CURRICULUM VITAE
John Paul Rollert
2746 N. Hampden Court, #2-O
Chicago, IL 60614
(617) 594-5124
[email protected]
HIGHER EDUCATION
Ph.D. Candidate, The John U. Nef Committee on Social Thought, The University of Chicago
(Degree Expected: Winter 2017)
M.A. Thesis: “A Hero for Our Time: The Prudent Man in Adam Smith”
Focus: Ethics, Political Economy, Literature
J.D., Yale Law School (2011)
Focus: Jurisprudence, Constitutional Law, Business Organizations
A.B., Harvard University (2001)
Honors: magna cum laude
Concentration: Social Studies
TEACHING EXPERIENCE
The University of Chicago Booth School of Business
38115 Ethics of Business (Spring 2012, Fall 2012, Summer 2013, Winter 2014, Spring 2014,
Fall 2014, Winter 2015, Fall 2015, scheduled Winter 2017, scheduled Spring 2017)
The University of Chicago Harris School of Public Policy
PPHA 40010 Leadership and Modern American Politics (Spring 2013, Spring 2014, Spring
2015, Spring 2016)
The University of Chicago Law School
LAWS 75105 Leadership and Modern American Politics (Spring 2016)
LAWS 75104 Leading, Following, and Parting Ways (Spring 2014)
LAWS 75102 Leadership (Spring 2013)
Harvard Extension School
GOVT E-1353 Leadership Lessons from Modern Presidential Politics (January Term 2014,
January 2015, January 2016, scheduled January 2017)
MGMT S-4150 Principles and Lessons on Leadership (January Term 2012)
MGMT E-4195 Business Ethics (January Term 2011)
Harvard Summer School
GOVT E-1353 Leadership Lessons from Modern Presidential Politics (Summer 2015, Summer
2016)
MGMT S-4150 Leadership (Summer 2010, 2011, 2012)
OBHR S-192 Principles and Lessons on Leadership (Summer 2008, 2009)
MGMT S-156 Business Ethics (Summer 2008)
SSAM S-133 Business Ethics: Principles and (Mal)Practices (Summer 2005, 2006, 2007)
GOVT S-10 Introduction to Political Philosophy, Teaching Fellow (Summer 2003, 2004)
Yale College
CCSY 310 Leadership and Politics (Fall 2014)
RESEARCH PAPERS & ACADEMIC BOOK REVIEWS
“The B-School Experiment and the Rise of Renegade Capitalism” Critical Inquiry (forthcoming)
Review of Clifford Longley’s Just Money: How Catholic Social Teaching Can Redeem
Capitalism (London: Theos, 2014) Common Knowledge Vol. 22, Number 3
“How To Succeed in Life: Benjamin Franklin at Business School” Common Knowledge Vol. 21,
Number 3 (2015)
“Shakespeare and the Theater of the Self” Raritan Vol. 34, Number 4 (2015)
“Standing in Barack Obama's Shoes: Judging the President's Jurisprudence of Empathy by
James Wilson's Jurisprudence of Common Sense” The Journal of Law, Culture and the
Humanities Volume 10, Issue 2 (2014)
“Does the Top Really Support the Bottom? - Adam Smith and the Problem of the Commercial
Pyramid” Business and Society Review Volume 116, Issue 2 (2011)
“Reversed on Appeal: The Uncertain Future of President Obama’s “Empathy Standard” 120 The
Yale Law Journal Online 89 (2010)
RESEARCH PAPERS IN PROGRESS
“Whose Name Is on the Line? Public Reputation and Personal Success in a Free Market”
“The Gift Outright? Philanthropic Aspirations for the Business Elite”
OTHER WRITING
“A Snuff Film at Harvard” Boulevard (forthcoming)
“Is the modern economy morally flawed?” Chicago Booth Review (Seventh Post in Conventional
Wisdom Series), August 1, 2016
“Bernie Sanders, the Keynesian candidate” Chicago Booth Review (Sixth Post in Conventional
Wisdom Series), July 29, 2016
“What anti-capitalists in Cleveland portend for Philadelphia” Chicago Booth Review (Fifth Post
in Conventional Wisdom Series), July 26, 2016
“Arguing with Milton Friedman” Chicago Booth Review (Fourth Post in Conventional Wisdom
Series), July 25, 2016
“Night Three of the RNC and a Negative Lesson in Management” The Huffington Post, July 22,
2016
“A binary choice” Chicago Booth Review (Third Post in Conventional Wisdom Series), July 21,
2016
“Free trade and George Orwell” Chicago Booth Review (Second Post in Conventional Wisdom
Series), July 20, 2016
“Party problems and postscarcity politics” Chicago Booth Review (First Post in Conventional
Wisdom Series), July 18, 2016
“Do we really need more Cheetos?” Chicago Booth Review, Fall Issue 2016
