Professor Ober has published a number of books and articles on various aspects of ancient Greek history; in recent years his interests have centered on Athenian democracy and Greek political thought. His book Mass and Elite in Democratic Athens won the Goodwin Award of Merit in 1989. His current research includes projects on self-governing organizations (ancient and modern), on the circulation of social and technical knowledge in democratic societies, and on the the interplay between political philosophy and culture.

2005 Wesson Lectures in Problems of Democracy. Stanford University
2004-5 Center for the Advanced Study of the Behavioral Sciences. Fellowship (residential)
2001 Nichols Visiting Professor in Humanities and the Public Sphere. U. of California at Irvine
2000 Professeur invité. Centre de recherche Gustave Glotz, Université Paris 1 Sorbonne
1997 Clare Hall, Cambridge. Visiting Fellowship
1997 National Endowment for the Humanities. Fellowship for University Teachers
1996-97 John Simon Guggenheim Foundation. Fellowship
1994 Charles Beebe Martin Classical Lectures. Oberlin College.
1991 Visiting Fellow, University of New England, Australia.
1989-90 American Council of Learned Societies. Fellowship
1989 American Philological Association. Charles J. Goodwin Award of Merit (year's best book)
for Mass and Elite in Democratic Athens
1989 Montana State University. Wiley Award for Meritorious Research
1989-90 Center for Hellenic Studies. Fellowship (residential)
1989 National Endowment for Humanities. Summer Research Stipend
1983-84 National Humanities Center. Fellowship (residential)
1981 American Council of Learned Societies. Fellowship for Recent Ph.D's
1981 National Endowment for Humanities. Summer Research Stipend

2004-2009 Senior Fellow. Center for Hellenic Studies.
2003-4 Paul H. Nitze Senior Fellow, St. Mary’s College (Maryland). 3 Lectures.
2003 Biggs Resident in Classics. Washington University in St. Louis. 3 Lectures.
2002-3 Acting Director. University Center for Human Values. Princeton University
1999-2002. Senior Fellow. Princeton Society of Fellows in the Liberal Arts.
1999-2000. Acting Director. Program in Hellenic Studies. Princeton University.
1997 (June), 1999 (June) New York University. Faculty Resource Network Workshops on "The
Classical World" (Diversity and Democracy, Ancient Slavery). Organizer.
1995-99 Member of the Editorial Board and the Board of Trustees, Princeton University Press
(Member of the Finance Committee of the Board of Trustees 1998, Chair of the Editorial
Board and Member of the Executive Committee of the Board of Trustees 1999).
1992-95 Board of Directors, American Philological Association.
1989-94 Co-Director, "Democracy 2500" Project. Public programs commemorating the origins
of democracy. Sponsored by the American School of Classical Studies at Athens, U.S.
National Archives, NEH, Cafritz and Leventis Foundations.

Undergraduate Courses
Political Science 237/337: Models of Democracy
Political Science 332R: Greek Political Economy I
Political Science 332S: Greek Political Economy II

Books

Political Dissent in Democratic Athens: Intellectual Critics of Popular Rule. Princeton
University Press: Princeton 1998.
             • Paperback ed. 2001.

The Athenian Revolution. Essays on Ancient Greek Democracy and Political Theory. Princeton
University Press: Princeton 1996.
            • Paperback ed. 1999.

Mass and Elite in Democratic Athens: Rhetoric, Ideology, and the Power of the People.
Princeton University Press: Princeton 1989.
           • Winner of the Goodwin Award for best book of the year, American Philological Association, 1989
           • Paperback ed. 1991.
           • Modern Greek edition: Mazes kai Elit stê Dêmokratikê Athêna. Polytropon: Athens 2003.
           • Chapter 4 reprinted in Oxford Readings in Attic Orators (forthcoming)

Fortress Attica: Defense of the AthenianLand Frontier, 404-322 B.C. Mnemosyne Supplement
84. E.J. Brill: Leiden 1985.

Edited Books

Demokratia: A Conversation on Democracies, Ancient and Modern (ed. J. Ober and C. Hedrick),
Princeton University Press: Princeton 1996.

