Hardin, Russell 1940-

PERSONAL:

Born 1940. Education: University of Texas, B.A. (mathematics; highest honors), B.S. (high honors), both 1962; Oxford University, B.A. (mathematics), 1964; Massachusetts Institute for Technology, Ph.D., 1971.

ADDRESSES:

Office—19 W. 4th Street, New York, NY, 10012. E-mail—russell.hardin@nyu.edu; russell.hardin@gmail.com.

CAREER:

Political scientist, educator, writer, and editor. University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, assistant professor of political science and public policy analysis, 1972-1976; University of Maryland, College Park, associate professor of government and politics, 1976-1981; University of Chicago, Chicago, IL, visiting associate professor, 1979-1981, associate professor, 1981-1983, professor of political science, philosophy, and public policy, 1983-1992, Mellon Foundation professor, 1987-1992, professor of political science and philosophy, 1992-1993, chair of the Committee on Public Policy Studies, 1983-1987; New York University, New York, NY, professor of politics, 1993—, chair, 1993-1998; Stanford University, Palo Alto, CA, visiting professor, 1999-2000, professor of political science, 2001-2003. Also Research School of the Social Sciences, Australian National University, Canberra, visiting fellow, 1987, 1990; Rockefeller Center, Bellagio, Italy, scholar-in-residence, 1988, 1996; Northwestern University School of Law, Chicago, IL, Jack N. Pritzker distinguished visiting professor, 1990; Russell Sage Foundation, New York, NY, visiting scholar, 1992-1993; Centre de Recherche en Epistémologie Appliquée (CREA), Ecole Polytechnique, Paris, France, visiting scholar, 1994; Fellow, Center for Advanced Study in Behavioral Sciences, Palo Alto, fellow, 1996-97; and University of Virginia School of Law, Charlottesville, John M. Olin distinguished visiting professor, 1998. Has served on numerous advisory boards.

MEMBER:

American Association for the Advancement of Science (fellow), American Academy of Arts and Sciences (fellow), American Economic Association, American Philosophical Association, American Political Science Association, American Society for Political and Legal Philosophy, Public Choice Society, Phi Beta Kappa.

AWARDS, HONORS:

Honorary Woodrow Wilson fellow, 1962; Research Institute on Communist Affairs junior fellow, Columbia University, 1971-1972; Hoover Institution national fellow, Stanford University, 1975-1976; Earhart fellow, 1983; Guggenheim Fellow, 1996-1997; Rhodes Scholar.

WRITINGS:

(Editor, with Brian Barry) Rational Man and Irrational Society? An Introduction and Sourcebook, Sage Publications (Beverly Hills, CA), 1982.

Collective Action, Resources for the Future/Johns Hopkins University Press (Baltimore, MD), 1982.

(Editor, with others) Nuclear Deterrence: Ethics and Strategy, University of Chicago Press (Chicago, IL), 1985.

Morality within the Limits of Reason, University of Chicago Press (Chicago, IL), 1988.

One for All: The Logic of Group Conflict, Princeton University Press (Princeton, NJ), 1995.

(Editor, with Ian Shapiro) Political Order, New York University Press (New York, NY), 1996.

Liberalism, Constitutionalism, and Democracy, Oxford University Press (New York, NY), 1999.

Trust and Trustworthiness, Russell Sage Foundation (New York, NY), 2002.

Indeterminacy and Society, Princeton University Press (Princeton, NJ), 2003.

(Editor) Distrust, Russell Sage Foundation (New York, NY), 2004.

(With Karen S. Cook and Margaret Levi), Cooperation without Trust?, Russell Sage Foundation (New York, NY), 2005.

David Hume: Moral and Political Theorist, Oxford University Press (New York, NY), 2007.

Dmitri Esterhaats: A Novel, Wings Press (San Antonio, TX), 2007.

(With Ingrid Creppell and Stephen Macedo) Toleration on Trial, Lexington Books (Lanham, MD), 2008.

Contributor to professional journals and periodicals. Also member of editorial advisory board for Ethics and International Affairs, 1986-2000, and Northwestern Law Review, 1998—; associate editor for Social Justice Research, 1986-95, Rationality and Society, 1992-95 (also member of editorial board, 1995—), consulting editor for Encyclopedia of Ethics, edited by Lawrence and Charlotte Becker, Garland Publishing, 1987-90; editor of Ethics: An International Journal of Social, Political and Legal Philosophy, 1982-90 (also associate editor and book review editor, 1979-82 and associate editor, 1990-92).

