dr. CDC (Christian) van der Veeke

Biography

Christian van der Veeke (1980) is a senior lecturer in the Humanities and the current Major Coordinator for Political Philosophy and Critical Theory at Erasmus University College (EUC), which is part of Erasmus University Rotterdam (EUR). 

Christian studied philosophy at EUR and received his master's degree in 2007. His master thesis Home Sickness of Philosophy. An Analysis and Evaluation of the Philosophical Use of Alienation (in Dutch: Heimwee van de filosofie. Een analyse en evaluatie van de wijsgerige toepassing van vervreemding) was awarded the Leo Polak thesis price in 2009, a nationwide award for the best MA-thesis in the field of the humanities.

Christian received his doctorate in philosophy in 2013 at Erasmus University Rotterdam. The topic of his dissertation is post-foundational critical philosophy in relation to theories of democracy. In the thesis Christian argues for the need of creating a bridge between the model of deliberative democracy as developed by Habermas, and models of radical democracy as expounded by Lefort, Rancière, Balibar, Abensour and Laclau. His supervisors were dr. Gijs van Oenen and Prof.dr. Jos de Mul.

Christian’s areas of philosophical interest are: Spinoza's and Hegel's philosophical systems, 20th and 21st century continental political and social thought, Critical Theory vs New Materialism, deliberative and radical democracy, the foundations of the humanities and the social sciences, and neo- and post-Marxist thought, in particular in the works of Laclau, Rancière, Balibar, and Honig.  

Currently, Christian is coordinating - and teaching in - the following courses at EUC:

• Modernity: From Enlightenment to Rationalization (100-level).
• Early Modern Political Philosophy (200-level) (with Marianne Klerk).
• Critical Theory (200-level) (with Amarantha Groen).
• Contemporary Political Philosophy: (re)constructing the Demos (300-level).
• Cheap: A Critique of Capitalism in the Web of Life (300-level)(with Willem Schinkel).

Besides his passion for philosophy and teaching, Christian enjoys playing and watching basketball; he regularly plays video games; and he listens to music, in particular fusion jazz (Snarky Puppy!). Christian is married and has two children (a son Samuel (b. 2019), and daughter Janna (b. 2022)).