Academic Work | Otto Lehto’s Homepage

Here you may find links to some of my published and unpublished articles in philosophy, political economy, semiotics, musicology, etc.

Curriculum Vitae (2022): download here.

I am a philosopher and political economist (PhD, MSSc). My current work focuses on utilitarianism, complexity theory, evolutionary political economy, transhumanism, human enhancement, basic income, social epistemology, and naturalism. I am currently a postdoctoral research fellow at New York University’s School of Law (2022-2024) and an affiliated Junior Researcher at Freiburg University’s FRIBIS Institute. I was also a visiting scholar at University of Arizona’s philosophy department (2020). I did my PhD at King’s College London’s Department of Political Economy (2021) under Prof. Mark Pennington and Dr. John Meadowcroft on the topic of “Complex Adaptation and Permissionless Innovation: An Evolutionary Approach to Universal Basic Income.” Prior to that, I did my BA in English (2009) and a Master of Social Science (MSSc) in Social and Moral Philosophy (2015) from the University of Helsinki. I am also the recipient of the Arts and Humanities Research Council (AHRC) LAHP studentship (2017-2019), Adam Smith Fellowhip at George Mason University (2019-2020), and a Templeton Foundation Grant at King’s College London (2020).

I am especially interested in the following academic topics:

– Anglo-American political and moral philosophy
– anarchism, classical liberalism, and libertarianism
– complex adaptive system (CAS) theory
– evolutionary biology and Darwinian theory
– epistemology and the the study of the mind
– linguistics and semiotics
– musicology and the ludology
– history of ideas
– German and French philosophy (especially existentialism, Foucault, and post-structuralism)

I have highlighted in bold articles that I consider to be my best.

I have marked with asterisks* the articles which have been published in scientific journals, anthologies, etc.

1. Philosophy (Social and Moral) and Political Economy

Otto Lehto (2023) (link forthcoming): Securing a Dignified Minimum Income: Uncertainty, Complexity, and UBI. In: “In Search for a Social Minimum: Human Dignity, Poverty, and Human Rights.” (Eds. Elena Pribytkova & Gottfried Schweiger.) In the series: AMINTAPHIL: The Philosophical Foundations of Law and Justice. Springer.

Otto Lehto (2022) (link forthcoming): Complex Adaptation and Permissionless Innovation: An Evolutionary Approach to Universal Basic Income. Ph.D. thesis. Department of Political Economy, King’s College London.

Otto Lehto (2022) (link forthcoming): Institutional Trust, the Open Society, and the Welfare State. In: Cosmos + Taxis, Special Issue on Kevin Vallier’s “Trust in a Polarized Age.”

Otto Lehto (2022) (link forthcoming): Hillel Steiner on Territorial Justice. In: Global Encyclopedia on Territorial Rights. (Ed. Kevin W. Gray.) Springer.

Otto Lehto (2022) (link forthcoming): Book review of “A Brief History of Equality.” By Thomas Piketty. In: Basic Income Studies.

Otto Lehto (2021): Permanent Crisis Management, the Rule of Law, and Universal Basic Income: A Polycentric Approach.* In: Cosmos+Taxis, Volume 9 (5+6): 122-136.

Otto Lehto & John Meadowcroft (2021): Welfare without rent seeking? Buchanan’s demogrant proposal and the possibility of a constitutional welfare state. In: Constitutional Political Economy, 32: 145–164. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10602-020-09321-7

Otto Lehto (2021): Book review of “Taxation in Utopia: Required Sacrifice and the General Welfare.” By Donald Morris. In: The Independent Review, 26(1), online edition.
https://www.independent.org/publications/tir/article.asp?id=1614

M.P. Fleischer & Otto Lehto (2019): Libertarian Perspectives on Basic Income. In: The Palgrave International Handbook of Basic Income (Ed. M. Torry): 439–458. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-23614-4_22

Otto Lehto (2019): Mitä hyötyä on sananvapaudesta? In: ”Mitä oikeudet ovat? Filosofian ja oikeustieteen näkökulmia.” (Eds. M. Aalto-Heinilä & V. Kurki.) Helsinki: Gaudeamus. https://kauppa.gaudeamus.fi/sivu/tuote/mita-oikeudet-ovat-/2523959

Otto Lehto (2018): An Earthquake in Finland. In:
“It’s Basic Income: The Global Debate” (Eds. S. Lansley & A. Downes): 165-170. Bristol University Press. https://muse.jhu.edu/chapter/2886089

Otto Lehto (2018): Basic Income Around the World: The Unexpected Benefits of Unconditional Cash Transfers. Adam Smith Institute.

Otto Lehto (2015): The Three Principles of Classical Liberalism from John Locke to John Tomasi: A Consequentialist Defence of the Limited Welfare State (Master’s Thesis in Social and Moral Philosophy, Uni. of Helsinki)

Otto Lehto – The Limited Welfare State as Utopia – The Case for a Libertarian Basic Income

Otto Lehto – Was Adam Smith a Classical Liberal?

Otto Lehto – Reason and Madness in the Holocaust (BA Thesis in English Philology, Uni. of Helsinki)*