome of God by Nature' or 'Naturall Kingdome of God', terms rarely found in English texts at the time. This article traces the concept back to the Catechism of the Council of Trent... more
In Leviathan, Hobbes outlines the concept of the 'Kingdome of God by Nature' or 'Naturall Kingdome of God', terms rarely found in English texts at the time. This article traces the concept back to the Catechism of the Council of Trent (1566), which sets forth a threefold understanding of God's kingdom—the kingdoms of nature, grace, and glory—none of which refer to civil commonwealths on earth. Hobbes abandons this Catholic typology and transforms the concept of the natural kingdom of God to advance a claim often missed by his interpreters: Leviathan-states are the manifestation of a real, not metaphorical, kingdom of God. This argument plays a key role in Leviathan, which identifies the kingdom of God as the Christian doctrine most subject to abuse. Hobbes harshly criticizes Catholic and Presbyterian clergy for claiming to represent God's kingdom. This claim, he argues, comes with the subversive implication that the church possesses spiritual and temporal authority, and caused great turmoil during the English Civil War. As an alternative, Hobbes points to civil commonwealths as the manifestation of God's natural kingdom, which is the only form his kingdom currently takes.
Research Interests: Political Philosophy, Political Theory, Hobbes, Political Science, Presbyterianism, and 12 moreThomas Hobbes, Catholic Theology, History of Political Thought, Political Theology, Early Modern Political Thought, Early Modern Catholicism, Kingdom of God, Political Thought, Council of Trent, English Civil War, Westminster Confession, and Early Modern English Political Philosophy
The United States has experienced a significant decline in the death penalty during the first part of the 21st century, as death sentences, executions, public support, and states with capital punishment all have declined. Many recent... more
The United States has experienced a significant decline in the death penalty during the first part of the 21st century, as death sentences, executions, public support, and states with capital punishment all have declined. Many recent reforms banning or placing a moratorium on executions have occurred in blue states, in line with the notion that ending the death penalty is a progressive cause. Challenging this narrative, however, is the emergence of Republican lawmakers as champions of death penalty repeal legislation in red states. This Article puts these efforts by Republican lawmakers into historical context, and explains the conservative case against the death penalty: its incompatibility with limited government, fiscal responsibility, and promoting a culture of life. Understanding Republican opposition to capital punishment takes on particular importance now following setbacks to efforts against the death penalty in the 2016 election. In this environment, building support among Republicans and conservatives likely will prove critical for taking further steps toward limiting and eventually ending the death penalty in the U.S.
Research Interests:
Persistent public support for capital punishment and constraints on political elites in the United States breed skepticism over grassroots campaigns’ ability to have much impact on this policy. Andrew Hammel advances this point in his... more
Persistent public support for capital punishment and constraints on political elites in the United States breed skepticism over grassroots campaigns’ ability to have much impact on this policy. Andrew Hammel advances this point in his study of successful efforts in Europe to repeal the death penalty and the lack of success in the US, where opportunities for repeal seem minimal. We challenge this view by offering the 2012 campaign to repeal Connecticut’s death penalty as a counterexample. Drawing on legislative, campaign, and media source documents, we provide a case study of this campaign. Particularly important in the Connecticut campaign was the participation of murder victims’ families and communities of color, who exercised what we term authentic power: the extent that a group harmed by a policy can get policymakers and other government officials to acknowledge this harm and, ultimately, to change the policy to the group’s benefit. Elites face limits in their ability to end the death penalty and enact criminal justice reforms, but the Connecticut example suggests a greater role than previously imagined for authentic power in overcoming these limits.
Research Interests:
The period known as the “War on Terror” has prompted a revival of interest in the idea of moral dilemmas and the problem of “dirty hands” in public life. Some contend that a policy of targeted killing of terrorist actors is (under... more
The period known as the “War on Terror” has prompted a revival of interest in the idea of moral dilemmas and the problem of “dirty hands” in public life. Some contend that a policy of targeted killing of terrorist actors is (under specified but not uncommon circumstances) an instance of a dirty-handed moral dilemma – morally required yet morally forbidden, the least evil choice available in the circumstances, but one that nevertheless leaves an indelible moral stain on the character of the person who makes the choice. In this chapter we argue that, while dirty hands situations do exist as a persistent problem of political life, it is generally a mistake to classify policies of target killing (such as the current US policy) as examples of dirty hands. Instead, we maintain, such policies, if justified at all, must ordinarily be justified under the more exacting standards of just war theory and its provisions for justified killing – in particular the requirement that (with limited and defined exceptions) non-combatants be immune from intentional violence. Understanding this distinction both clarifies the significance of dirty hands as a moral phenomenon and also forestalls a set of predictable and all-too-easy appropriations of the concept to domains it was never intended to address.
Research Interests:
Judith Shklar, David Runciman, and others argue against what they see as excessive criticism of political hypocrisy. Such arguments often assume that communicating in an authentic manner is an impossible political ideal. This article... more
Judith Shklar, David Runciman, and others argue against what they see as excessive criticism of political hypocrisy. Such arguments often assume that communicating in an authentic manner is an impossible political ideal. This article challenges the characterization of authenticity as an unrealistic ideal and makes the case that its value can be grounded in a certain political realism sensitive to the threats posed by representative democracy. First, by analyzing authenticity’s demands for political discourse, I show that authenticity has greater flexibility than many assume in accommodating practices common to politics, such as deception, concealment, and persuasion through rhetoric. Second, I argue that a concern for authenticity in political discourse represents a virtue, not a distraction, for representative democracy. Authenticity takes on heightened importance when the public seeks information on how representatives will act in contexts where the public is absent and unable to influence decisions. Furthermore, given the psychological mechanisms behind hypocrisy, public criticism is a sensible response for trying to limit political hypocrisy. From the perspective of democratic theory and psychology, the public has compelling reasons to value authenticity in political discourse.
