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What's New?

The Center for Western Civilization, Thought & Policy is now the Benson Center for the Study of Western Civilization

In June, the Center for Western Civilization, Thought & Policy was renamed the Bruce D. Benson Center for the Study of Western Civilization in recognition of the recently retired CU president, who throughout his tenure strongly supported diversity of perspectives on the CU campus. "Our goal is to promote the study of Western civilization and its traditions back to antiquity, all the way to modern times," says center director Robert Pasnau, "and thinking in particular about the ethical implications of those traditions for society today."  The center will continue to promote critical reflection on the traditions and political perspectives that characterize Western civilization. Its aim is to promote a lively and balanced conversation that fosters diversity of political, economic and philosophical perspectives on the ���񱦵� campus. 

2019-20 Benson Center theme is "American Identities"

What is America? What is it to be American?  Is there anything the people of this country, or this continent, or this hemisphere, have in common? The Benson Center will explore these questions through its 2019-20 theme, American Identities. 

2019-20 Visiting Scholar in Conservative Thought & Policy series: American National Character Project

With the aim of increasing intellectual diversity on campus, the Visiting Scholar in Conservative Thought & Policy invites guests throughout the academic year to give public lectures on campus. In keeping with the American Identities theme, this year's series  is the "American National Character Project."

The Founding generation recognized the importance of cultivating a national character, by which they meant the formation of “a people” dedicated to the principles of the American Revolution and the great experiment in self-government. Today, Americans are fragmented, disunited, and unclear about what, if anything, they hold in common. The American National Character Project seeks to explore and identify principles and purposes that Americans do or might in the future share, and to discover how to provide a way forward for republican self-governance in America. 

Inaugural Summer Institute extends Benson Center's mission

In June the Benson Center launched a pilot Summer Institute, which brought five scholars to Boulder for the month to conduct research and exchange ideas. Per center director Pasnau, "The Summer Institute is a way for the center to extend its mission beyond CU, beyond Boulder, and to try to pull in scholars from other places who are interested in what we are doing . . . . the genesis for the (pilot program) was a larger conversation about how the center can have a broader influence nationally. We want to be a leader in the sort of work we're doing." 

On the horizon - please watch for registration information                                                                                                                                                                            

• Sept. 17: New York Times Columnist Ross Douthat, cosponsored by the Aquinas Institute for Catholic Thought 
• Oct. 1: Robert Merry, nationally known political and governmental reporter, CEO, publisher and author
• Oct. 15: Jonathan Haidt, professor of Ethical Leadership at New York University's Stern School of Businesss and founder of the centrist Heterodox Academy
• Nov. 14:  Georgetown University Professor of Philosophy Jason Brennan and Rutgers University Professor of Philosophy Larry Temkin, "Capitalism: The Good, the Bad, the Ugly" Debate rescheduled from April 2019
• Dec. 1: Visiting Scholar Colleen Sheehan, Jane Austen's "Emma" film screening, tea and discussion, Boulder Public Library
• Dec. 4: University of Chicago president Robert Zimmer