Josiah Ober is Constantine Mitsotakis Professor in the School of Humanities and Science, professor of political science and classics, and professor of philosophy (by courtesy) at Stanford University. He is the founder and currently faculty director of the Stanford Civics Initiative. Ober joined the Stanford faculty in 2006, having previously taught at Princeton and Montana State universities. Ober’s scholarship focuses on historical institutionalism and political theory, especially democratic theory and the contemporary relevance of the political thought and practice of the ancient Greek world. He is the author of The Civic Bargain: How Democracy Survives (with Brook Manville, 2023), The Greeks and the Rational: The Discovery of Practical Reason (2022), Demopolis: Democracy Before Liberalism (2017), The Rise and Fall of Classical Greece (2015), and other books and articles.