dr. (Christian) CDC van der Veeke

Profile

Christian van der Veeke (1980) is a senior lecturer in the Humanities and the current Head of the Humanities Department at Erasmus University College (EUC), part of Erasmus University Rotterdam (EUR). In 2019, Christian was appointed as the Academic Director of the Erasmus Honours Programme at EUR by the Rector Magnificus. Christian is responsible for the educational policy and over-arching content and organization of this interdisciplinary programme, developed for 40 carefully selected motivated and skilled second year students coming from all faculties of Erasmus University Rotterdam.

Christian studied philosophy at Erasmus University Rotterdam and received his master's degree in 2007. His master thesis ‘Heimwee van de filosofie. Een analyse en evaluatie van de wijsgerige toepassing van vervreemding’ (‘Home Sickness of Philosophy. An Analysis and Evaluation of the Philosophical Use of Alienation.’) was awarded the Leo Polak thesis price in 2009, a nationwide award for the best MA-thesis in the field of the humanities.

Christian received his doctorate in philosophy in 2013. His dissertation is concerned with post-foundational critical philosophy and a post-foundational account of democracy. In his PhD-thesis he brings together two normative political theoretical traditions that are generally conceived as mutually exclusive: deliberative democracy (Habermas, Benhabib, Bohman) and radical and plural democracy (Laclau and Mouffe, Rancière, Abensour). On the basis of the political and social differences that can be found in the works of Hegel, Schmitt, Ricoeur, Lefort and Rancière, he shows how these traditions should be conceived as complementary, as the institutional and extra-institutional elements of democratic politics are two sides of the coin that stands for any progressive concept of democracy, as he argues.

Christian’s areas of philosophical expertise are: Hegel’s practical philosophy, 20th and 21st century continental political and social thought, deliberative and radical democracy, the methodology of the humanities and the social sciences, post-structuralism, neo- and post-Marxist thought, and Critical Theory. 

Currently, Christian is teaching and coordinating in several courses. For EUC, these course are: 

• Scientific Practice: An Invitation (introductory course on climate science from the perspective of a multitude of disciplines; 100-level);
• Contemporary Political Philosophy: Liberal Democracy and Beyond (300-level);
• Modernity: From Enlightenment to Rationalization (100-level). 

In the fall of 2021, Christian will teach a course Philosophy of the Humanities  and the Social Sciences at the Graduate School for Social Sciences and the Humanities at EUR (Post-graduate level).

Besides his interests in philosophy and teaching, Christian is a big fan of spending time with his son and wife, watching quality tv-series, playing basketball, and listening to music, in particular 19th and 20th century classical music and fusion jazz.