Curriculum Vitae
Department of Philosophy
University at Buffalo, Buffalo, NY
sankaran.kirun.k@gmail.com
| https://kirunsankaran.github.io
Social and Political Philosophy; History of Social and Political Philosophy; Philosophy of Social Science
Ethics; Applied Ethics; Environmental Ethics; Philosophy of Law; Early Modern Philosophy; Wittgenstein
University at Buffalo — Postdoctoral Associate, Department of Philosophy (2026–)
Dartmouth College — Postdoctoral Fellow, Political Economy Project, and Lecturer, Department of Philosophy (July 2023–2026)
University of North Carolina–Chapel Hill — Teaching Assistant Professor, Department of Philosophy, and Core Faculty, PPE Program (July 2020–July 2023)
Brown University and Wheaton College (MA) — Brown/Wheaton Faculty Fellow (January 2020–May 2020)
PhD, Philosophy, Brown University (May 2020)
Dissertation: "Essays on Justice and Social Structure"
Committee: Charles Larmore (director), David Estlund, Sharon Krause,
Gerald Gaus (University of Arizona)
Visiting Graduate Student, University of Arizona (Spring 2018)
M.A., Philosophy, University of Wisconsin–Milwaukee (June 2014)
B.A., Philosophy and Economics, The Ohio State University (June 2012)
Forthcoming. "Stasis Undermines Equality: Or, What's Wrong with Urban Growth Controls?" Philosophical Perspectives.
2025. "Cash Rules Everything Around Me: In Defence of Housing Markets." Economics and Philosophy 41(3), 581–599.
2025. "Putting the 'Structural' Back in 'Structural Injustice'." Ethics 135(3), 545–559. (with Jake Monaghan; Discussion of Estlund, "What's Unjust About Structural Injustice?")
2025. "The Body Politic Has Private Parts: Market Creation as a Policymaking Tool." Economics and Philosophy 41(2), 340–356.
2021. "Structural Injustice and the Tyranny of Scales." Journal of Moral Philosophy 18(5), 445–472.
2021. "Structural Injustice as an Analytical Tool." Philosophy Compass 16(10), 1–12. [invited]
2020. "What's New in the New Ideology Critique?" Philosophical Studies 177(5), 1441–1462.
2023. Review of Scott Ashworth, Christopher Berry, and Ethan Bueno de Mesquita, Theory and Credibility. Economics and Philosophy.
2022. Review of Michelle Schwarze, Recognizing Resentment: Sympathy, Injustice, and Liberal Political Thought. Journal of Scottish Philosophy 20(3), 283–286.
Forthcoming. "Philosophical Perspectives on Affordable Housing," for the Murphy Institute, Tulane University.
"There is No Such Thing as Gentrification" (with
Violet Victoria)
Philosophy, Politics and Economics Society, 13 November 2025
"Stasis Undermines Equality"
Philosophy, Politics and Economics Society, 15 November 2025
"Is Social Ontology Continuous with Social
Science?"
Social Ontology 2025, August 2025
"On the Epistemic Role of the Administrative State"
(with Akshath Jitendranath)
Association for Social and Political Philosophy, July 2025
Philosophy, Politics, and Economics Society London, July 2025
"Immigration and Gentrification"
American Philosophical Association, Pacific Division, 19 April 2025
"Alienation Arguments"
University of Southern California, 3 December 2025 [invited]
Chapman University, 2 December 2025 [invited]
MIT, 24 November 2025 [invited]
Philosophy, Politics, and Economics Society, 14 November 2025
Brandeis University, 24 October 2025 [invited]
Midwest Political Science Association, 3 April 2025
"Political Philosophy is Not Metaphysics"
Binghamton University, 7 February 2025 [invited]
"What's the Point of Ideal Theory?"
