The Edward J. Sexton Professor of Philosophy Emeritus at Claremont McKenna College, Roth taught there for more than forty years and was the founding director of the Center for the Study of the Holocaust, Genocide, and Human Rights (now the Mgrublian Center for Human Rights). Best known for his contributions to the Holocaust and genocide studies as well as to American philosophy and religious thought, Roth’s work concentrates on ethics, which comprises what he calls “careful deliberation about the difference between right and wrong, encouragement not to be indifferent toward that difference, cultivation of virtuous character, and action that defends what is right and resists what is wrong.”
Named the 1988 U.S. National Professor of the Year by the Council for Advancement and Support of Education and the Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching, Roth is the author or editor of more than sixty books. In works such as The Failures of Ethics (2015), Sources of Holocaust Insight (2020), Warnings: The Holocaust, Ukraine, and Endangered American Democracy (2023), and Saving the American Dream (2026), he encourages people to work together to resist anti-democratic authoritarianism and to advance human rights.
The American Dream, at its best, is an ethical ideal and a moral compass. If respected and sustained, it can guide the United States through Trump 2.0. Anchored in the US Constitution, Saving the American Dream features meditations for dark times. Meditations are intentional acts of focused attention. They seek insight—a clear and deep understanding—about critical issues. What, for example, is most important for the United States today? Are we Americans doing the best we can? How may inquiry about the American Dream advance the reflection and action needed now to support and defend the Constitution of the United States?
Saving the American Dream is a journey that goes where such questions lead. Its fundamental premise is that individuals moved to communal action by raised awareness and committed resistance are indispensable to meet challenges that grow by the day. Guidance from reliable American writers—philosophers, historians, novelists, poets, essayists, religious thinkers—maps the way.
What if the way we have taught the Holocaust is no longer enough?
This Time: Teaching the Holocaust Today examines one of the most pressing questions facing educators and scholars: how to teach the Holocaust in an era marked by rising authoritarianism, political polarization, antisemitism, historical distortion, and ongoing mass violence. Edited by Carol Rittner and John K. Roth, this volume brings together leading voices in Holocaust and genocide studies to reflect on the ethical, political, and pedagogical challenges shaping Holocaust education in the twenty-first century.
The brutality on both sides—Hamas’s terrorist attack and Israel’s retaliatory actions—has sparked fierce debate in the United States and across the world. Can one support Israel’s right to self-defense while also advocating for the rights of the Palestinian people? As many hesitate to discuss the conflict for fear of saying the wrong thing, Stress Test’s renowned editors and contributors boldly enter the conversation, offering a nuanced, informed, and necessary dialogue for this fraught historical moment.
John K. Roth is renowned for his work in Holocaust and genocide studies. He has authored and edited over fifty books. In 1988, he was honored as the U.S. National Professor of the Year by the Council for Advancement and Support of Education and the Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching.
by John K. Roth An American Protestant Christian philosopher, I have studied, written, and taught about the Holocaust for more than fifty years. Early on, that life-changing work showed me how tragically my Christian tradition led to Nazi Germany’s genocide against the Jewish people. No Christianity = No Holocaust—that is the devastating connection. It compels…
John K. Roth 