Public lecture by Professor Erazim Koh??k, Charles University, PragueSeptember 14, 2009 at 7:30–9:30 p.m.

Professor Koh??k will speak on: "Democracy in Europe: An Imperfect Union."

Synopsis: "Today everyone claims to be democratic (the attack on Iraq was in the name of "democracy"), but we don't know whether we mean "romantic" democracy a la Rousseau, or "Enlightenmnent" democracy based on human rights a la Kant. Yet, the pressing issues of survival are elsewhere: ecology, war, poverty. We need less talk of democracy and more about solving problems.

Professor Koh??k taught in the Department of Philosophy at Gustavus in the late 1950's and is still remembered as a charismatic teacher. He went on to a long and distinguished career at Boston University. When the Velvet Revolution occurred in 1989 he returned to his native Czechoslovakia where he became a professor at Charles University, and one of the Czech Republic's most renowned public intellectuals.