Joseph Cloward

I am a Ph.D. candidate in political science at Stanford University. I am currently a Community Engagement Fellow at the Center for the Comparative Study of Race and Ethnicity at Stanford. I am a political theorist and my research focuses on immigration, political participation, and education.

My dissertation rethinks the way we justify non-citizens’ political rights. Traditional arguments often hinge on finding the threshold for when immigrants have qualified for political rights by becoming sufficiently like citizens. I’m interested in revising two things in that approach. First, I argue that these kinds of arguments don’t live up to the democratic commitment that all people have a right to shape their world through political participation. I argue that a commitment to that principle means securing participation rights for all people within a state’s territory, including some immigrants who haven’t yet become part of that state’s political community in other ways. Second, I emphasize the role of participation outside of voting and argue that we should formally protect non-electoral forms of participation as political rights.

Other stand-alone papers (and areas for future research) include work on the political representation of unenfranchised groups through 19^th century petitioning and on the permissibility of public-school teachers making politically-motivated decisions in their classrooms.

Previously, I earned a BA in International Relations and German Studies at Penn. I am also proud to have worked as a high school history teacher for four years in Roma, Texas, an experience that continues to inform all aspects of my work.