Philosophy, Politics, and Economics Society, 15 November 2024
"Cash Rules Everything Around Me: In Defense of Housing
Markets"
Southern Methodist University, 18 January 2024 [invited]
University at Buffalo, 1 February 2023 [invited]
Zicklin Workshop in Normative Business Ethics, Wharton School of
Business, 28 October 2022
"Conceptual Consequences of Empirical Methods"
Philosophy, Politics, and Economics Society, 3 November 2023
"De-Commodifying Housing?"
Philosophy, Politics, and Economics Society, 3 November 2022
"Political Philosophy is Not Applied Ethics"
Tulane University, 12 December 2022 [invited]
Philosophy of Science Association, 10 November 2022
Political Theory In/And/As Political Science, Stanford University, April
2022
Philosophy, Politics, and Economics Society, February 2022
Rust Belt PPE Workshop, 5 May 2021 [invited]
"Democracy and Discretion in the Administrative
State"
Philosophy, Politics, and Economics Society, February 2022
"Rosenberg's Smith: An Appreciation"
International Adam Smith Society Meeting, 16 October 2021
"Against Trolleyology"
Rocky Mountain Ethics Congress, 10 August 2019 (poster presentation)
"What Is Structural Injustice?"
Philosophy, Politics, and Economics Society, 28 March 2019
"Smith on Blame and Resentment in Structural
Contexts"
International Adam Smith Society Meeting, 19 January 2019
Social Ontology 2018, 24 August 2018
Rocky Mountain Ethics Congress, 11 August 2018 (poster presentation)
"Roger Williams: A Historical Case Study in Public
Reason"
Philosophy, Politics and Economics Society, 15 March 2018
"What's New in the New Ideology Critique?"
Philosophy of Social Science Roundtable, 12 April 2019
European Congress of Analytic Philosophy, 24 August 2017
North American Society for Social Philosophy, 13 July 2017
New England Political Science Assoc., 21 April 2017
Philosophy, Politics and Economics Society, 17 March 2017
Princeton Workshop in Social Philosophy, 9 March 2017
"Neo-Republicanism Needs a Criterion of
Reasonableness"
Northwestern University Society for the Theory of Ethics and Politics,
19 May 2016
"Brandom on Moral Reasons"
Wisconsin Philosophical Association, 20 April 2013
Comments on Maeve McKeown, With Power Comes
Responsibility
American Political Science Association, September 2025
Comments on Ben Jones, "Distributive Justice and Police Deadly
Force," and Adam Hosein, "What is at stake in seeking social cohesion
through inclusion or through control?"
Midwest Political Science Association, 7 April 2024
Pacific Philosophical Quarterly, Journal of Scottish Philosophy, Journal of Ethics and Social Philosophy, Erkenntnis, Ethical Theory and Moral Practice, Critical Review of International Social and Political Philosophy, Philosophical Studies, European Journal of Philosophy, Synthese (×4), Social Theory and Practice, Social Epistemology, Contemporary Political Theory, Philosophers' Imprint, American Political Science Review (×2), Constellations, Philosophia, Journal of Social Philosophy
Political Science 0011, Introduction to Political Thought, on John Stuart Mill, 3 April 2019
Judge, National High School Ethics Bowl
Rhode Island Regional, 2017, 2019; North Carolina Regional, 2022, 2023;
National Competition, 2023
Updated letters are available through Interfolio.
Charles Larmore — W. Duncan MacMillan Family Professor of Humanities and Professor of Philosophy, Brown University — charles_larmore@brown.edu
David Estlund — Lombardo Professor of Humanities and Professor of Philosophy, Brown University — david_estlund@brown.edu
Abraham Singer — Associate Professor, Quinlan School of Business, Loyola University Chicago — asinger2@luc.edu
Russell Muirhead — Robert Clements Professor of Democracy and Politics, Dartmouth College — russell.muirhead@dartmouth.edu
Joseph Heath — Professor, Department of Philosophy, University of Toronto — joseph.heath@utoronto.ca