Andrei Bespalov

Background

About Andrei Bespalov

In 2004 I earned a Candidate of Philosophical Sciences degree in social philosophy from Lomonosov Moscow State University (MSU), where I subsequently held teaching and administrative positions in the Faculty of Philosophy until 2015. Then, looking for a wider international experience in research and teaching, I took a fresh start as a PhD student in normative political theory at Pompeu Fabra University in Barcelona. My dissertation (2019) develops a principled public reason approach to the problem of religious exemptions from generally applicable laws. I have published the results of this work in the journals Res Publica, Jurisprudence, and the Oxford Journal of Law and Religion.Currently I hold a WIRL-COFUND research fellowship (EU Marie Skłodowska Curie COFUND programme) at the University of Warwick under the supervision of Prof Fabienne Peter. Also, as part of this fellowship, I spent the 2022 Hilary term as an Academic Visitor hosted by Prof Paul Billingham in the Department of Politics and International Relations at the University of Oxford.The aim of my research project titled Sceptical Liberalism: Maintaining Public Reason in the Age of Disagreement is to develop a minimalist version of political liberalism that would be even less morally and epistemically demanding than the standard Rawlsian one. My key idea is that political liberalism can provide a robust framework for resolving political controversies under the conditions of deep disagreement if it adopts a sceptical stance towards its own foundations. Political liberals should learn how to defend and realize liberal values and principles in politics without implying that all rational and reasonable persons would accept them as part of their moral, broadly philosophical, or even religious beliefs.My recent teaching has been focused on contemporary political philosophy. As a PhD student at Pompeu Fabra University I participated in the design and delivery of an undergraduate module Theories of Democracy and Justice that addressed major social and political challenges of the day, such as cultural diversity, mass migration, and populism.Earlier at MSU I developed and lead year-long modules aimed at familiarizing undergraduate students with the most important ideas and figures in the history of philosophy from Plato and Aristotle to Foucault and Derrida.