Carlo Invernizzi Accetti

Professor of Political Science

Executive Director, Moynihan Center

Main Affiliation

Political Science

Building

North Academic Center

Office

4/138B

Phone

212-650-7050

Accetti Profile Photo

Carlo Invernizzi Accetti

Profile

Carlo Invernizzi Accetti is Full Professor of Political Science at The City College of New York (CUNY); Associate Researcher at the Center for European Studies of the Institut d’Etudes Politiques de Paris (Sciences Po); and Visiting Professor of European Politics at Columbia University's School of International and Public Affairs (SIPA).

His research is at the point of intersection of democratic theory and comparative EU/US party politics. It combines a historical approach with a concern for contemporary normative issues, relating in particular to the relationship between politics and religion, the rise of populism and technocracy as structuring poles of electoral competition, and the ideological reconfigurations taking place in advanced Western Democracies.

He has published three monographs, two edited volumes, and over two dozen articles in top international peer-reviewed journals on topics such as: populism and technocracy, political ideologies and party politics in Western Europe and the United States, militant democracy, referendums, and the philosophical foundations of human rights.

Professor Invernizzi Accetti is also a regular commentator on European and US political affairs for venues including: the New York TimesThe Financial TimesThe GuardianForeign AffairsForeign Policy, The Wall Street JournalLa RepubblicaQuartzLe Monde Diplomatique, and France 24.

Education

  • Ph.D. Political Science, Columbia University, 2012
  • M.A. History and Theory of Politics, Institut d'Etudes Politiques de Paris, 2006
  • B.A. Philosophy, Politics, Economics, Oxford University, 2004

Courses Taught

  • Political Ideas and Issues (PSC 12400)
  • Democratic Theory (PSC 31134)
  • Political Ideologies: From Left to Right (PSC 27700)
  • Political Systems of Europe (PSC 23100)
  • Politics in Film (PSC 31160)

Publications

Books

 
Techno-Populism: The New Logic of Democratic Politics (co-authored with Chris Bickerton), Oxford University Press, 2021. 
 
 
 

 

Edited Volumes

Ideologies and the European Union (co-edited with Jonathan White), London : Routledge, 2021.

Hans Kelsen, The Essence and Value of Democracy, Rowman and Littlefield, 2013 (co-edited with Nadia Urbinati).

 

 

Articles In Peer-Reviewed Journals

‘Repoliticizing Environmentalism, Beyond Populism and Technocracy’Critical Review, forthcoming.

‘What Is A Consultative Referendum ? The Democratic Legitimacy of Popular Consultations’ (co-authored with Giulia Oskian), Perspectives on Politics, 2020.

‘The European Union as a Christian Democracy. A Heuristic Approach’Journal of European Public Policy, 27 : 9, 2020.

'Techno-Populism as a New Party Type : The Five Star Movement and Podemos’ (co-authored with Christopher Bickerton), Contemporary Italian Politics, 10 : 2, 2018.

‘Is the European Union Secular ?’Comparative European Politics, 16:4, 2018.

‘Catholic Social Doctrine and Human Rights: From Rejection to Endorsement ?’, Humanity, 9:2, 2018.

‘Reconciling Legal Positivism and Human Rights : Hans Kelsen’s Argument from Relativism’, Journal of Human Rights, 17:2, 2018.

‘The Crisis of Party Democracy, Cognitive Mobilization and the Case for Making Parties More Deliberative’ (co-authored with Fabio Wolkenstein), American Political Science Review, 111 : 1, 2017.

‘What’s Wrong with Militant Democracy’ (co-authored with Ian Zuckerman), Political Studies, 65 : 1, 2017.

‘Populism and Technocracy. Opposites or Complements ?’ (co-authored with Chris Bickerton) Critical Review of International Social and Political Philosophy, 20 : 2, 2016.

‘The Temporality of Normativity. Hans Kelsen’s Overcoming of the Problem of the Foundation for Legal Validity’, Philosophy and Social Criticism, 42 :1 2016.

