Jingzhi Chen

Jingzhi Chen is a D.Phil student at Balliol College, Oxford. She is supervised by Prof. Ruth Chang, and her doctoral studies are generously supported by the Law Foundation at the Faculty of Law, University of Oxford.

Her academic interests lie in political and legal philosophy. In her D.Phil thesis, she explores the grounds of associative obligations, which asks in virtue of which we have obligatory reasons to treat certain individuals, such as our parents, children, or friends, preferentially. In her research, she will argue that associative obligations are grounded in the joint commitment among individuals who share a sustaining practice, of which the practice of special relationships constitutes a part. By identifying the conditions under which joint commitment holds a grounding force, she hopes to reconcile the tension between individual autonomy, obligations arising from special relationships, and distributive justice.

Prior to her D.Phil study, she has previously studied law at the University of Oxford (M.Phil), China University of Political Science and Law (Master of Laws), and Beijing Institute of Technology (Bachelor of Law). Her M.Phil study at Oxford was kindly sponsored by the David and Jayne Paterson Education Trust.