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G.A. Cohen

Born

in Montreal, Quebec, Canada

April 14, 1941

Died

August 05, 2009

Genre

Political Philosophy, Ethics, Philosophy Of History

Influences

Karl Marx, Gilbert Ryle, Isaiah Berlin ...more

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Gerald Allan Cohen FBA, known as G. A. Cohen or Jerry Cohen, was a Canadian Marxist political philosopher who held the positions of Quain Professor of Jurisprudence, University College London and Chichele Professor of Social and Political Theory, All Souls College, Oxford.

Born into a communist Jewish family in Montreal, Quebec, on 14 April 1941, Cohen was educated at McGill University (BA, philosophy and political science) in his home town and the University of Oxford (BPhil, philosophy) where he studied under Isaiah Berlin and Gilbert Ryle.

Cohen was assistant lecturer (1963–1964), lecturer (1964–1979) then reader (1979–1984) in the Department of Philosophy at University College London, before being appointed to the Chichele chair at Oxford Gerald Allan Cohen FBA, known as G. A. Cohen or Jerry Cohen, was a Canadian Marxist political philosopher who held the positions of Quain Professor of Jurisprudence, University College London and Chichele Professor of Social and Political Theory, All Souls College, Oxford.

Born into a communist Jewish family in Montreal, Quebec, on 14 April 1941, Cohen was educated at McGill University (BA, philosophy and political science) in his home town and the University of Oxford (BPhil, philosophy) where he studied under Isaiah Berlin and Gilbert Ryle.

Cohen was assistant lecturer (1963–1964), lecturer (1964–1979) then reader (1979–1984) in the Department of Philosophy at University College London, before being appointed to the Chichele chair at Oxford in 1985. Several of his students, such as Christopher Bertram, Simon Caney, Alan Carter, Cécile Fabre, Will Kymlicka, John McMurtry, David Leopold, Michael Otsuka, Seana Shiffrin, and Jonathan Wolff have gone on to be important moral and political philosophers in their own right, while another, Ricky Gervais, has pursued a successful career in comedy.

Known as a proponent of analytical Marxism and a founding member of the September Group, Cohen's 1978 work Karl Marx's Theory of History: A Defence defends an interpretation of Karl Marx's historical materialism often referred to as technological determinism by its critics. In Self-Ownership, Freedom, and Equality, Cohen offers an extensive moral argument in favour of socialism, contrasting his views with those of John Rawls and Robert Nozick, by articulating an extensive critique of the Lockean principle of self-ownership as well as the use of that principle to defend right as well as left libertarianism. In If You're an Egalitarian, How Come You're So Rich? (which covers the topic of his Gifford Lectures), Cohen addresses the question of what egalitarian political principles imply for the personal behaviour of those who subscribe to them.

Cohen was close friends with Marxist political philosopher Marshall Berman.

Cohen died on 5 August 2009. ...more

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G.A. Cohen’s books

Average rating: 3.6 · 2,750 ratings · 332 reviews · 25 distinct works • Similar authors

	Why Not Socialism? 3.39 avg rating — 1,809 ratings — published 2009 — 20 editions	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
	Karl Marx's Theory of History: A Defence 3.92 avg rating — 250 ratings — published 1978 — 11 editions	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
	If You're an Egalitarian, How Come You're So Rich? 4.01 avg rating — 243 ratings — published 2000 — 12 editions	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
	Self-Ownership, Freedom, and Equality 4.11 avg rating — 177 ratings — published 1995 — 16 editions	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
	Rescuing Justice and Equality 4.06 avg rating — 79 ratings — published 2008 — 8 editions	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
	On the Currency of Egalitarian Justice, and Other Essays in Political Philosophy by G.A. Cohen, Michael Otsuka (Editor) 4.28 avg rating — 61 ratings — published 2011 — 7 editions	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
	Finding Oneself in the Other 4.11 avg rating — 45 ratings — published 2012 — 7 editions	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
	Lectures on the History of Moral and Political Philosophy 3.80 avg rating — 25 ratings — published 2013 — 5 editions	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
	History, Labour, and Freedom: Themes from Marx 3.95 avg rating — 19 ratings — published 1989 — 3 editions	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
	Por una vuelta al socialismo: o cómo el capitalismo nos hace menos libres 4.31 avg rating — 13 ratings — published 2014 — 3 editions	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars

More books by G.A. Cohen…

Quotes by G.A. Cohen (?)

“Of course, not everybody likes camping trips. I do not myself enjoy them much, because I'm not outdoorsy, or at any rate, I'm not outdoorsy overnight-without-a-matress-wise. There's a limit to the outdoorsiness to which some academics can be expected to submit.”
― G.A. Cohen, Why Not Socialism?

tags: camping, outdoorsiness, outdoorsy

10 likes

“[T]he history of the twentieth century encourages the thought that the easiest way to generate productivity in a modern society is by nourishing the motives of which I spoke earlier, namely, those of greed and fear. But we should never forget that greed and fear are repugnant motives.”
― G.A. Cohen, Why Not Socialism?

6 likes

“The promise of abundance is not an endless flow of goods but a sufficiency produced with a minimum of unpleasant exertion.”
― G.A. Cohen

tags: capitalism, consumerism, consumption, emancipation, need

3 likes

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G.A. Cohen’s Followers (122)

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G.A. Cohen

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