William Sweet
Encyclopedia
William Sweet is a Canadian
philosopher, and a Past-President of the Canadian Philosophical Association. He is currently Professor of Philosophy and Director of the Centre for Philosophy, Theology, and Cultural Traditions at St Francis Xavier University. Sweet is also a member of the Faculty of Graduate and Postdoctoral Studies at the University of Ottawa
, and serves as an adjunct professor in the graduate programmes of Saint Paul University
and of the Collège dominicain de philosophie et de théologie in Ottawa, Canada. Sweet was Professor of Philosophy and Professor of Religious Studies at St Thomas University
in Fredericton, New Brunswick, where he served as the Vice President (Academic) from 2007 to 2008. He has also been a Visiting Professor at the John Paul II Catholic University of Lublin
, Poland, Soochow University
, Taipei, and the Dharmaram Vidya Kshetram
and the University of Pune
, India.
Sweet studied political science
, theology
, and philosophy in Canada, France, and Germany. He completed a DEA in political science at the Sorbonne
at the Université de Paris (with Luc Ferry
), a PhD in philosophy at the University of Ottawa, and a D.Ph. at the Université Saint-Paul. He also studied at Carleton University
, the University of Manitoba
, the Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin, and the Centre Sèvres
, (Faculté de Théologie de la Compagnie de Jésus, Paris).
Sweet specializes in political philosophy
(particularly on issues of human rights
); the philosophy of religion (e.g., the influence of science and technology on religion and, broadly, epistemology of religion); the relation of culture and tradition to philosophical thinking (particularly, comparative Asian and Western philosophy); late 19th and early 20th century Anglo-American Philosophy (particularly, the origins of analytic philosophy and British Idealism); ethical theories and applied ethics
(especially, cross-cultural ethics); and the philosophy of Jacques Maritain
.
. Recent research focuses on philosophical debates in the 20th century in South Africa
and India
, and the challenges of the migration of philosophical texts and traditions across cultures.
The focus of several of Sweet’s articles and books in political philosophy
is on the theme of rights and obligations. Much of this has been historical – providing substantial and novel reassessments of British idealists such as Bernard Bosanquet
but also of Maritain (who, Sweet argues, converge on a number of significant points). Sweet’s view is that these traditions provide a basis for a liberal, but non-individualistic, political philosophy. He gives a brief account of a positive theory of idealist ethics in his Introductory essay to his edited volume on The Moral, Social, and Political Philosophy of the British Idealists (2009), and he defends a broadly Maritainian view of dignity and human rights in a number of recent essays.
Sweet’s contributions to the philosophy of religion are developed over two single authored, one co-authored, and several edited books. His focus is on the epistemology of religion and the nature of religious belief. Sweet argues that much of the debate in the Anglo-American traditions concerning the relation of faith and reason is based on assumptions concerning the meaning and truth of religious beliefs – assumptions which he traces to the early 17th century. Sweet argues that these accounts misrepresent or misunderstand what religious belief is, and that a more accurate account of religious belief (which requires recognizing both the descriptive and expressive character of religious beliefs), and a broadly coherentist theory of truth can be used to address a number of contemporary issues in the philosophy of religion, such as the relation of religion and science.
Sweet travels extensively, and regularly lectures or teaches in East Asia, India, and Western Europe. He has been a major contributor to the international programmes of the Council for Research and Values in Philosophy and of the World Union of Catholic Philosophical Associations and the Istituto Internazionale Jacques Maritain (of which he is currently President).
He is currently the Editor of Philosophy, Culture, and Traditions and an Editor of Collingwood and British Idealism Studies. He has also been Editor of Etudes maritainiennes / Maritain Studies (1994–2006) and Bradley Studies (2005).
His work has been published in Castilian, Chinese
, English
, French
, Gallego
, German
, Italian, Persian
, Polish
, and Vietnamese.
