Oxford Handbook of Grounded and Engaged Normative Theory

The Oxford Handbook of Grounded and Engaged Normative Theory introduces readers to this burgeoning field of theory and methodology by exploring a range of empirical research practices that center lived experience to develop normative arguments. Theorists who work in this way demonstrate a commitment to expanding thinking about political theory to include those who have a stake in the concepts being studied. They consider the meanings that people make of their own experiences, political context, and histories in the struggle to be recognized by oppressors with epistemic authority. Undoing these histories depends on a commitment to epistemic inclusion, that is, a commitment to look for and attend to modes of knowing and sources of knowledge that are otherwise marginalized by the politics of knowledge or the norms of the discipline. In the last decade, grounded and engaged normative theory has coalesced into a distinctive approach in political science. This Handbook offers a cohesive overview of the field's principles, origins, methodologies, substantive lines of inquiry, and applications. Contributors to the volume enrich theoretical and methodological discussions with chapters full of examples of how the authors themselves have done the work. By laying out multiple theoretical starting points and demonstrating diverse methodological approaches, this volume helps both practitioners and students to better understand what they can learn from and do in this dynamic field.

Brooke Ackerly is Professor of Political Science at Vanderbilt University. Luis Cabrera is Professor of Political Science in the School of Government and International Relations at Griffith University in Brisbane. Monique Deveaux is Professor of Philosophy at the University of Guelph, where she co-directs the Grounded & Engaged Theory (GET) lab. Fonna Forman is Professor of Political Theory and Founding Director of the Center on Global Justice at UC San Diego. Genevieve Fuji Johnson is Professor of Political Science at Simon Fraser University. Gina Starblanket is an Associate Professor in the School of Indigenous Governance at the University of Victoria. Antje Wiener, FAcSS MAE, is a Professor of Political Science and Law at the University of Hamburg and By-Fellow at Hughes Hall, Cambridge.