“A Lap at Indy” Harper’s Magazine, June 30, 2016
“Bernie Sanders and the price of dignity” Chicago Booth Review, Summer Issue 2016
“Of Morals and Markets” The University of Chicago Magazine, Spring Issue 2016
“An unappreciated virtue in business—patience” Chicago Booth Review Blog, May 4, 2016
“An Ethicist Reads The Art of the Deal” The Atlantic, March 31, 2016
“Temperance” & “Chastity” Ben Franklin Circles, January 18, 2016
“My spirited debate with Ben Baldanza, former CEO of America's most hated airline” Capital
Ideas Blog, January 14, 2016
“American Childhood, as Seen Through Early Kids' Magazines” The Atlantic, December 7, 2015
“Second Founding” The Point, November 30, 2015
“Paul Ryan and the “Moral Case” for Capitalism” Los Angeles Review of Books, October 29,
2015
“Between the World and Me: Empathy is a Privilege” The Atlantic, September 28, 2015
“How America Lost Track of Ben Franklin’s Definition of Success” The Atlantic (Part of the
“American Dreams” series), September 2, 2015
“The flesh is weak, but Spirit is willing: Flying the Worst Airline in America” Capital Ideas,
Summer Issue 2015
“Dispirited: A business school professor studies the world's worst airline” The New Republic,
April 16, 2015
“Vegas Odds” Harper’s Magazine, April 10, 2015
“Meeting Ayn Rand on the Las Vegas Strip” The Atlantic, December 15, 2014
“Disagree in Good Faith?” Slate, October 30, 2014
“The Will to Believe” Paris Review, October 8, 2014
“If Greed Is God, Why Is Insider Trading Bad?” The Atlantic, September 17, 2014
“Shakespeare, Heartthrob” Paris Review, April 23, 2013
“Was Shakespeare a Good Actor?” The Atlantic, April 23, 2014
“Greed Is Good: A 300-Year History of a Dangerous Idea” The Atlantic, April 7, 2014
“An Ethicist on Wolf of Wall Street: The Most Anti-Greed Movie Ever?” The Atlantic, February
26, 2014
“How Leaders Can Learn from Presidential Politics” The Spark (The Blog of the Harvard
Extension School), February 17, 2014
“The Invisible Heart: Adam Smith Reconsidered” The Los Angeles Review of Books, December
14, 2013
“What Adam Smith Can Teach Us About Incentives in Higher Education” Boston Review,
November 4, 2013
“Empathy, Gatsby, and the Great American Tragedy” The Huffington Post, May 16, 2013
“Five Principles for Moral Leadership” The Huffington Post, January 25, 2013
“What Obama should say in his second inaugural” Salon, January 20, 2013
“How much is enough to make a banker happy?” Salon, January 6, 2013
“Five Lessons from the Presidential Debates” The Spark (The Blog of the Harvard Extension
School), October 30, 2012
“Sleight of the ‘Invisible Hand’” The New York Times, October 21, 2012
“Mitt Romney’s ‘Factual Dexterity’ and the Presidential Debates” The Huffington Post, October
2, 2012
“Ryan the Salesman Won’t Take No for an Answer” Bloomberg View, August 28, 2012
“Limit Cases: Michael Sandel’s What Money Can’t Buy” The Point, August 13, 2012
“Six Principles for Business Ethics” The Huffington Post, July 11, 2012
“The Primal Ache: What Adam Smith Knew about Inequality” Boston Review, May 23, 2012
“President Obama’s ‘cool’ factor” The Washington Post, May 16, 2012
“A Tale of Two Smiths: What Capitalism's Founder Would Think of Goldman's Greed” Next
New Deal: Blog of the Roosevelt Institute (reprinted at The Huffington Post), April 20, 2012
“The enduring fallacy of the CEO President” Politico, February 24, 2012
“American presidents share these key leadership qualities” The Spark (The Blog of the Harvard
Extension School), February 20, 2012
“A Matter of Trusts” Slate, December 20, 2011
“A Failure of Will: Roland Emmerich’s Anonymous” The Point, December 12, 2011
“The moral crisis of modern capitalism” Salon, November 9, 2011
“The hardy myth of ‘job creators’” Salon, September 28, 2011
“Justice Sotomayor – not guilty of ‘empathy’” The Christian Science Monitor Weekly Review,
August 29, 2011
“What Would Adam Smith Think of the Idea of “Job Creators”? Rortybomb (reprinted at Salon),
August 8, 2011
“The Great Infidel at 300” The Huffington Post, June 4, 2011
“Obama’s Empathy for the Supreme Court” The Huffington Post, March 22, 2011
