Ronald van Raak will become professor of ‘Erasmian values’ at Erasmus University Rotterdam. With this part-time appointment, he will return to the faculty where he once studied philosophy. Van Raak was a member of parliament for the SP for fifteen years.
As a member of parliament, he was concerned with the integrity of governance and the protection of whistleblowers. Within Erasmus School of Philosophy, he will focus on questions concerning academic integrity and trust in science:
‘What are the limits of academic freedom? To what extent may commerce be of influence in science? Why is science more than simply an opinion? These are questions a university community should tackle in order to determine its place in society. Erasmus University can draw inspiration from its namesake here, and from the values this great European thinker stood for.’
- Ronald van Raak
Van Raak studied social history and philosophy at Erasmus University, where he graduated in 1996. In 2000, he obtained his PhD at the University of Amsterdam with In naam van het volmaakte (‘In the name of the perfect’), a study of conservatism in the Netherlands. As a member of parliament, he wrote books on the intersection of politics and philosophy, including Op zoek naar vrijheid. Een filosoof in de politiek (‘In Search of Freedom. A Philosopher in Politics’, 2012); Op zoek naar ons. De politiek door andere ogen (‘Looking for us. Politics through different eyes’, 2015); De Tweede Kamer is geen talkshow (‘The Lower House is not a talk show’, 2017)