Research Interests:
Reply to Gregory Claeys's review of Apocalypse without God.
Research Interests:
Book review of Luke William Hunt's The Police Identity Crisis.
Research Interests:
The Ethics of Policing takes a more expansive approach to examining the normative expectations for police in a democratic society. It features essays from an interdisciplinary group of leading scholars, including Sally Hadden, Joy James,... more
The Ethics of Policing takes a more expansive approach to examining the normative expectations for police in a democratic society. It features essays from an interdisciplinary group of leading scholars, including Sally Hadden, Joy James, Tracey Meares, Vesla Weaver, Michael Walzer, and Franklin Zimring. Some essays in the volume are on traditional topics in police ethics like use of force, while other essays push the boundaries of the field by examining policing’s links to slave patrols and the testimonies of Black and Brown Americans in communities subject to over-policing.
Research Interests: Criminal Justice, Philosophy, Political Philosophy, Ethics, Political Theory, and 12 moreRace and Racism, Political Science, Critical Race Theory, Race and Ethnicity, Professional Ethics, Police, Police and criminal justice ethics, Police and Policing, Criminology and Criminal Justice, Criminal Justice Ethics, Public Policy, and Black Lives Matter
On March 20, 2019, a State College officer shot and killed a Black man with schizophrenia, Osaze Osagie. His father had called police for help, concerned his 29-year-old son was suicidal. It was a stark reminder of how far even... more
On March 20, 2019, a State College officer shot and killed a Black man with schizophrenia, Osaze Osagie. His father had called police for help, concerned his 29-year-old son was suicidal. It was a stark reminder of how far even progressive communities fall short of the ideals they ostensibly champion. The loss of another Black life prompted little change in the year following the incident. Such inaction often plays out in local communities, resulting in the frustration and anger we’ve seen erupt at recent protests. In State College and elsewhere, three obstacles have stood in the way of reform and eroded trust: (1) an accountability vacuum for police, (2) justifying rather fixing police tactics, and (3) empty action.
Research Interests:
There is little doubt after the July 1 executive order that the president hopes to bolster the legitimacy of U.S. drone policy before he leaves office. But the new requirements may have a limited effect. Obama inherited a drone program... more
There is little doubt after the July 1 executive order that the president hopes to bolster the legitimacy of U.S. drone policy before he leaves office. But the new requirements may have a limited effect. Obama inherited a drone program that was secretive, expansive in scope and a risk to civilian lives. Eliminating these aspects of the program has proven difficult. Institutionalizing and normalizing one of the most controversial policies of the Bush administration ultimately may be Obama’s legacy on drones.
Research Interests:
Race has played a disturbing role in the death penalty’s application throughout its history in the United States. During slavery, discrimination was explicitly written in many states’ laws, with a number of capital offenses reserved... more
Race has played a disturbing role in the death penalty’s application throughout its history in the United States. During slavery, discrimination was explicitly written in many states’ laws, with a number of capital offenses reserved solely for black slaves. Racial bias continued during the Jim Crow era, in which black defendants often received little due process, as trials and executions sometimes both took place in a single day. Today, the race of the victim has a significant impact on who gets the death penalty, with the implication that black lives matter less.
Research Interests:
The conservative case against the death penalty consists of three principal arguments: the death penalty’s incompatibility with (1) limited government, (2) fiscal responsibility, and (3) promoting a culture of life. As evidence of the... more
The conservative case against the death penalty consists of three principal arguments: the death penalty’s incompatibility with (1) limited government, (2) fiscal responsibility, and (3) promoting a culture of life. As evidence of the death penalty’s brokenness has become harder to ignore, support for its repeal has grown across the political spectrum. If that trend continues and ending the death penalty increasingly becomes a bipartisan cause, its days almost certainly are numbered.
Research Interests:
This article explains the key factors behind the campaign that successfully repealed Connecticut's death penalty succeeded, and why we should expect more states in the US to also end capital punishment.
Research Interests:
Research Interests:
Research Interests:
Research Interests:
Research Interests:
Research Interests:
This is an edited collection of paper on the ethics of policing that Ben Jones and I edited. The volume came out of a conference we organized at Penn State University. The contributions are stellar and should be useful in helping us move... more
This is an edited collection of paper on the ethics of policing that Ben Jones and I edited. The volume came out of a conference we organized at Penn State University. The contributions are stellar and should be useful in helping us move the conversation on "law enforcement" in the US.
Research Interests:
This article identifies an argument in Hobbes’s writings often overlooked but relevant to current philosophical debates. Political philosophers tend to categorize his thought as representing consent or rescue theories of political... more
This article identifies an argument in Hobbes’s writings often overlooked but relevant to current philosophical debates. Political philosophers tend to categorize his thought as representing consent or rescue theories of political authority. Though these interpretations have textual support and are understandable, they leave out one of his most compelling arguments—what we call the lesser evil argument for political authority, expressed most explicitly in Chapter 20 of Leviathan. Hobbes frankly admits the state’s evils but appeals to the significant disparity between those evils and the greater evils outside the state as a basis for political authority. More than a passing observation, aspects of the lesser evil argument appear in each of his three major political works. In addition to outlining this argument, the article examines its significance both for Hobbes scholarship and recent philosophical debates on political authority.
