Chas. Phillips is Senior Lecturer in the Department of Political Science, where he studies and teaches political theory. His paradigm for both teaching and research is oriented around an interdisciplinary approach to political theory, in which theory influences and is influenced by other subfields, practices, disciplines, methods, and experiences. His research is centered around the intersection of global violence—the ways in which violence and vulnerabilities are coded, conditioned, obscured, and perpetuated at the local and global levels—and democratic theory—conceptualizations of practices that configure and refigure public life at multiple registers.

His forthcoming book (Brutus’ Foresight: Reconciling the Modern U.S. Supreme Court with the Framers’ Intent, with Professor Scott Boddery) marries a politico-theoretical analysis of the Federalists, Anti-Federalists, and their inspirations with a quantitative analysis of the contemporary polarization of Supreme Court Justices. It proposes a resolution to alleviate the current judicial turmoil while adhering more closely with the overlapping theoretical views of the founders involved in the constitutional debate.

His recent single-author publications use the work of Gilles Deleuze (and a minor tradition of thinkers preceding him) to disrupt and critique traditional political understandings of contemporary issues. In two related pieces, he analyzes aggressive policing tactics and global climate change, respectively, as related to a particular and static image of the human rather than as a mode of radical becoming.

Phillips is the recipient of multiple teaching awards at both Johns Hopkins University and elsewhere.

Phillips' research is centered around the intersection of global violence—the ways in which violence and vulnerabilities are coded, conditioned, obscured, and perpetuated at the local and global levels—and democratic theory—conceptualizations of practices that configure and refigure public life at multiple registers.

Most recently, Chas. Phillips has taught:

• Introduction to Western Political Theory
• Democratic Political Theory
• Theories of Global Violence

Recent articles:

• “Becoming the Apocalypse: Global Climate Change and a Tragic Swerve in Deleuze’s Logic of Sense.” Spring 2022. Deleuze and Guattari Studies, 15(4).
• “Human without Image: Deleuzian Critique beyond the Neighbourhood Effect.” Spring 2020. Deleuze and Guattari Studies, 14(1).