“Sam Alito: Setting the "Empathy Standard" for the Supreme Court” The Huffington Post, March
16, 2011
“Students Teach Business Ethics” Harvard Business Review Online, March 1, 2011
“Adam Smith and the Wall Street Bonuses” The Huffington Post, February 16, 2011
“From bureaucrat to businessman: Orszag's path reveals what really seals deals” The Christian
Science Monitor, January 24, 2011
“Going Beyond Business Ethics-as-Castor Oil” (Third in a Three Part Series on Business Ethics
after the Financial Crisis) Harvard Business Review Online, October 14, 2010
“Does the Tea Party Take the Constitution Seriously?” The Huffington Post, October 6, 2010
“The Problem with Capitalism? Capitalists.” (Second in a Three Part Series on Business Ethics
after the Financial Crisis) Harvard Business Review Online, September 22, 2010
“When Lehman’s Fall Called Capitalism into Question” (First in a Three Part Series on Business
Ethics after the Financial Crisis) Harvard Business Review Online, September 15, 2010
“A Coda to the Kagan Nomination: Empathy, Impartiality and the (Mis)Education of Jeff
Sessions” The Huffington Post, August 16, 2010
“Ben Franklin’s MBA Oath” Harvard Business Review Online, July 28, 2010
“The surprising star at Elena Kagan's hearing: Thurgood Marshall” Christian Science Monitor,
July 8, 2010 (reprinted in The Baltimore Sun, July 12, 2010)
“Leading in a New Direction: Barack Obama’s Changing Leadership Style” The Huffington
Post, July 2, 2010
“Elena Kagan: Would she embody empathy as a Supreme Court justice?” The Christian Science
Monitor, May 10, 2010
“Goldman Sachs bonuses: more than just bad PR” The Christian Science Monitor, December 18,
2009
“Bernard Madoff, Adam Smith, and capitalism’s moral crisis” The Christian Science Monitor,
September 21, 2009
CREATIVE WRITING
“Recollections of a Ruin” New Orleans Review, Volume 41, Issue 1 (2015)
“Last Rites” Midway Journal, Volume 9, Issue 1 (2015)
“The Passing of the Spoon” The Homestead Review, Number 31 (2014)
“Eddie McConnehey Contemplates Martyrdom” The Madison Review, Volume 22, Number 2
(2001)
“How We Say Things” The Harvard Advocate, Winter Issue (2001)
PRESENTATIONS AND PANELS
“Authority and Influence: An Introduction.” Delivered at the Invitation of Laspau: Academic
and Professional Programs for the Americas, Harvard University, July 5, 2016
“The Application and Implication of Dale Carnegie Strategies on Leadership.” Delivered at the
Invitation of the University of Chicago Booth Leadership Group, April 30, 2015
“A “Nobel” Vision of Business Ethics.” Speech Delivered at the University of Chicago Booth
School of Business Autumn Quarter Graduate Dinner, December 4, 2015
“The Empathy of Sam Alito.” Delivered at the Invitation of Professor Daniel Urman to Legal
Studies S-111 Understanding the Modern Supreme Court, Harvard Summer School, July 27,
2015
“Capitalism and Customer Service: A ‘Spirited’ Debate.” Moderated Discussion with Ben
Baldanza and Eric Zorn, The University of Chicago Booth School of Business, June 6, 2015
“The Long Tragic Life of Oliver Eddleson: A Work of Speculative Fiction.” Delivered at the
Literature and Philosophy Workshop, The University of Chicago, May 19, 2015
“The Limits of Empathy and Shakespeare’s Theater of the Self.” Delivered at The John U. Nef
Committee on Social Thought Colloquium, The University of Chicago, April 12, 2015
“How Should We Think about the Relationship Between Business and Government?” Moderated
Discussion with E. J. Dionne, The University of Chicago Booth School of Business,
February 23, 2015
“Business and Politics in the Age of Obama.” Moderated Discussion with Mike Konczal and
Megan McArdle, The University of Chicago Booth School of Business, December 6, 2014
“Charisma or Competency? - Two Approaches to Leadership by Way of Modern American
Presidential Politics.” Delivered at the Invitation of the Yale University Office of
International Affairs to the Nigerian Leadership Initiative, October 28, 2014
“This Time It’s Personal: A Presentation on the Evolving Ethics of Commercial Relationships.”