The Moral, Social and Political Philosophy of the British Idealists (Imprint Academic 2009)
Rethinking the Role of Philosophy in the Global Age (ed., with Pham Van Duc) (2009)
The Dialogue of Cultural Traditions (ed., with Tomonobu Imamichi, G.F. McLean, et alii) (2008)
Religion and the Challenges of Science (ed., with Richard Feist) (2007)
Bernard Bosanquet and the Legacy of British Idealism (2007)
Edition of the Works of Arthur Ritchie Lord (with Errol E. Harris), 3 vols. (with introductions and critical biographies) (2006)
Philosophy of Religion [Vol. 8, Proceedings of the XXI World Congress of Philosophy, 2003] (2006)
Approaches to Metaphysics (2004)
Edition of Early Responses to British Idealism, 3 vols. (2004) [ed. with Carol A. Keene and C. Tyler]
The Philosophy of History: a re-examination (2004)
"To the Mountain": essays in honour of Professor George F. McLean , [ed. with Hu Yeping]
Husserl and Stein (2003) [ed. with Richard Feist]
Religion, Science, and Non-Science (2003)
Religious Belief: The Contemporary Debate (2003)
Philosophical Theory and the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (2003)
Edition of Bernard Bosanquet: Essays in Philosophy and Social Policy, (1883–1922), 3 vols. (with introductions and critical bibliographies) (2003)
Philosophy, Culture and Pluralism (2002)
Idealism, Metaphysics, and Community (2001)
British Idealism and Aesthetics (2001)
Edition of Bernard Bosanquet's The Philosophical Theory of the State and Related Essays (2001) [ed., with Gerald F. Gaus]
Edition of Natural Law: reflections on theory and practice, by Jacques Maritain (2001; corrected edition, 2003)
The Bases of Ethics (2000)
The Collected Works of Bernard Bosanquet, 20 vols. (with introductions and critical bibliographies) (1999)
Idealism and Rights: The Social Ontology of Human Rights in the Political Thought of Bernard Bosanquet (1997; paperback 2005).
Canada
Canada is a North American country consisting of ten provinces and three territories. Located in the northern part of the continent, it extends from the Atlantic Ocean in the east to the Pacific Ocean in the west, and northward into the Arctic Ocean...
philosopher, and a Past-President of the Canadian Philosophical Association. He is currently Professor of Philosophy and Director of the Centre for Philosophy, Theology, and Cultural Traditions at St Francis Xavier University. Sweet is also a member of the Faculty of Graduate and Postdoctoral Studies at the University of Ottawa
University of Ottawa
The University of Ottawa is a bilingual, research-intensive, non-denominational, international university in Ottawa, Ontario. It is one of the oldest universities in Canada. It was originally established as the College of Bytown in 1848 by the Missionary Oblates of Mary Immaculate...
, and serves as an adjunct professor in the graduate programmes of Saint Paul University
Saint Paul University
Saint Paul University is a Catholic Pontifical university federated with the University of Ottawa. It is located on Main Street in Ottawa, Ontario, Canada, and has been entrusted for more than a century to the Congregation of the Missionary Oblates of Mary Immaculate...
and of the Collège dominicain de philosophie et de théologie in Ottawa, Canada. Sweet was Professor of Philosophy and Professor of Religious Studies at St Thomas University
St. Thomas University (New Brunswick)
St. Thomas University is jointly a public and Roman Catholic liberal arts university located in Fredericton, New Brunswick, Canada. It offers degrees exclusively at the undergraduate level for approximately 3,000 students in the liberal arts, humanities, journalism, education, and social work....
in Fredericton, New Brunswick, where he served as the Vice President (Academic) from 2007 to 2008. He has also been a Visiting Professor at the John Paul II Catholic University of Lublin
John Paul II Catholic University of Lublin
John Paul II Catholic University of Lublin is located in Lublin, Poland. Presently it has an enrollment of over 19,000 students...
, Poland, Soochow University
Soochow University
Soochow University refers to two distinct universities: one located in Suzhou, Jiangsu, People's Republic of China, and the other in Taipei, Taiwan . Though both universities share the same English name, they are named differently in Chinese...
, Taipei, and the Dharmaram Vidya Kshetram
Dharmaram Vidya Kshetram
Dharmaram Vidya Kshetram is an ecclesiastical Institution of Higher Learning established by the congregation for Catholic Education, Rome, as an independent institute empowered to grant degrees, including Doctorate in Philosophy and Theology. Located in Bengaluru, it is a pontifical with...
and the University of Pune
University of Pune
The University of Pune , is a university located in northwestern Pune, India. It was founded in 1949. Spread over a campus, the university is home to 46 academic departments...
, India.
Sweet studied political science
Political science
Political Science is a social science discipline concerned with the study of the state, government and politics. Aristotle defined it as the study of the state. It deals extensively with the theory and practice of politics, and the analysis of political systems and political behavior...
, theology
Theology
Theology is the systematic and rational study of religion and its influences and of the nature of religious truths, or the learned profession acquired by completing specialized training in religious studies, usually at a university or school of divinity or seminary.-Definition:Augustine of Hippo...
, and philosophy in Canada, France, and Germany. He completed a DEA in political science at the Sorbonne
Sorbonne
The Sorbonne is an edifice of the Latin Quarter, in Paris, France, which has been the historical house of the former University of Paris...
at the Université de Paris (with Luc Ferry
Luc Ferry
Luc Ferry is a French philosopher and a notable proponent of Secular Humanism. He is a former member of the Saint-Simon Foundation think-tank....
