About

Brian Kogelmann is an Associate Professor of Philosophy and Political Science at Purdue University. His research focuses on social and political philosophy, with published work on topics including liberalism, property rights, reparations, the methodology of the social sciences, Marx's theory of false consciousness, and the ethics of the U.S. Senate filibuster. He has authored a book titled "Secret Government: The Pathologies of Publicity," which addresses transparency in government. Kogelmann has also founded the major in Philosophy, Politics, and Economics at the University of Maryland, College Park, and has held academic positions at West Virginia University and the University of Maryland. He is an Affiliated Fellow at the F.A. Hayek Program for Advanced Studies in Philosophy, Politics, and Economics at the Mercatus Center at George Mason University. Currently, he is working on a monograph for Cambridge University Press on meritocracy and politics, with future projects including books on economic growth and political parties.

Research topics

• Sociology
• Political Science
• Philosophy
• Law
• Positive economics
• Computer Science
• Economics
• Law and economics
• Public relations
• Epistemology
• Internet privacy
• Engineering

Selected publications

• Sortition and cognitive ability

  Politics Philosophy & Economics · 2026-01-21 · 1 citations

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  There is a growing sense that representative democracy is in crisis, leading to renewed interest in alternative institutional designs. One popular proposal—what I call legislative sortition —says we should replace elected legislators with randomly selected citizens. While legislative sortition has drawn both numerous supporters and critics, one objection has received little attention: that ordinary citizens’ lower cognitive abilities, relative to elected officials, will diminish the quality of governance. This paper articulates and evaluates this concern, distinguishing between several versions of it. I argue that some forms of the objection are implausibly strong, but that a suitably qualified version can be defended. Although this does not provide a decisive reason to reject legislative sortition, it meaningfully shapes how we should assess its promise.

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• Legitimate expectations in the age of innovation

  AI and Ethics · 2026-01-28 · 1 citations

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• Autonomy, zoning, and gentrification

  Politics Philosophy & Economics · 2025-04-03 · 3 citations

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  Zoning severely limits what individuals can do with their private property. There is also empirical evidence that zoning contributes to the housing affordability crisis. There are good reasons to be skeptical of zoning, yet it is ubiquitous. What (if anything) can justify this widespread yet dubious practice? I critically examine one argument in this paper. The argument says zoning is justified because it facilitates autonomy. After a charitable reconstruction of the argument, I present what I think is a decisive objection to it. While the autonomy defense of zoning ultimately fails, the analysis provides insight into a related topic: gentrification. Many articulate what's wrong with gentrification by arguing that it inhibits autonomy. Reflections on zoning and autonomy show that this claim must be curtailed and common remedies to the problem of gentrification reconsidered.

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• Introduction

  2025-01-01

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• Ideology vs. Collective Action

  Erkenntnis · 2025-02-14 · 3 citations

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• Prosecuting Politicians

  Res Publica · 2025-10-03

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  Abstract This paper examines the argument that prosecutors should consider public perceptions when deciding to prosecute political figures. This was a popular argument marshalled to criticize the many prosecutions of former and current United States president Donald J. Trump. Using the tools of analytic philosophy, I construct what I think is the most compelling version of this argument. The argument is not obviously wrong but does encounter problems. I raise what I think are two decisive objections against it. I conclude that prosecutors need not worry about perceptions of political motivation when deciding to charge political figures.

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• Natasha Piano, <i>Democratic Elitism: The Founding Myth of American Political Science</i>

  Philosophy &amp Public Affairs · 2025-06-10

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  ABSTRACT All a political system needs to be democratic, according to this minimal definition, is competitive elections. Where does this understanding of democracy come from? The standard story says from two Italian thinkers, Vilfredo Pareto and Gaetano Mosca, who inspired the German Robert Michels, who inspired the Austrian Joseph Schumpeter, who brought it across the Atlantic to the United States when he took a job at Harvard.

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• Political Meritocracy in the 21st Century

  Cambridge University Press eBooks · 2025-11-26 · 4 citations

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  Political meritocrats believe political power should be allocated according to virtue and competence. It is an old idea, going back at least to Plato. But what is old is new again, as several political philosophers have recently proposed and defended novel articulations of this ancient idea. The purpose of this short monograph is to offer a critical overview of this literature. I cover three schools of thought. I first look at epistocracy, a form of government identical to modern liberal democracies, except voting power is allocated to citizens according to competence. I then turn to Confucian meritocracy, where more blatantly nondemocratic forms of political meritocracy are defended. I finally look at democratic meritocracy, which is the idea that elections either do or could (if they were appropriately reformed) select virtuous and competent leaders. I end by offering reasons to think the entire enterprise of political meritocracy rests on a mistake.

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• Political Epistemology

  2024-10-10 · 1 citations

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  Epistemology is the study of knowledge and political philosophy the study of political institutions and values. At their intersection is political epistemology, which we define as the study of knowledge in political contexts specifically. It is a new and rapidly growing field. The purpose of this entry is to offer a very brief introduction to the main topics and debates in this nascent field. We break down the field of political epistemology into three subfields: the micro level, which focuses on the beliefs of individuals in their capacity as participants in politics, the macro level, which focuses on the relationship between political institutions and knowledge, and the meso level, which focuses on intermediate institutions such as social media networks and other online ecosystems.

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• The Demand and Supply of False Consciousness

  Social Philosophy and Policy · 2024-01-01 · 1 citations

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  Abstract Why do oppressive social and political systems persist for as long as they do? Critical theorists posit that the oppressed are in the grip of ideology or false consciousness, leading them voluntarily to accept their servitude. An objection to this explanation points out that we have no account of how the ruling class’s ideology comes to dominate. One common reply says that the ruling class’s ideology comes to dominate because they control major organizations such as schools, churches, and news agencies. This response is seriously flawed, I argue. I then explore an alternative, neglected answer: The ruling class’s ideology dominates because believing it is good for the oppressed. After sketching some details, I explore the implications of this account for critical theory as a research program.

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Frequent coauthors

• Stephen G. W. Stich

  4 shared

• Jeffrey Carroll

  West Virginia University

  3 shared

• Alexander William Salter

  3 shared

• Hun Chung

  Emory University

  3 shared

• Benjamin Ogden

  Texas A&M University

  3 shared

• Robert H. Wallace

  1 shared

• Gerald Gaus

  1 shared

• Benjamín C. Ogden

  Texas A&M University

  1 shared