Philosophy of Institutions Project

Sabre's project in the philosophy of institutions supports work on the conceptual grounds of modern institutions - the ideals that animate them, the rhetoric and logic of the deliberations that shape them, and their influence on the lives of the persons participating in them.

Sabre's activity in this area has included international conferences, scholarly research and publication, and theoretical inquiry.

Edward Christie Banfield (1916-1999)

An important contributor to the Philosophy of Institutions Project died during 1999. From 1984 to 1993, Edward Christie Banfield pursued through Sabre a philosophical inquiry into the concept of happiness, as it appears in the founding of the American regime, the ministrations of the professions, and the writings of moral and political philosophers. He projected an ambitious and reflective work, the culmination of an already distinguished career as a social scientist.

Professor Banfield leaves a considerable body of writing, including pioneering studies in city politics. Banfield's most cited book, The Moral Basis of a Backward Society (1958), based on fieldwork in a village in southern Italy with his wife Laura Fasano Banfield, is a classic of political anthropology.

His efforts at Sabre, supported by several private foundations and individuals, were repeatedly interrupted and ultimately cut short by recurring medical problems. That this final, uncompleted work was pursued in the face of failing health testifies to a dedication that inspired generations of students and colleagues. Sabre mourns his passing.

The Michael Oakeshott Association is dedicated to the critical discussion of a writer increasingly viewed as the leading philosopher of politics in the English-speaking tradition in the twentieth century. Sabre will serve as the home for the Association until it adopts by-laws and elects officers at an inaugural conference at the London School of Economics in 2001, Oakeshott's centenary. 

Information on the Association is updated regularly by its convener, Leslie Marsh, on an independent website: http://www.michael-oakeshott-association.org. 

Contributions to Sabre for the Michael Oakeshott Association should be so earmarked.

During 1999 Josiah Lee Auspitz developed with a leading Swiss computer scientist a computationally tractable illustration of a fragment of the underlying logical system employed in his long-standing work for Sabre. A privately funded laboratory has been founded in Switzerland and the U.S. to exploit and apply this novel computer architecture.