SIDELIGHTS:

Russell Hardin is a political scientist whose areas of interest include rational choice, collective action, morality behind the law, and moral and political philosophy. He is also the author and editor of books focusing primarily on these areas of interest. The author has written several books focusing on moral issues and the idea of trust within the social and political arenas. For example, in Morality within the Limits of Reason, Hardin presents a reconstruction of utilitarianism (a doctrine of ethics which states that an action's moral worth is based only on its contribution to the overall welfare of most people). The author's reconstruction focuses on the practical constraints involved in ethical choice, principally that information can be inadequate, and the understanding of cause and effect can be limited.

Often the author presents viewpoints in his books that are counter to popularly held beliefs. One example appears in his 1995 book One for All: The Logic of Group Conflict. In this book, Hardin challenges many ideas of why individuals engage in collective conflict. Writing in One for All, the author notes that the book "is an effort to understand the motivations of those who act on behalf of groups and to understand how they come to identify with the groups for which they act." Lewis Coser wrote in the Political Science Quarterly: "This volume … is at one level an attempt to apply rational choice theory to the area of group conflicts, and a rebuttal of the pretension of currently fashionable communitarian theory models of desirable forms of collective behavior."

Examining group action in its most destructive forms, the author argues that group violence is not primarily due to irrationality, primordial instinct, or complex psychology. Rather, the author uses examples such as Mafia vendettas and ethnic violence to show how group violence often results from the exploitation of self-interest associated with the underpinnings of group identification and collective violence. To support his theory, the author examines conflicts between groups such as Serbs and Croats, Hutu and Tutsi, and even the Northern Irish Catholics and Protestants—all examples of how danger arises when individual and group interests merge. The author argues that, in these examples, groups have been governed by movements that managed to reflect their members' personal interests, mainly by striving for political and economic advances at the expense of other groups and by closing themselves off from society at large. In the end, Hardin argues, the group violence often results from a rational choice, and concludes that a better and safer world can be formed by designing social institutions to facilitate individual efforts to achieve personal goals rather than focusing on the ethnic and political makeup of various societies.

"The book is not a historical work intended to describe specific ethnic conflicts, although it presents many details; rather, it is primarily an attempt to explain those conflicts," wrote Karl-Dieter Opp in the Independent Review. "For this purpose, Hardin applies the Theory of Rational Action, a theory with a long tradi- tion in the social sciences. Notwithstanding the book's explicit theoretical perspective, it is accessible to a general reader with some social science knowledge, and it is enjoyable to read—something one can say of only a few social science books." To make the book more accessible to the general reader, the author begins by looking at the psychology and propensity for violence in individuals and groups. He then examines the basis of group power and its influence on individuals. Hardin also explores the psychology of group identification and the norms of exclusion, as well as universalistic norms that bind people into groups.

Noting that the author "has magisterially ‘deconstructed’ an elaborate edifice of practical and theoretical notions," Growth and Change contributor Ulf Zimmermann went on, in his review of One for All, to write: "His mere 230 pages are absolutely exuberant with erudition, luminous with insight, and graced with not a little wit." Writing in the American Political Science Review, Brian Barry noted: "In spite of its often somber subject-matter, the book is a pleasure to read—lucid, sharp, and quirky. Who else would illustrate the norm of honor by retelling the preposterously convoluted plot of Verdi's opera Ernani?"

Cooperation without Trust?, written with Karen S. Cook and Margaret Levi, presents the argument that society can function well in the absence of trust. This theory presented by the authors goes against the thinking of some social theorists, who believe that trust is necessary for the smooth functioning of a democratic society. Although the authors do not argue that trust has no value in most relationships, they do present a case that beneficial cooperation between parties can be achieved without it. Through a wide range of examples, the authors show how cooperation is achieved without an inherent basic trust between parties. They also show how lack of trust can sometimes be beneficial. For example, they point to a person in a small community deciding not to breech agreements because of concern about his or her reputation. They also examine how state enforcement of contracts ensures that business partners do not need to trust one another in order to trade. Overall, the authors argue that lack of trust actually motivates people to reduce risks and establish institutions that promote cooperation. As an example, they point to the distrust that America's founding fathers had for government. As a result, the founding fathers were prompted to establish a system in which leaders are highly accountable to their constituents and in which numerous checks and balances were designed to keep government officials' behavior in check utilizing the public will.

