Conservative Thought and Policy finalist to speak at CU

The University of Colorado Boulder has announced William Voegeli as a finalist for the position of Visiting Scholar in Conservative Thought and Policy in the 2015-16 academic year.

Voegeli (pronounced ˈvōɡ-lē) will visit the CU-Boulder campus on Jan. 14 and will give a public talk. He will discuss “Liberalism, Conservatism and Compassion” at 5 p.m. in Hale 230 on campus.

Voegeli is senior editor at the Claremont Review of Books at the Claremont Institute in California. Since 2007, he has also been a visiting scholar at the Henry Salvatori Center at Claremont McKenna College.

Voegeli holds a Ph.D. in political science from Loyola University. He is the author of two books: Never Enough: America’s Limitless Welfare State and The Pity Party:  Mean-Spirited Diatribe against Liberal Compassion.

He has published numerous articles in The Los Angeles Times, Commentary, National Review, The Federalist and other publications.

The visiting scholar search committee is chaired by Keith Maskus, economics professor of distinction at the CU-Boulder College of Arts and Sciences. The committee includes both internal and external members.

The committee has been working to identify finalists for the visiting-scholar position, which is a one-year appointment. The committee has sought “highly visible” scholars who are “deeply engaged in either the analytical scholarship or practice of conservative thinking and policymaking or both.”

After reviewing the applications received, the committee selected two finalists for the position of visiting scholar in the 2015-16 academic year.  They are Voegeli and Bradley Birzer, who is the current scholar in 2014-15. 

The Conservative Thought and Policy Program was launched in fall 2013 with the appointment of Steven Hayward as the inaugural visiting scholar.

The Visiting Scholar in Conservative Thought and Policy is a pilot program supported by private funds. More than 20 donors have raised $1 million to support the program.