Greater Chicago Midwest HERC

Call for 2025-26 Faculty Fellows

The Institute for Ethics and the Common Good (ECG) awards 6-8 residential Faculty Fellowships annually to researchers whose work addresses the Institute's yearly Research Theme.

During the 2025-26 academic year, ECG is sponsoring research projects that investigate The Future of Virtue Ethics: Strengthening Foundations and Exploring Applications.

The 21st century poses a host of novel ethical challenges arising from tremendous technological, social, and environmental changes, requiring us to develop, strengthen, and apply our core ethical frameworks.

One such framework is virtue ethics, which emphasizes the importance of virtue and practical wisdom in leading a moral life.

In the ancient world, figures like Plato and Aristotle (in the West) and Confucius and Mencius (in the East) developed virtue ethics. It further traces roots in the wisdom tradition of Judaism. It became a powerful influence for Catholic thought through the work of Augustine and Aquinas, and it continues to be a significant ethical tradition today, with genuinely global reach.

The Notre Dame Institute for Ethics and the Common Good aims to catalyze and develop new work in virtue ethics with a series of 6-8 residential faculty research fellowships during the 2025-26 academic year.

These fellowships will bring together ethicists from across many disciplines—including philosophers, theologians, humanities scholars, social scientists, policy analysts, and legal scholars—to discern future directions of virtue ethics.

Note that while the term 'virtue ethics' has come to have a specific meaning in philosophy and theology, it should be understood broadly here to include topics such as integral human development; holistic human flourishing; character development; and the political, social and institutional structures that best foster such development. Researchers working on these topics from any disciplinary perspective are welcome to apply.

In 2025-26, one Faculty Fellowship will be co-sponsored by the History of Philosophy Forum at Notre Dame, in connection with the Forum's Historical Traditions of Ethics Research Cluster beginning in 2025. This fellowship will fund a project that investigates a topic in the history of ethics.

Program Details

Research Topics
Potential research proposal topics on The Future of Virtue Ethics may address, but are not limited to:

• Theoretical Analyses: What is virtue ethics? How is it best understood as an ethical theory? What is virtue, and what are the virtues? What is practical knowledge or wisdom? How can it be cultivated? How do particular virtues like love, humility, or generosity fit with contemporary ethical theory? How should we characterize the common good? How do we develop political and social theory rooted in core assumptions about human flourishing?
  
• Practical Applications: How can virtue ethics inform our understanding of real-world problems, such as emerging technology, migration, environmental issues, and economic and political inequality? How should we approach Just War Theory in the 21st century? How do virtue ethical frameworks inform our thinking about ethical and governance issues in business?
  
• Critical Evaluations: Is virtue ethics a plausible ethical framework? What are its main objections and can they be answered? Can it hold its own against competing theories, such as consequentialism, deontology, and natural law theory?
  
• Historical Studies: How was virtue ethics understood by Plato, Aristotle, Mencius, Confucius, and/or other historical figures? How has the view shifted over time? How should an analysis of the history of virtue ethics inform contemporary approaches to ethics?
  
• Theological Connections: How is virtue ethics present in and informed by religious texts and theological traditions? How do we apply these traditions in increasingly pluralistic and global contexts?
  
• Psychological and Sociological Connections: How have ideas about virtue and character development manifested themselves in culture and society? How does recent research in social psychology impact our assumptions about whether individuals have stable character traits and what is the current state of the art for empirical challenges to the virtue ethical framework?
  
• Technological Questions: Can machines develop virtues and/or practical wisdom? Does virtue ethics provide insight into the responsible development of AI?

ECG is also interested in supporting artistic works—fiction writing, visual arts, musical composition, etc.—that address or challenge our understanding of the importance of virtue in a moral life.

The above list is a mere sampling of projects that fit with the theme: ECG welcomes any research project that fits with the topic of virtue ethics, broadly understood, whether or not it is explicitly specified above. ECG also welcomes projects that fit the theme in creative or surprising ways.

Research Support
Faculty Fellows receive half of their base salary per academic year (up to $80,000), subsidized housing (for those who currently reside outside of the South Bend area), a research allowance of $1,000 per year, and a private office at ECG.

Fellows' home institutions provide the remainder of their salaries as well as all benefits, including health insurance.

Postdocs are welcome to apply and receive a stipend of up to $80,000 paid directly to them (rather than to a home institution). Postdocs are also provided health insurance benefits.

The Faculty Fellows will be joined by a cohort of Signature Course Fellows and Distinguished Graduate Fellows from Notre Dame who are pursuing their own projects related to The Future of Virtue Ethics and collaborate with the Faculty Fellows during weekly research seminars and other ECG events.

