Few contemporary thinkers have shaped the landscape of philosophy and public life as profoundly as Martha C. Nussbaum. A renowned philosopher, legal scholar, and public intellectual, she has dedicated her career to exploring the intersections of justice, ethics, and human development. In this conversation, Martha C. Nussbaum reflects on the philosophical roots of her ideas, the urgency of cultivating compassion in fractured societies, and the role of philosophy in bridging intellectual thought with everyday human struggles.
1. How did you start your career as a philosopher?
In high school I was fascinated by philosophical questions, some of which I work on today: the nature of the emotions, the significance of suffering. But my school, like most U.S. schools, did not teach a subject called “philosophy,” so I found these issues in works of literature, such as novels and dramas – especially Greek tragedy, which still fascinates me today. But I also loved the theater and wanted to be an actress, so I left college after two years to take a professional acting job, then went on to a professional repertory training program at NYU.
When I decided a life in the theater was not for me, or rather that I wanted to think about the plays rather than act professionally, I changed over to NYU’s academic side and majored in Classics, continuing both Greek and Latin. I went to graduate school at Harvard in Classics, but soon saw that literary scholarship did not address the philosophical questions that fascinated me, so I moved to an interdisciplinary program in Classics/Philosophy and found two wonderful mentors: G. E. L. Owen, who supervised my dissertation on Aristotle, and Bernard Williams, who supervised writings on tragedy that later became The Fragility of Goodness.
When I looked on the job market, I insisted on being at least partly in a philosophy department, because I saw that this is where the issues I loved were being pursued with rigor, and where I would have the most helpful and toughest criticism. But I never gave up my love of ancient Greek and Roman philosophy, and do some teaching and writing in that area every year.
2. What unique role can philosophy play in addressing today’s global challenges?
Philosophy helps us think about the goal posts: which states of the world are worth promoting. It challenges simplistic notions of development based on economic growth alone, insisting that we consider how each person is actually doing — how wealth is distributed, and whether people are being enabled to live lives worthy of their dignity. This is what the Capabilities Approach spells out in detail, but other philosophical theories valuably join the debate. More recently, philosophers have focused on our abuse of the environment and animals.
3. Since starting your career, what have you noticed about the advancements in philosophy?
When I was a student, philosophy was just emerging from a period of great narrowness, in which constructive work in ethics and philosophy was just starting up again, thanks to the wonderful work of John Rawls. Now these disciplines flourish, but they have been enhanced by additions: philosophy of race and gender, philosophies of environmental and animal justice.
There is a new attention to generating conversation across philosophical traditions, so “philosophy” no longer means just “western philosophy.” Our Human Development and Capability Association has members from about 100 countries.