Athenian Political Thought and the Reconstruction of American Democracy (ed. J. P. Euben, J.
Wallach, and J. Ober), Cornell University Press: Ithaca 1994.

The Craft of the Ancient Historian: Essays in Honor of Chester G. Starr (ed. J.W. Eadie and J.
Ober), University Press of America: Lanham, Maryland 1985.

Textbooks and Books for Non-Academic Audiences

A Company of Citizens: What the World's First Democracy Teaches Leaders about Building
Great Organizations (co-author, with Brook Manville) Harvard Business School Press: Boston,
2003.
           • Modern Greek edition. Klidarithmos: Athens forthcoming.
           • Chinese edition. CITIC Publishing House forthcoming.

The Threshold of Democracy: Athens in 403 B.C. 2nd edition (co-author, with Mark C. Carnes)
Reacting to the Past Series. Pearson Custom Publishing: New York 2003. Textbook.
           • “Reacting to the Past” won the Theodore Hesburgh Award: “outstanding pedagogical initiative for               2004.”

The Anatomy of Error: Ancient Military Disasters and Their Lessons for Modern Strategists (coauthor,
with B.S. Strauss) St. Martin's Press: New York, 1990.
           • Paperback ed. 1992.

The Birth of Democracy. Exhibition catalogue, National Archives Rotunda, June 15 1993 -
January 2 1994 (ed. J. Ober and C. Hedrick), American School of Classical Studies at Athens:
Princeton, 1993.

Forthcoming

Book: Athenian Legacies: Essays on the Politics of Going on Together. Princeton University
Press.
Chapter: "The productive marginality of political philosophy in democratic Athens." In
The Shape of the Humanities. Keith Baker (ed.). Stanford University Press.
Chapter: "Democratic Athens (508-322 B.C.): An exemplary historical narrative and the project
of political theory." For A. Creager et al. (eds.) Science Without Laws: Model Systems, Cases
and Exemplary Narratives. Duke University Press.
Chapter: "Athenian Law and Political Theory." For Cambridge Companion to Greek Law. David
Cohen and Michael Gagarin (eds.). Cambridge University Press.
Chapter: "Thucydides and the Invention of Politial Science." For Brill Companion to Thucydides.
Chapter: "Trial and Condemnation: Socrates and Athenian Democracy," For Cambridge
Companion to Socrates. Donald Morrison (ed.). Cambridge University Press.

Recent Papers

2004
New York Classical Club.
Northwestern University. Aristotle Conference.
University of Bergen, Norway (2 lectures).
St. Mary's College (Maryland). Nitze Fellows Program (2 lectures)

2003
Katholieke Universiteit Nijmegen (Holland). Solon Conference (paper read in absentia)
Univerity of Chicago. Conference on Politics and Ancient History
Institute for Advanced Study (Princeton). Conference on Greek thought in Islam.
USC/UCLA Greek Seminar: Authority and Its Resistances in Greek Cuture.
Washington University in St. Louis. Biggs Resident in Classics (3 lectures)
Macalester College. International Center and Classics Department.
St. Mary's College (Maryland). History Dept, Democracy Center, Nitze Fellows
Yale University. Classics Conference on Use and Abuse of the Past.
Columbia University. Political Philosophy Colloquium
Columbia University. Law and Society Seminar.
University of Chicago. Danziger Lecture in Humanities.
Ohio State University. Schlam Memorial Lecture.
Rutgers University. Classics Graduate Student Group.

2002
National Humanities Center. Conference in Honor of W.R. Connor.
University of Michigan. Inaugural Platsis Symposium on War and Democracy
UC Santa Cruz. Practicing Democracy. Symposium in honor of Peter Euben.
Florida State University. Langford Conference on Athenian Democracy.
Soonsgil University, Seoul, South Korea. Inaugural President's Lecture.
Bristol University (UK). British Academy Centenary Lecture.
Wellesley College. Departments of Classics and Politics (2 lectures)
Dickinson College. Classics Department.
Cornell University. Department of History. Sibley/LaFeber Lecture.
University of South Florida, Tampa. American Foundation for Greek Culture and Language. Keynote