Joseph Runzo

Joseph Runzo "is Professor of Philosophy and Religious Studies at Chapman University, California; Life Member of Clare Hall, Cambridge University; and Founding Executive Director of the Global Ethics and Religion Forum, an international NGO and federal non-profit educational organization. He received his BA from the University of California, Irvine; his MA and Ph.D. in philosophy from the University of Michigan; his MTS in theological studies from Harvard University, and studied South Asian Religion and culture as an NEH Fellow at the East-West Center of the University of Hawaii.  His principle areas of teaching, research and publication are human rights, the ethics of war, human sexuality and sexual ethics, global philosophy of religion, and comparative religious ethics.

"Dr. Runzo has published ten books, more than forty-five articles and three dozen photographs. He has received six awards and fellowships from the National Endowment for the Humanities, and a British Spalding Trust Award for research in India.  In addition, he is the executive producer for the Global Ethics and Religion Forum's documentary project Patterns for Peace; general co-editor with Dr. Nancy N. Martin of The Library of Global Ethics and Religion; a member of the editorial board of the journal Faith and Philosophy; Honorary Research Scholar at the Centre for the Study of World Religions, University of Wales, Lampeter; and a member of the advisory board of the Citizen Peace-building Program, University of California, Irvine.

"Dr Runzo has been a Visiting Fellow at the Centre of International Studies at Cambridge University, England, and has lectured extensively around the world in China, India, Thailand, Australia, South Africa, Spain, Germany, England, Wales, Scotland, Canada, and the U.S. He has been an invited speaker on human rights and the ethics of war at both the Third and Fourth Parliaments of the World's Religions in Capetown, South Africa and Barcelona, Spain. He was the keynote speaker at the 72nd Congress of the Canadian Federation of the Humanities and Social Sciences, and he was a plenary speaker at the International Conference "World Peace: Problem for a Global Era" in Gujarat, India. He has delivered the McManis Lectures at Wheaton College and the Lowell Lecture at Boston University.

"He is currently completing three books: War and the Destruction of the Soul, War and Reconciliation and Global Medical Ethics. He is also directing the Global Ethics and Religion Forum's project to revise Just War Theory for the 21st century. This 5-year project involves approximately 50 prominent ethicists, international lawyers, experts in international relations, experts in public policy, and scholars of the world religions and is projected to produce a 3-volume study."