Why Institutions Matter: Religious Perspectives on Building and Sustaining Institutions,..
Kristen Deede Johnson
90.15
23 January 2023
14 November 2025
Why Institutions Matter: Religious Perspectives on Building and Sustaining Institutions in a Fractured Society
Thursday, January 19, 2023, 7 p.m.
Knight Hall's Emerson Auditorium at Washington University in St. Louis
The John C. Danforth Center on Religion and Politics sponsored this dialogue between some of the nation’s foremost thinkers on institutions and religious pluralism with focus on the challenges and opportunities of building and sustaining civic institutions in a polarized society. Speakers included Richard Garnett (Notre Dame Law School), Shadi Hamid (Brookings Institution), Kristen Deede Johnson (Western Seminary), and Yuval Levin (American Enterprise Institute). The panel was moderated by Professor John Inazu, who holds a joint appointment with the John C. Danforth Center on Religion and Politics and the Washington University School of Law.
ABOUT THE SPEAKERS
Richard W. Garnett is the Paul J. Schierl/Fort Howard Corporation Professor of Law at University of Notre Dame Law School. He teaches and writes about the freedoms of speech, association, and religion and constitutional law more generally.
Shadi Hamid is a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution and an assistant research professor of Islamic studies at Fuller Seminary. He is also a contributing writer at The Atlantic, where he writes a monthly essay on culture and politics.
Kristen Deede Johnson is the G.W. and Edna Haworth Professor of Educational Ministries and Leadership and the Dean and Vice President of Academic Affairs at Western Theological Seminary. Her teaching and scholarship engage areas of theology, discipleship and formation, justice, culture, and political theory.
Yuval Levin is the director of Social, Cultural, and Constitutional Studies at the American Enterprise Institute (AEI), where he also holds the Beth and Ravenel Curry Chair in Public Policy. The founder and editor of National Affairs, he is also a senior editor at The New Atlantis, a contributing editor at National Review, and a contributing opinion writer at The New York Times.
John Inazu is the Sally D. Danforth Distinguished Professor of Law and his scholarship focuses on the First Amendment freedoms of speech, assembly, and religion, and related questions of legal and political theory.
Read more about our speakers and this event at: https://rap.wustl.edu/events/why-institutions-matter/