), a PhD in philosophy at the University of Ottawa, and a D.Ph. at the Université Saint-Paul. He also studied at Carleton University
Carleton University
Carleton University is a comprehensive university located in the capital of Canada, Ottawa, Ontario. The enabling legislation is The Carleton University Act, 1952, S.O. 1952. Founded as a small college in 1942, Carleton now offers over 65 programs in a diverse range of disciplines. Carleton has...
, the University of Manitoba
University of Manitoba
The University of Manitoba , in Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada, is the largest university in the province of Manitoba. It is Manitoba's most comprehensive and only research-intensive post-secondary educational institution. It was founded in 1877, making it Western Canada’s first university. It placed...
, the Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin, and the Centre Sèvres
Centre Sèvres
The Centre Sèvres - Facultés jésuites de Paris is a university-level institution established in 1974 in Paris that focuses on the study of theology and philosophy...
, (Faculté de Théologie de la Compagnie de Jésus, Paris).
Sweet specializes in political philosophy
Political philosophy
Political philosophy is the study of such topics as liberty, justice, property, rights, law, and the enforcement of a legal code by authority: what they are, why they are needed, what, if anything, makes a government legitimate, what rights and freedoms it should protect and why, what form it...
(particularly on issues of human rights
Human rights
Human rights are "commonly understood as inalienable fundamental rights to which a person is inherently entitled simply because she or he is a human being." Human rights are thus conceived as universal and egalitarian . These rights may exist as natural rights or as legal rights, in both national...
); the philosophy of religion (e.g., the influence of science and technology on religion and, broadly, epistemology of religion); the relation of culture and tradition to philosophical thinking (particularly, comparative Asian and Western philosophy); late 19th and early 20th century Anglo-American Philosophy (particularly, the origins of analytic philosophy and British Idealism); ethical theories and applied ethics
Ethics
Ethics, also known as moral philosophy, is a branch of philosophy that addresses questions about morality—that is, concepts such as good and evil, right and wrong, virtue and vice, justice and crime, etc.Major branches of ethics include:...
(especially, cross-cultural ethics); and the philosophy of Jacques Maritain
Jacques Maritain
Jacques Maritain was a French Catholic philosopher. Raised as a Protestant, he converted to Catholicism in 1906. An author of more than 60 books, he helped to revive St. Thomas Aquinas for modern times and is a prominent drafter of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights...
.
Contributions
Much of Sweet’s work is in the history of modern philosophy, although he uses this as a resource and a vehicle to address contemporary issues in ethical theory and applied ethics, political philosophy, and the philosophy of religion. His early essays as well as his first book focused on the British idealist philosophers of the late 19th and early 20th century, but he has published a number of papers and translations on the personalist tradition in French philosophy, particularly that of Jacques MaritainJacques Maritain
Jacques Maritain was a French Catholic philosopher. Raised as a Protestant, he converted to Catholicism in 1906. An author of more than 60 books, he helped to revive St. Thomas Aquinas for modern times and is a prominent drafter of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights...
. Recent research focuses on philosophical debates in the 20th century in South Africa
South Africa
The Republic of South Africa is a country in southern Africa. Located at the southern tip of Africa, it is divided into nine provinces, with of coastline on the Atlantic and Indian oceans...
and India
India
India , officially the Republic of India , is a country in South Asia. It is the seventh-largest country by geographical area, the second-most populous country with over 1.2 billion people, and the most populous democracy in the world...
, and the challenges of the migration of philosophical texts and traditions across cultures.
The focus of several of Sweet’s articles and books in political philosophy
Political philosophy
Political philosophy is the study of such topics as liberty, justice, property, rights, law, and the enforcement of a legal code by authority: what they are, why they are needed, what, if anything, makes a government legitimate, what rights and freedoms it should protect and why, what form it...
is on the theme of rights and obligations. Much of this has been historical – providing substantial and novel reassessments of British idealists such as Bernard Bosanquet
Bernard Bosanquet
Bernard Bosanquet may refer to:* Bernard Bosanquet , English cricketer credited with inventing the googly* Bernard Bosanquet , English philosopher...
but also of Maritain (who, Sweet argues, converge on a number of significant points). Sweet’s view is that these traditions provide a basis for a liberal, but non-individualistic, political philosophy. He gives a brief account of a positive theory of idealist ethics in his Introductory essay to his edited volume on The Moral, Social, and Political Philosophy of the British Idealists (2009), and he defends a broadly Maritainian view of dignity and human rights in a number of recent essays.
