Fabienne Peter

I am a Professor of Philosophy at the University of Warwick, specialising in moral and political philosophy and in social epistemology, including political epistemology. I served as Head of Department from 2017 to 2020, and I am currently an Academic Director in the University's Research Executive, responsible for interdisciplinary research and research communications.

Before coming to Warwick, I was a postdoc at Harvard University and then an assistant professor at the University of Basel. I have held visiting positions at the Research School of Social Sciences at ANU and the Murphy Institute at Tulane University.

I am an associate editor of the Journal of Moral Philosophy. I am also a past editor of Economics and Philosophy  and a past associate editor of the Journal of Applied Philosophy. In 2024/25, I am President of the Aristotelian Society.

Personal webpage: fabiennepeter.org

Recent Publications

Book

• The Grounds of Political Legitimacy. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2023.

Papers

• 'Relational Moral Demands.' Proceedings of the Aristotelian Society 125(1): 1–22, 2025 (draft paper).
• 'Runaway Reasons.' In Russ Shafer-Landau (ed) Oxford Studies in Metaethics, Vol 20, pp. 245 - 268, 2025 (penultimate version).
• 'Moral Affordances and the Demands of Fittingness.' Philosophical Psychology 37(7): 1948-1970, 2023.
• 'Political Legitimacy and the News Media: Four Normative Models of the Political Role of the News Media, with Jonathan Heawood. In Carl Fox and Joe Saunders (eds.) The Routledge Handbook of Philosophy and Media Ethics. New York: Routledge, 2023, pp. 83 - 95.

Publication Lists

• Full list of publications
• Google Scholar pageLink opens in a new window
• PhilPapers profileLink opens in a new window
• Academia pageLink opens in a new window

Impact Project

Building on my research in political philosophy on political legitimacy, democracy, and well-ordered political debate, I am involved in an impact-focused project on co-creational news media -- a model for the news media that aims to combine truth-seeking with enhanced public participation.

Teaching

• Introduction to Philosophy
• Ethics
• Contemporary Political Philosophy
• Moral Epistemology
• Philosophy of Social Science
• Philosophy and Economics (with Peter Hammond)
• Topics in Moral and Political Philosophy (MA module)
• Democratic Legitimacy and Justification (MA module, with Matthew Clayton)

Recent Public Writing, Interviews, and Podcasts

• Conversation with Toby Buckle on The Political Philosophy Podcast (November 2024)
• Conversation with Jeffrey Church on The Political Theory Review (November 2024)

• The Philosopher interview and podcast on "The Grounds of Political Legitimacy", in conversation with Alfred Moore (September 2024)

• Contributions to BBC Radio 4 programme run by Rory Stewart on The Long History of Ignorance, (Episodes 4 and 5, July 2024)
• BBC In our Time, episode on Rawls' Theory of Justice (January 2023)
• Article in IAI news on "The Blurred Line between Facts and Value" (November 2022)
• Interview by Daniele Lorenzini and Federico Testa on Biopolitics and Democracy (April 2022)
• Article in The New Statesman on “Can Authoritarianism Ever be Justified?" (August 2021)
• Blog post for Warwick Knowledge Centre on “The Experts are Back – But How Much Political Power Should Experts Have?Link opens in a new window” (March 2020)

Contact

E-mail: f.peter@warwick.ac.uk

Office: Social Sciences Building, S2.57

Personal webpage: https://www.fabiennepeter.org/