‘Vers un Modèle de Démocratie Chrétienne ? Politique et Religion dan le Traité de Lisbonne’, Revue Française de Science Politique, 65 : 4, 2015.

‘Hans Kelsen et le Fondement de la Validité du Droit’, Droit et Société, 92 : 1 2015.

‘La Normativité Démocratique, Entre Vérité et Procédures’, Raisons Politiques, 55, 2015.

‘Democracy Without Parties. Italy After Berlusconi’ (co-authored with Chris Bickerton), Political Quarterly, 85 : 1, 2014.

‘Can Democracy Emancipate Itself from Political Theology? Habermas and Lefort on the Permanence of the Theologico-Political’, Constellations, 17.2, 2011.

‘Kant et Sade: Les Lumières sont-elles Totalitaires?’, Raisons Politiques, 33, 2009.

 

Contributions To Edited Volumes

‘Christian Democracy in America and Vice Versa: Sturzo, Maritain and the United States’, in Christian Democracy in Exile (W. Kaiser and P. Kosicki eds.), Leuven: Leuven University Press, forthcoming.

‘Militant Democracy as Decisionist Liberalism. Reason and Power in the Work of Karl Loewenstein’ (co-authored with Ian Zuckerman), The Decisionist Imagination (N. Guilhot and D. Bessner eds.), New York: Berghahn, 2019.

‘Populism, Technocracy and the Critique of Party Democracy’  (co-authored with Chris Bickerton), Oxford Handbook on Populism (C. Mudde, P. Taggart and R. Kaltwasser eds.) 2018.

‘Party Democracy, Between Populism and Technocracy’ (co-authored with Christopher Bickerton), Next European Democracy: The Battle to Change Europe, Milano: Feltrinelli, 2016.

‘Religious Truth and Democratic Freedom. A Critique of the Religious Discourse of Anti-Relativism’, Religion, Secularism and Constitutional Democracy (J. Cohen and C. Laborde eds.), Columbia University Press, 2015.

'Claude Lefort: Democracy as the Empty Place of Power', Thinking Radical Democracy: The Return to Politics in Post-War France (M. Breaugh ed.), University of Toronto Press, 2015.

‘Lefort, Claude’, The Encyclopedia of Political Thought, Wiley Blackwell, 2011. 

 

Review Essays

'Is Truth Safe for Democracy? On Sophia Rosenfeld's Democracy and Truth', Contemporary Political Theory, forthcoming.

‘Between Reason and Will: On Christopher Meckstroth’s The Struggle for Democracy’, European Journal of Political Theory, 16:4, 2017.

‘In Defense of Relativism: A Reply to My Critics’, contribution to the critical exchange on my Relativism and Religion. Why Democratic Societies Do Not Need Moral Absolutes’, Journal of Politics Religion and Ideology, 17 : 2-3, 2016.

‘From Personalism to Liberalism: On Samuel Moyn’s Christian Human Rights’, The Immanent Frame, June 2015. 

 

Book Reviews

Partisanship and Political Liberalism in Diverse Societies, Matteo Bonotti, in Perspectives on Politics, forthcoming

What is Populism?, Jan-Werner Muller, in Revue Française de Science Politique, 67: 1, 2017.

Religion Without God, Ronald Dworkin, in Revue Française de Science Politique, 65: 4, 2015.

The Disclosure of Politics. Struggles over the Semantics of Secularization, Maria Pìa Lara, in Constellations, 21:4, 2014.

Democratic Statecraft, Jason Stuart Maloy, Revue Française de Science Politique, 64:6, 2014.

The Last Utopia. Human Rights in History, Samuel Moyn, (co-authored with G. Oskian) in Critica Liberale, 185, 2011.

Democracy in What State?  eds. G. Agamben, A. Badiou, D. Bensaid, J-L. Nancy, J. Ranière, S. Zizek, (co-authored with G. Oskian), in Critica Liberale, 184, 2011.