Anbar Lecture: Jennifer Morton

The Department of Philosophy, with support from the Syracuse University Humanities Center, is thrilled to invite Jennifer Morton (University of Pennsylvania) to deliver the 2026 Anbar Lecture. Prof. Morton will deliver a talk entitled, "The Scaffolds of Agency: Precarity, Security and the Social Contract."

Abstract: This lecture offers a Hobbes-inspired rethinking of the social contract. I argue that the fundamental task of political institutions is not solely redistribution but addressing precarity—understood as encompassing both insecurity and instability. Precarity undermines our capacity to prioritize our future-directed goals, both as individuals and collectively.  And when people cannot reliably pursue valuable, future-directed individual and collective ends, the very foundations of the state are eroded. I distinguish between objective precarity, actual exposure to instability and insecurity, and subjective precarity, the subjective feeling of insecurity and instability. Both matter politically. Widespread feelings of precarity, even when they outstrip objective conditions, can destabilize our political community. I argue that a political theory focused narrowly on distributive inequality misses something fundamental. Addressing precarity requires that we move beyond a narrow concern with inequality and revisit the fundamental Hobbesian insight that security and stability are the precondition for the pursuit of our other political values.