معرفی
Melissa Lane is the Class of 1943 Professor of Politics at Princeton University, with affiliations in Classics and Philosophy. She holds the 50th Professorship of Rhetoric at Gresham College (2023–2026), delivering public lectures livestreamed on YouTube. In 2024–25, she is on sabbatical in the UK as the Isaiah Berlin Visiting Professor at Oxford and Honorary Visiting Professor of Philosophy at UCL, while continuing her Gresham College lectures. Her research focuses on ancient Greek philosophy (especially Plato), contemporary political theory, and climate change communication. She has won prestigious awards including the 2024 Book Prize for *Of Rule and Office: Plato’s Ideas of the Political*, recognized for its innovative analysis of Platonic constitutionalism and political thought.
Education: MPhil and PhD in Philosophy from the University of Cambridge. Prior to Princeton (since 2009), she taught at Cambridge for 15 years. Notable fellowships include the Guggenheim Fellowship in Classics and visiting roles at ANU, Harvard, Stanford, and the American Academy in Rome. Her work bridges ancient and modern political theory, emphasizing ethics in governance, scientific communication under uncertainty, and the role of lawgivers in constitutional design. Public engagement includes op-eds in *US News & World Report*, *LA Times*, and appearances on BBC Radio Four’s *In Our Time*.
Her academic contributions span monographs, edited volumes, and interdisciplinary collaborations. Recent work examines Plato’s relevance to contemporary issues like judicial ethics (e.g., Supreme Court justices) and the ethical dimensions of climate policy. She has organized international symposia on Plato’s political thought and co-authored works on the intersection of environmental ethics and ancient philosophy.
Awards include the Phi Beta Kappa Teaching Prize and the Stanley J. Kelley Teaching Award at Princeton. She advises on climate change ethics and chairs panels at the American Political Science Association. Her upcoming lectures at Gresham College (e.g., *Lawgivers in Modern Revolutions*, 2025) highlight her commitment to public intellectualism and interdisciplinary dialogue.
