Each year, the Symposium and Forum devote their public program to one or two issues facing modern democracies. The public program — free and open to all — of a lecture series and a year-end, international conference. The events, many of which have been broadcast by C-Span, are now  archived on this website. Recent topics have included “Liberal Democracy and Religion,” “Biotechnology and Modern Democracy,” and “Jefferson and 'American Empire',” and “Beyond Radical Istam?”

To date, the Symposium and the Forum have sponsored almost two hundred lectures at Michigan State University and more than a dozen international conferences in such venues as Prague, Budapest, Lisbon, and Munich. Participants — drawn from among the world’s most prominent and accomplished academics, journalists, policy analysts, and novelists — deliver original essays on our annual theme.

The Nineteenth Annual Program (2007-2008)
of the Symposium on Science, Reason, and Modern Democracy
and the LeFrak Forum

This year's program will feature a lecture series on diverse themes and a conference on the United States Supreme Court.

A.  Lecture Series:

Stephen Biddle, Senior Fellow for Defense Policy, Council on Foreign Relations, “US Strategy in Iraq,” Wednesday, October 17, 8:00 pm, Lincoln Room, Kellogg Center.  Dr. Biddle has been a critic of the conduct of the war in Iraq.  His book, Military Power: Explaining Victory and Defeat in Modern Battle (2004), makes major contributions to political science, military history, social science methodology, and contemporary policy debates, and has had a significant effect on thinking about military policy.  It received a number of major awards.  Before joining the CFR, Dr. Biddle taught at the US Army War College.
 
Peter Feaver, Alexander F. Hehmeyer Professor of Political Science and Public Policy, Duke University, and Director, The Triangle Institute for Security Studies, “The ‘Surge’: the Politics of Wartime Strategy,” Thursday, January 24, 8:00 pm, Lincoln Room, Kellogg Center.  Professor Feaver is one of the architects of the “surge." For the past two years, he served as the Special Advisor for Strategic Planning and Institutional Reform on the National Security Council Staff at the White House.  He has written widely on American foreign policy, nuclear proliferation, civil-military relations, and US national security.  His books include Choosing Your Battles:  American-Military Relations and the Use of Force (2004), and Armed Servants: Agency, Oversight, and Civil-Military Relations (new edition, 2007).
 
Charles Butterworth, Professor of Government and Politics, University of Maryland, College Park, “Islamic Political Philosophy and Its Significance Today,” Tuesday, February 5, 8:00 pm, Big Ten Room C, Kellogg Center.  Professor Butterworth is a leading scholar of medieval Islamic political philosophy.  His publications include critical editions of most of the middle commentaries by Averroes on Aristotle's logic and translations of books and treatises by Averroes, Alfarabi, and Alrazi, as well as Maimonides.  Professor Butterworth is a graduate of Michigan State University.  His lecture is co-sponsored by The Muslim Studies Program and James Madison College.
 
David Blight, Class of 1954 Professor of American History, and Director, Gilder-Lehrman Center for the Study of Slavery, Resistance, and Abolition, Yale University, “Slaves No More: Newly Discovered Slave Narratives and the Legacies of Emancipation,” March 19, 8:00 pm, Big Ten Room C, Kellogg Center.  Professor Blight is one of the foremost authorities on the US Civil War and its legacies.  His book Race and Reunion: The Civil War in American Memory (2001) earned a number of awards, including the Frederick Douglass Prize, the Lincoln Prize, three awards from the Organization of American Historians, and the Bancroft Prize.  His newest book, A Slave No More: Two Men Who Escaped to Freedom, Including Their Narratives of Emancipation, will be published shortly.  Professor Blight is a graduate of Michigan State University.  His lecture is co-sponsored by James Madison College.

Clifford Orwin, Professor of Political Science, University of Toronto, “Is Compassion Good?” Wednesday, April 9, 8:00 pm, Lincoln Room, Kellogg Center.  Professor Orwin has written widely on ancient, modern, contemporary, and Jewish political thought.  He is also a regular commentator on public affairs (in columns in Canada's Globe and Mail and National Post).  He is the author of The Humanity of Thucydides (1994) and is completing a book on the theory and practice of compassion.
 
Each guest will lead an informal follow-up seminar on the morning after his lecture. 

B.  Conference: "The United States Supreme Court: Contested Constitutional Doctrines," March 27-29, MSU Union

Last year, the Symposium sponsored a conference on “The Idea of Constitutionalism” (held at MSU in January).  At that conference, we approached current political and intellectual controversies regarding the role of the U.S. Supreme Court as protector of our liberties and guardian of our constitutional design from some distance, considering the idea of constitutionalism in comparative, historical, and philosophical perspective.   

This year's conference will focus on the United States Supreme Court and examine a range of controversies regarding evolving constitutional doctrine: separation of powers and executive power, federalism, religion, property, equality, privacy and liberty.  It will bring together lawyers and judges; historians, philosophers, and social scientists; journalists and public intellectuals.

The keynote address will be delivered by Judge Michael McConnell, who serves on the United States Court of Appeals for the Tenth Circuit.  Judge McConnell is one of the nation's most prominent constitutional scholars and perhaps its leading student of the religious clauses of the First Amendment.  He is regularly mentioned as a potential nominee to the United States Supreme Court.  Judge McConnell taught at the University of Chicago Law School from 1985 until 1996 and now teaches at the University of Utah College of Law.  He is a graduate of Michigan State University's James Madison College and has received the MSU Distinguished Alumni Award from the MSU Alumni Association.

Major papers at the conference will be delivered by Robert Nagel, Rothgerber Professor of Constitutional Law at the University, Colorado School of Law; Patrick F. Philbin, Partner, Kirkland & Ellis (Washington, DC); Lawrence Sager, Dean of the University of Texas Law School and John Jeffers Research Chair in Law and Alice Jane Drysdale Sheffield Regents Chair; Reva Siegel, Deputy Dean, Yale Law School, and Nicholas Katzenbach Professor of Law and Professor of American Studies at Yale University; and Ilya Somin, Assistant Professor, George Mason University School of Law.  For additional details and the conference schedule, click on "Schedule of Events."

The lecture series and conference are supported, in part, by a challenge grant from the National Endowment for the Humanities.

We invite you to participate in the Symposium and the LeFrak Forum, either attending upcoming lectures at Michigan State University, or by visiting the Archives for past lectures. Go to the Schedule of Events for times and dates of this year's programs.