The authors begin their discussion with a look at the significance of trust and the meaning of trustworthiness. They then examine the relationship between trust and power. After exploring the many ramifications of distrust, both good and bad, the authors look at how cooperation occurs without law or trust and provides examples of international alternatives to trust. They then present various institutional alternatives to trust and organizational design for reliability. They completes his examination of trust by reviewing its overall role in society.

"These fresh ideas render less ominous the warnings of doomsaying theorists" and their belief that distrust "will breed instability," wrote a contributor to the Harvard Law Review. Michael Macy, writing in Social Forces, referred to Cooperation without Trust? as "both instructive and provocative."

Hardin has also written fiction, including short stories. In Dmitri Esterhaats: A Novel, Hardin presents a story that features the coming-of-age of pianist Dmitri Esterhaats. The novel follows Esterhaats and his career from a precocious adolescent talent to a professional virtuoso. Along the way, he flees Russia with his Menshevik parents and ends up in Amsterdam, and then New York, at the age of sixteen during the 1930s. Esterhaats is eventually drafted during World War II but is fortunate enough to become an aide to a music-loving colonel. The novel also follows Esterhaats's numerous relationships with women, from his initiation into high society and sex by a soprano opera singer to his relationship with an intense violinist who is as uncompromising in her dedication to her art as Esterhaats is to his own. Along the way, the author also examines the pianist's mastery of various classical pieces, drawing upon the cultural and anecdotal history of the music itself. "This novel about a pianist plays out as gracefully as one of the protagonist's concerts," wrote Laurie Sullivan in the Library Journal. A Publishers Weekly contributor commented that the protagonist "serves nicely as a medium for Hardin's passionate imaginings of a microculture in flux."

Hardin told CA: "The pleasure of creating people and ideas on the page, from a very early age, is what first got me interested in writing.

"My work has been influenced by various wonderful writers, such as Franz Kafka, Marcel Proust, T.S. Eliot, as well as various philosphers, especially David Hume and Thomas Hobbes."

When asked to describe his writing process, Hardin responded: "I sit down and start writing. I create piles of notes and stash them away for later use. I am often surprised to discover that these piles are very repetitive, with essentially the same note written down many times.

"The most surprising thing I have learned as a writer is the pleasure in it all.

"My favorite books include: Dmitri Esterhaats, because of the glorious people I created in those pages; David Hume, because his visions came so naturally to me; Liberalism, Constitutionalism, and Democracy, because through writing it I came to make sense, for myself at least, of how these theories work together to produce a creative social order; and One for All, because it makes constructive sense of grim actions—it does not require evil people to destroy societies and lives.

"I hope my books will inspire others to tackle the same topics and to get great pleasure from them."

BIOGRAPHICAL AND CRITICAL SOURCES:

BOOKS

Hardin, Russell, One for All: The Logic of Group Conflict, Princeton University Press (Princeton, NJ), 1995.

PERIODICALS

Administrative Science Quarterly, June, 2006, Linda D. Molm, review of Cooperation without Trust?, p. 305.

American Journal of Sociology, March, 1996, Claus Offe, review of One for All, p. 1448; March, 2005, Steven Rytina, review of Indeterminacy and Society, p. 1529; January, 2007, Charles Tilly, review of Cooperation without Trust?, p. 1293.

American Political Science Review, December, 1989, Aaron Wildavsky, review of Morality within the Limits of Reason, p. 1343; December, 1995, Brian Barry, review of One for All, p. 1008.

Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social Science, July, 1989, Bernard Gert, review of Morality within the Limits of Reason, p. 130.

Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists, November, 1985, review of Nuclear Deterrence: Ethics and Strategy, p. 52.

Canadian Journal of Philosophy, December, 1997, Frank Cunningham, review of One for All, p. 571.

Canadian Journal of Political Science, September, 1989, Arthur Ripstein, review of Morality within the Limits of Reason, p. 685.

Choice, December, 1995, review of One for All, p. 695; May, 2001, M. Coulter, review of Liberalism, Constitutionalism, and Democracy, p. 1693; November, 2002, A.S. Rosenbaum, review of Trust and Trustworthiness, p. 481; March, 2005, M.G. Pufong, review of Distrust, p. 1303; February, 2006, E. Lewis, review of Cooperation without Trust?, p. 1091.

Contemporary Sociology, May, 1996, Sun-Ki Chai, review of One for All, p. 345; September, 2005, Gretchen Peterson, review of Distrust, p. 512; May, 2006, Arthur L. Stinchcombe, review of Cooperation without Trust?, p. 268.

