Odin Lysaker

Appointments

• Professor of Ethics, University of Agder (2016–).
• Associate Professor of Ethics, University of Agder (2011–2016).

Education

• PhD in Philosophy, University of Oslo (2011). My PhD thesis investigates Axel Honneth's recognition theory concerning human dignity and statelesssness within the discourse on international political theory and transnational migration. The thesis was published as a book (in Norwegian) titled The Politics of Dignity: Recognition of Bodily Injurability (Abstrakt Press, 2013).
• PhD Fellow, CULCOM (Cultural Complexity in the New Norway), University of Oslo (2006–2010).
• Associated PhD Fellow, The Ethics Program, University of Oslo (2006–2011).

Research Projects

• WAIT (Waiting for an Uncertain Future: The Temporalities of Irregular Migration (2017–2020); funded by the Research Council of Norway's SAMKUL program; led by Professor Christine M. Jacobsen, University of Bergen.
• Reason and Affect in Divided Societies: The Nordic Case (2017-2018); funded by NOS-HS (The Joint Committee for Nordic Research Councils in the Humanities and Social Sciences); led by Professor Lars Tønder, University of Copenhagen.
• NECORE (Negotiating Values: Collective Identities and Resilience in Post-Terror Norway) (2013–2017); funded by the Research Council of Norway's SAMKUL program, and led by Research Professor Henrik Syse, PRIO (Peace Research Institute Oslo)
• CULCOM (Cultural Complexity in the New Norway) (2006–2010); strategic and interdisciplinary research program funded by the University of Oslo; led by Professor Thomas Hylland Eriksen.

Research Interests

• Moral Philosophy - e.g., dignity; bodily integrity; vulnerability; existential preconditions.
• Political Philosophy - e.g., migration; human rights; deliberative democracy; civil free speech; active citizenship.
• Social Philosophy - e.g., recogniton; critical theory.
• Philosophy of nature - e.g., ecocentrism; ecological democracy.

Associated Researcher

• SUM (Centre for Development and the Environment), University of Oslo – the research group Culture, Ethics, and Sustainability.

Teaching

• Conflict and Reconciliation.
• Applied Ethics.
• Research Method and Theory of Science.
• Religion and Gender.
• Human Rights.

Research Stays

• Uppsala University, Department of Government, invited by Professor Sofia Näsström (2019).
• University of Oxford, Centre on Migration, Policy and Society (COMPAS), invited by Professor Bridget Anderson (2017).
• Goethe University, Frankfurt, Institute of Philosophy and Research Centre Normative Orders, invited by Professors Axel Honneth and Rainer Forst (2016).
• Humboldt University, Department of Philosophy, invited by Professor Rahel Jaeggi (2012).
• Goethe University, Frankfurt, Institute of Philosophy and Department of Political Science, invited by Professors Axel Honneth and Rainer Forst (2008–2009).

Leader of the Ethics and Philosophy Research Group. 

Selected Publications

Books

Re-Imagining Ecological Democracy: Caring for the Earth in the Anthropocene. London: Routledge, 2023.

Between Closeness and Evil: A Festschrift for Arne Johan Vetlesen (Lysaker ed.). Scandinavian Academic Press, 2020.

Recognition and Freedom: Axel Honneth's Political Thought (Lysaker co-ed. with Jonas Jakobsen). Brill, 2015.

Journal Articles

Bodily Felt Integrity: The Anarchic Core of Communication in Jürgen Habermas’s Democratic Thought, in: Distinktion: Journal of Social Theory, Vol. 22, No. 3, pp. 1-22, 2021.

Miracles in Dark Times: Hannah Arendt and Refugees as 'Vanguard' (with Cindy Horst), in: Journal of Refugee Studies, Vol. 34, No. 1, pp. 67–84, 2021.

Ecological Sensibility: Recovering Axel Honneth’s Philosophy of Nature in the Age of Climate Crisis, in: Critical Horizons: A Journal of Philosophy and Social Theory, Vol. 21, No. 1, pp. 205–221, 2020.

Institutional Agonism: Axel Honneth's Radical Democracy, in: Critical Horizon: A Journal of Philosophy and Social Theory, Vol. 18, No. 1, pp. 1–19, 2017.

The Dignity in Free Speech: Civility Norms in Post-Terror Societies (with Henrik Syse), in: Nordic Journal of Human Rights, Vol. 34, No. 2, pp. 104–123, 2016.

Book Chapters

Transnational Struggle for Recognition: Axel Honneth on the Embodied Dignity of Stateless Persons. In: Schweiger, Gottfried (ed.): Migration, Recognition, and Critical Theory. Dodrecht: Springer Verlag, 2021.

Dignity in Natality: Hannah Arendt on Human Rights in Dark Times. In Jakob Lothe (ed.): Research and Human Rights. Novus Press, 2020.

Ecological Love: Reflections on Morality's Existential Preconditions. In: Odin Lysaker (ed.): Between Closeness and Evil: A Festschrift for Arne Johan Vetlesen. Scandinavian Academic Press, 2020.

Nowhere Home: The Waiting of Vulnerable Child Refugees, in: Margareta Dancus, Maria Karlsson, and Mats Hyvönen (eds.) Vulnerability in Scandinavian Art and Culture. Palgrave Macmillan, 2020.

Democratic Disagreement and Embodied Dignity: The Moral Grammar of Political Conflicts, in: Lysaker, Odin and Jonas Jakobsen (eds.): Recognition and Freedom: Axel Honneth's Political Thought. Brill, 2015.