Stephen Bronner

Early life and education

Born in New York City, New York, United States on 19 August 1949, Bronner earned a Bachelor of Arts (B.A.) at City College of New York, spent a year at the Universität Tübingen in Germany on a Fulbright-Hays Fellowship in 1973, and completed his Master of Arts (M.A.) and Doctor of Philosophy (Ph.D.) in Political Science from the University of California, Berkeley in 1976.

Career

Bronner has been employed at Rutgers University since 1976, and has held visiting professor positions at the New School for Social Research (1989) the Universität Leipzig (1998).

Bronner is Director of Global Relations at the Center for the Study of Genocide and Human Rights at Rutgers University, and the Executive Chair of US Academics for Peace and an advisor to Conscience International. His activities in civic diplomacy led him to audiences with presidents and high ranking political dignitaries in Iran, Iraq, Palestine, Syria, Sudan, Darfur, Ukraine, and Russia. Some of these experiences are discussed in his books dealing with the internal politics of these nations in Blood in the Sand (2005), Peace out of Reach (2007), and The Bitter Taste of Hope (2017). Invitations to speak at universities and conferences all over the United States, Japan, China and South Africa have been numerous.

Bronner is Senior Editor of Logos and on the editorial board of other journals. His various works include studies of contemporary political theory, political history, and cultural politics.

Theoretical contributions

Influenced by critical theory, existentialism, and liberal socialism, Bronner is best known for his reinterpretation of tradition and a host of concepts like the class ideal and the cosmopolitan sensibility. He is perhaps the foremost contemporary proponent of developing the linkage of political theory with practical and progressive political concerns. His work is discussed in Rational Radicalism and Political Theory: Essays in Honor of Stephen Eric Bronner, ed. by Michael J. Thompson (Lanham: Lexington Books, 2010).

Awards and honors

Bronner was the recipient of the MEPeace Award by the Network for Middle Eastern Politics in 2011. Along with various teaching awards, he received the Michael A. Harrington Prize for Moments of Decision (1991) and Honorable Mention for the David Easton Prize, which honored the best work of political theory of the last five years, for Reclaiming the Enlightenment. Bronner’ received the Charles McCoy Lifetime Achievement Prize from the American Political Science Association in 2005.