Oliver Traldi, "Political Beliefs: A Philosophical Introduction" (Routledge, 2024)
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What is political epistemology and why has it emerged as a new sub‑field?
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Hello, and thanks for joining us for this episode of New Books in Philosophy, which is part of the New Books Network. I'm Robert Talese, and I'm professor of philosophy at Vanderbilt University. I co-host the program with Carrie Figter, Malcolm Keating, and Sarah Tyson. My guest today is Oliver Tralde. Oliver is incoming professor at the University of Tulsa Honors College. He specializes in social and political epistemology. He has a new book, which has just been published with Routledge. It's titled Political Beliefs, a Philosophical Introduction. Now, the idiom of contemporary politics is a kind of philosophical hodgepodge. While there's plenty of talk about traditional themes like freedom and justice, equality and autonomy, there's also an increasing reliance on ideas like misinformation, bias, expertise, propaganda, and the like.
Now these latter notions belong, at least in part, to epistemology, which is the area of philosophy that deals with issues concerning knowledge, rationality, evidence, belief, and the transfer of information. Relatively recently, the subfield of political epistemology has emerged. Political epistemologists explore the philosophical issues surrounding political beliefs, political expertise, political information, and so on. But they're also concerned to examine the ways in which political arrangements and institutions can go well or badly, depending on the character of the epistemic practices that prevail in a society. Now, as I've said, political epistemology is, by philosophy standards at least,
pretty new. Perhaps it's no more than two decades old, yet the field is organized around a few core disputes. And in the book Political Beliefs, Oliver Tralde surveys the terrain, often leading the reader to the conclusion that things are more complicated than they might have seen. Now, as usual, there's a lot to talk about, but let's begin, again as we normally do, with our guest. Hello, Oliver. How are
you? I'm good, Bob. Thank you so much for having me.
Oh, it's great. And thank you for writing the book. Got a lot to cover in the agenda because the book is pretty wide. You know, it's got a pretty broad scope. But why don't we begin with you? Can you tell us a bit about yourself?
Yeah. So I've been thinking, you know, what elements of my life are relevant to this book? So I grew up in Pennsylvania in a place called Easton. My father was a professor of mathematics at Lafayette College. Easton is an interesting place politically. It's from the bellwether of the bellwether, the Lehigh Valley, which usually determines how Pennsylvania goes, and Pennsylvania usually determines how the nation goes in presidential elections.
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Chapters
8 chapters
1
What is political epistemology and why has it emerged as a new sub‑field?
0:00–8:40
2
How did Oliver Traldi’s personal and academic background shape his interest in political beliefs?
8:40–17:15
3
What are the core disputes that organize the field of political epistemology?
17:15–26:38
4
How does the book define political beliefs and what role does conflict play in that definition?
26:38–36:24
5
What are the main accounts of how political beliefs are formed (psychological, cultural, epistemic)?
36:24–44:26
6
How do epistemic democracy arguments evaluate the justification of political beliefs?
44:26–52:17
7
What philosophical challenges arise when analysing conspiracy theories, fake news, and polarization?
52:17–58:30
8
What unresolved questions and future directions does Traldi highlight for political epistemology?
58:30–1:06:09
Speakers
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