University of California, Berkeley

The department has participated actively in UC Berkeley's Diversity Research Initiative, as a founding member of the Diversity and Democracy Cluster in the Haas Institute for a Fair and Inclusive Society. In this capacity, we have worked to make the contributions of diversity to flourishing societies an object of academic study at Berkeley, including study by philosophers. The cluster makes available resources to hire faculty members who will both add diversity to our community, and contribute to the academic study of diversity within the departments participating in the cluster. The department makes ongoing efforts to identify promising women and members of underrepresented groups in all faculty searches, reaching out to such candidates to encourage them to apply for our positions. We have frequently applied for, and been granted, additional faculty positions to make offers to candidates who would add diversity to our faculty. The department supports regular informal meetings by women who are faculty members and graduate students for philosophical exchange, as well as discussion of ongoing challenges that women face in our field. (The group meets under the name "Philfemme".) Our department is well aware of the systemic problems about equity and inclusion facing philosophy as a whole, including philosophy at Berkeley, and we aim to be an active participant in the effort to improve the situation in philosophy for women and underrepresented minorities. To this end, we have recently established a departmental task force for equity and inclusion, which includes both graduate students and members of the faculty. The task force meets regularly throughout the academic year to develop strategies for fostering diversity and inclusion both in the department and in the profession more generally.