Sweet’s contributions to the philosophy of religion are developed over two single authored, one co-authored, and several edited books. His focus is on the epistemology of religion and the nature of religious belief. Sweet argues that much of the debate in the Anglo-American traditions concerning the relation of faith and reason is based on assumptions concerning the meaning and truth of religious beliefs – assumptions which he traces to the early 17th century. Sweet argues that these accounts misrepresent or misunderstand what religious belief is, and that a more accurate account of religious belief (which requires recognizing both the descriptive and expressive character of religious beliefs), and a broadly coherentist theory of truth can be used to address a number of contemporary issues in the philosophy of religion, such as the relation of religion and science.
Sweet travels extensively, and regularly lectures or teaches in East Asia, India, and Western Europe. He has been a major contributor to the international programmes of the Council for Research and Values in Philosophy and of the World Union of Catholic Philosophical Associations and the Istituto Internazionale Jacques Maritain (of which he is currently President).
He is currently the Editor of Philosophy, Culture, and Traditions and an Editor of Collingwood and British Idealism Studies. He has also been Editor of Etudes maritainiennes / Maritain Studies (1994–2006) and Bradley Studies (2005).
His work has been published in Castilian, Chinese
Chinese language
The Chinese language is a language or language family consisting of varieties which are mutually intelligible to varying degrees. Originally the indigenous languages spoken by the Han Chinese in China, it forms one of the branches of Sino-Tibetan family of languages...
, English
English language
English is a West Germanic language that arose in the Anglo-Saxon kingdoms of England and spread into what was to become south-east Scotland under the influence of the Anglian medieval kingdom of Northumbria...
, French
French language
French is a Romance language spoken as a first language in France, the Romandy region in Switzerland, Wallonia and Brussels in Belgium, Monaco, the regions of Quebec and Acadia in Canada, and by various communities elsewhere. Second-language speakers of French are distributed throughout many parts...
, Gallego
Galician language
Galician is a language of the Western Ibero-Romance branch, spoken in Galicia, an autonomous community located in northwestern Spain, where it is co-official with Castilian Spanish, as well as in border zones of the neighbouring territories of Asturias and Castile and León.Modern Galician and...
, German
German language
German is a West Germanic language, related to and classified alongside English and Dutch. With an estimated 90 – 98 million native speakers, German is one of the world's major languages and is the most widely-spoken first language in the European Union....
, Italian, Persian
Persian language
Persian is an Iranian language within the Indo-Iranian branch of the Indo-European languages. It is primarily spoken in Iran, Afghanistan, Tajikistan and countries which historically came under Persian influence...
, Polish
Polish language
Polish is a language of the Lechitic subgroup of West Slavic languages, used throughout Poland and by Polish minorities in other countries...
, and Vietnamese.
Major publications
Biographical Encyclopedia of British Idealism (Continuum 2010)The Moral, Social and Political Philosophy of the British Idealists (Imprint Academic 2009)
Rethinking the Role of Philosophy in the Global Age (ed., with Pham Van Duc) (2009)
The Dialogue of Cultural Traditions (ed., with Tomonobu Imamichi, G.F. McLean, et alii) (2008)
Religion and the Challenges of Science (ed., with Richard Feist) (2007)
Bernard Bosanquet and the Legacy of British Idealism (2007)
Edition of the Works of Arthur Ritchie Lord (with Errol E. Harris), 3 vols. (with introductions and critical biographies) (2006)
Philosophy of Religion [Vol. 8, Proceedings of the XXI World Congress of Philosophy, 2003] (2006)
Approaches to Metaphysics (2004)
Edition of Early Responses to British Idealism, 3 vols. (2004) [ed. with Carol A. Keene and C. Tyler]
The Philosophy of History: a re-examination (2004)
"To the Mountain": essays in honour of Professor George F. McLean , [ed. with Hu Yeping]
Husserl and Stein (2003) [ed. with Richard Feist]
Religion, Science, and Non-Science (2003)
Religious Belief: The Contemporary Debate (2003)
Philosophical Theory and the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (2003)
Edition of Bernard Bosanquet: Essays in Philosophy and Social Policy, (1883–1922), 3 vols. (with introductions and critical bibliographies) (2003)
Philosophy, Culture and Pluralism (2002)
Idealism, Metaphysics, and Community (2001)
British Idealism and Aesthetics (2001)
Edition of Bernard Bosanquet's The Philosophical Theory of the State and Related Essays (2001) [ed., with Gerald F. Gaus]
Edition of Natural Law: reflections on theory and practice, by Jacques Maritain (2001; corrected edition, 2003)
The Bases of Ethics (2000)
The Collected Works of Bernard Bosanquet, 20 vols. (with introductions and critical bibliographies) (1999)
Idealism and Rights: The Social Ontology of Human Rights in the Political Thought of Bernard Bosanquet (1997; paperback 2005).