David Schmidtz

Dr. David Schmidtz is Professor and Presidential Chair of Moral Science at West Virginia University’s Chambers College of Business & Economics. Furthermore, Dr. Schmidtz is a Distinguished Affiliated Fellow with the F. A. Hayek Program for Advanced Study in Philosophy, Politics, and Economics and editor-in-chief of Social Philosophy & Policy, which is by circulation the field's leading journal.

With co-author Harry Brighouse, David Schmidtz published Debating Education: Is There a Role for Markets? (Oxford University Press, 2019). Other notable works include Ethics, Economy, and Entrepreneurship, coauthored with Cathleen Johnson and Robert Lusch (Sagent Publishing, 2016); A Brief History of Liberty, co-authored with Jason Brennan and published with Wiley Blackwell in 2011, Person, Polis, Planet (Oxford University Press, 2009), Elements of Justice (Cambridge University Press, 2005) and Rational Choice and Moral Agency (Princeton University Press, 1995). He also edited a collection of essays for Cambridge University Press on the philosopher Robert Nozick, and his leading textbook on environmental ethics for Oxford University Press is now going into its third edition with co-editor Dan Shahar. He is known for his work on moral theory and has written on diverse topics such as the limits of government, individual responsibility and moral theory, and most recently on the elements of justice. He has also written articles of particular interest to the legal academy on the institution of property, environmental ethics, and rational choice.

Dr. Schmidtz holds a PhD in philosophy and MA in Economics from the University of Arizona.