A Corporate Presentation Delivered at the Invitation of Belly, September 26, 2014
“The Intersection of Business and Government.” Moderated Discussion with Jordan Weissmann,
The University of Chicago Booth School of Business, May 29, 2014
“Adam Smith’s Invisible Hand” – The Story Behind the Most Famous Phrase in Economics.”
Delivered at the Invitation of The University of Chicago Booth School of Business for
Reconnect Weekend, May 17, 2014
“A Jurisprudence of Uncertainty: Empathy, Umpires, and the Supreme Court.” Delivered at the
Invitation of the Northeastern University Doctorate of Law & Policy Program, February 9,
2014
“Appeals to the Head and Heart: What Presidential Politics Can Teach Us About Leadership.”
Delivered at the Invitation of the MBA/MS Marketing Association, Hofstra University,
November 16, 2012
“‘Fatherland’ and the Fiction of Nightmare.” Delivered at The John U. Nef Committee on Social
Thought Colloquium, The University of Chicago, November 15, 2011
“The Great Gatsby and the Insensible Imagination.” Delivered at the Literature and Philosophy
Workshop, The University of Chicago, May 26, 2011
“How We Say Things: A Reading and Talk.” Delivered at St. Anthony Hall, Yale University,
April 22, 2009
“Un Objetivo personal y professional.” Delivered at I Congreso Conciliación, Pozuelo, Spain,
February 25, 2009
“How We Say Things: A Reading and Talk.” Delivered at The John U. Nef Committee on
Social Thought Colloquium, The University of Chicago, November 19, 2007
“Vision, Principles, and Message.” Panel Discussion, Rebuilding the Democratic Party and the
Left, Harvard Law School, April 5, 2005
REFEREEING
Leadership (Sage), This is Philosophy series (Wiley)
PROFESSIONAL RESPONSIBLITIES AND EXPERIENCE
Global Alumni, Board of Directors (Since August 2014)
The University of Chicago Committee on Social Thought Creative Writing Dinner Series,
Founder and Organizer (November 2010-May 2015)
Obama for America Re-Election Headquarters, Finance Team (October 2011-November 2012)
Obama for America Campaign Headquarters, Public Policy Team (September 2007-November
2008)
Obama for America Campaign Headquarters, Political Outreach Team (May 2007-July 2008)
Executive Office of the United Nations Secretary-General, Speechwriting Unit (Winter 2001)
HONORS AND AWARDS
Dean’s Commendation for Distinguished Teaching Performance, Harvard University Extension
School Faculty (2014, 2015, 2016)
Featured Syllabus, CasePlace.org, The Aspen Institute Center for Business Education
Exchange Scholar, Yale University (Spring, 2009)
Harvard College Dean’s List (1996-2001)
John Harvard Scholar (1996-2001)
Harvard College Edward Eager Prize for Fiction Writing (2000)
MEDIA INTERVIEWS
The Washington Post, Chicago Tribune, Associated Press, National Public Radio, The Boston
Herald, Air America, Bigger Picture with Timothy Spangler, The Jon McComb Show, Coco
Soodek Live, Financial Post, At Night with Dan Riendeau, The University of Chicago Magazine,
Poets and Quants, BBC Capital
OTHER MEDIA COVERAGE
USA Today, Washington Monthly, Boston Globe, National Review Online (Bench Memos),
Reuters, SCOTUSblog, Rortybomb, The Paris Review, Harvard Law and Policy Review, The
American Conservative, NPR, National Post, Associated Press, Chicago Reader, Christian
Science Monitor, Ayn Rand Institute, Business Insider, Harvard Business Review Blog, Andrew
Sullivan’s The Dish, Fortune