Ethics, October, 1990, Susan Mendus, review of Morality within the Limits of Reason, p. 183; January, 1997, Garrett Cullity, review of One for All, p. 361; January, 2006, Daniel M. Hausman, review of Indeterminacy and Society, p. 425.

Europe-Asia Studies, July, 1996, Alan Carling, "Liberalism and the Economic Order," includes review of One for All, p. 846.

Forbes, April 15, 2002, Daniel Fisher, "The Coming Ruckus," p. 044.

Foreign Affairs, July-August, 1995, Francis Fukuyama, review of One for All, p. 133.

Growth and Change, fall, 1995, Ulf Zimmermann, review of One for All, p. 633.

Harvard Law Review, March, 2006, review of Cooperation without Trust?, p. 1640.

History: The Journal of the Historical Association, January, 1997, Ritchie Ovendale, review of One for All, p. 102.

Independent Review, winter, 1977, Karl-Dieter Opp, "One for All: The Logic of Group Conflict," p. 459.

International Affairs, April, 1996, James Gow, review of One for All, p. 361.

International Journal, spring, 1988, review of Nuclear Deterrence, pp. 337-339.

International Journal of Social Economics, March, 2005, review of Trust and Trustworthiness, p. 268.

International Studies Quarterly, April, 1996, Sasja Tempelman, review of One for All, p. 119.

Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, December, 1989, William R. Keech, review of Morality within the Limits of Reason, p. 369.

Journal of Economic Literature, March, 1989, review of Morality within the Limits of Reason, p. 150; March, 1990, Robert H. Frank, review of Morality within the Limits of Reason, p. 80; December, 1995, review of One for All, p. 2049; September, 2002, review of Trust and Trustworthiness, p. 1082; September, 2003, Luis Cabral, review of Trust and Trustworthiness, p. 953; March, 2004, review of Indeterminacy and Society, p. 250.

Journal of Peace Research, November, 1999, Daniel McIntosh, review of One for All, p. 754; November, 1999, Daniel McIntosh, review of One for All, p. 754.

Journal of Philosophy, July, 2001, Robert E. Goodin, review of Liberalism, Constitutionalism, and Democracy, p. 374.

Journal of Politics, August, 1996, Manus I. Midlarsky, review of One for All, p. 863.

Journal of Religion, July, 1990, Arthur J. Dyck, review of Morality within the Limits of Reason, p. 483.

Library Journal, May 15, 2007, Laurie Sullivan, review of Dmitri Esterhaats: A Novel, p. 80.

Mind, April, 1998, Charles R. Pigden, review of One for All, p. 482; October, 2004, Peter Vallentyne, review of Indeterminacy and Society, p. 753.

New York Times, June 17, 1988, Philip H. Dougherty, "Russell Hardin," p. 13.

Personnel Psychology, spring, 2003, Susan Phelps, review of Trust and Trustworthiness, p. 263.

Philosophical Quarterly, July, 2005, review of Indeterminacy and Society; July, 2005, review of Liberalism, Constitutionalism, and Democracy.

Philosophical Review, October, 1991, George Sher, review of Morality within the Limits of Reason, p. 682; January, 1998, Margaret Gilbert, review of One for All, p. 135.

Political Science Quarterly, winter, 1995, Lewis Coser, review of One for All, p. 668.

Political Studies, March, 1990, Joseph Raz, review of Morality within the Limits of Reason, p. 171; December, 1996, Keith Dowding, review of One for All, p. 973.

Political Theory, February, 1990, Alan Ryan, review of Morality within the Limits of Reason, p. 176; April, 1998, David D. Laitin, review of One for All, p. 221.

Prairie Schooner, winter, 1995, review of One for All, p. 668.

Publishers Weekly, February 19, 2007, review of Dmitri Esterhaats, p. 149.

Reference & Research Book News, August, 2002, review of Trust and Trustworthiness, p. 8.

Social Forces, December, 2007, Michael Macy, review of Cooperation without Trust?, p. 851.

Studies in Conflict and Terrorism, January-March, 1997, James David Ballard, review of One for All, p. 128.

Times Literary Supplement, September 22, 2000, Jeremy Waldron, review of Liberalism, Constitutionalism, and Democracy, p. 12.

ONLINE

New York University Department of Politics Web site,http://politics.as.nyu.edu/ (March 21, 2008), faculty profile of author.