Hello! I am an Associate Professor in the Department of Political Science and core faculty member of the Kellogg Center for Philosophy, Politics, and Economics at Virginia Tech in Blacksburg, Virginia. I mainly work in political philosophy.

Bio
I was born and raised in Munich, Germany. I earned my M.A. in philosophy and political science from the University of Regensburg in 2005, and my Ph.D. in philosophy from LMU Munich in 2008. I was an Assistant Professor at the University of Hamburg on a fixed-term Habilitation position from 2009-2015. In the 2013/2014 academic year I was on leave, visiting the University of Arizona with a DFG research fellowship. In 2015, I earned my Habilitation in philosophy and, after two years as a visiting professor at Bielefeld University, I transitioned to the United States in 2017. I held postdoc positions at Chapman University and UNC-Chapel Hill before starting my tenure-track position at Virginia Tech in 2021. In 2025, I was promoted to Associate Professor with tenure.

Research
A first research interest is the justification of the practice of private property and its implications for distributive justice. I have defended a sufficientarian version of libertarianism that is grounded in the value of autonomy and emphasizes the role conventions must play in determining the specifics of property schemes. Relatedly, I have written about the legitimation of taxation, the idea of a universal basic income, restitution for historic injustice, and the concept of liberty.

A second research interest lies in the age-old topic of political authority. I have raised objections against attempts to downplay the importance of political authority (and to go along with weaker conceptions of state legitimacy, or with philosophical anarchism). More recently, I have tried to develop my own justification of political authority which, in some ways, parallels my justification of the practice of private property and highlights the moral power of conventions.

A third research interest are political ethics and political morality beyond justice. I have argued that peace and public justifiability are values that are independent from the value of justice and sometimes give politicians reasons to make compromises (in the case of public justifiability principled reasons), I have discussed modus vivendi arrangements, fair compromises, the limits of compromises, and the value of integrity in democratic compromises.

Contact
My email address is [email protected]. I'm on academia, philpeople, google scholar, facebook, and instagram. Don't hesitate to get in touch!

C.V.
You can download my C.V. from my academia page.

Recurring Events
Since 2015, I've been the co-organizer of the workshop series Workshop für Politische Philosophie, and I regularly organize the PPE Cinema at Virginia Tech.


The header photos are from Camp Creek State Park in West Virginia, not too far from where I live, the English Garden in my hometown Munich, and Saguaro National Park near Tucson, Arizona, the first city in the U.S. where I lived. The (selfie) portrait photo was taken in the Virginia Museum of Transportation in Roanoke.