Throughout the year, ECG will organize robust programming to further explore the theme and cultivate collaboration, such as work-in-progress seminars, guest lectures, book clubs, film viewings, and social events.

Fellowship Expectations
All Faculty Fellows are expected to reside in the South Bend area and to remain in residence at the University of Notre Dame during the period of their fellowship (except for vacation periods, holidays, and University breaks).

Faculty Fellows are expected to be free of their regular commitments and to have their primary office at the Institute so they may devote themselves full time to the work outlined in their research proposal and participate fully in the community of scholars at the Institute.

Faculty Fellows are also expected to attend weekly seminars, present their research twice during these seminars, and attend ECG retreats, communications workshops, and other special events.

Public Engagement
ECG aims to support Faculty Fellows who are committed to making their research accessible not only to scholars from across the disciplines, but also, crucially, to the broader public who will benefit from engagement with these ideas and debates.

At ECG, Faculty Fellows present their research on these questions to their fellowship cohort, to faculty colleagues and special guests, and to the wider public each week during ECG's weekly seminars. These seminars come in a variety of formats, from masterclass sessions aimed at introducing key research components in an engaging way, to work-in-progress sessions aimed at workshopping a research challenge of the moment, to public-engagement sessions aimed at translating research insights for the public.

As part of their fellowship, Faculty Fellows also participate in multi-day fall and spring retreats that foster collaboration and provide tools and training to engage in ethical research and discussion with multi-disciplinary audiences and the community. These retreats vary from year to year, but in the past they have included a workshop with a professional communications consulting group and a workshop with an opinion editor at the New York Times.

Participation in ECG's weekly seminars and communications retreats is required for all Faculty Fellows—they are central components to making our year a success and a defining feature of our program.

Eligibility
Faculty Fellowships are open to scholars in any discipline who are conducting research related to virtue ethics.

Faculty Fellows typically have a faculty appointment at their home institution, but the fellowships are also open to independent researchers, public practitioners, postdoctoral scholars, those who have recently received their Ph.D. (or equivalent terminal) degree, those who are pursuing the creative arts, and faculty from Notre Dame. Scholars from outside the U.S. are welcome to apply—there are no citizenship requirements for these fellowships.

Current graduate students are eligible to apply only if they will receive their terminal degree by August 1, 2025.

One goal of the fellowship selection process is the creation of a diverse and collaborative community of scholars with a range of disciplines and academic ranks. Applicants who are members of traditionally under-represented groups are encouraged to apply.

Preference is given to those who can join ECG for the entire academic year (August - May), but fellowships for shorter periods of time may be possible.

Application Requirements
Applications for Faculty Fellowships must be submitted through Interfolio and should include the following:

• Completed online application form
  
• Cover letter
  
• Curriculum vitae (no more than four pages, single-spaced)
  
• Proposal abstract (no more than 400 words)
  
• Fellowship research proposal (no more than six pages double-spaced; research proposals may include a works-cited or bibliography page, which does not count toward the six-page limit). In the research proposal, applicants should provide an explanation of the project they intend to pursue at ECG, including:
  
  • How the proposed research aligns with the research theme and mission of the Institute
    
  • Preliminary objectives for the research to be conducted (i.e., whether the research might result in a book, journal article, art work, etc.)
    
  • The proposed work plan (including what research or work has already been accomplished, what will be done during the fellowship period, the methodology to be employed, and the organization of the scholarly project, book, or other work)
  
  
• Public-engagement proposal (no more than two pages, double sided). In the public-engagement proposal, applicants should explain how they plan to engage a public audience with their proposed research project (e.g., through a newspaper op-ed, public discussion, podcast episode, etc.).
  
• Two letters of reference. The letters should address the strength of the applicant's proposed research project, its fit with the 2025-2026 theme of The Future of Virtue Ethics, and the applicant's collaborative potential and collegiality. (See FAQ page for common questions about letters of reference.)
  
• (Optional) Up to two pages of non-text materials supporting the research proposal

Proposals will be evaluated on the basis of their potential for research impact, fit with the theme, and fit with the Institute's mission.

Finalists will be asked to be available for a brief Zoom conversation with committee members during the final stage of the selection process.

Applications
Applications for Faculty Fellowships on The Future of Virtue Ethics are due by Monday, October 14, 2024 at 11:59 p.m. (EDT).

If you have questions about the application process for our Faculty Fellowships, please visit our FAQ page. Additional questions may be directed to Kristian Olsen at kolsen1@nd.edu.





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