Wilfried Ver Eecke obtained a doctorate in philosophy from the University of Louvain. He did doctoral and post-doctoral work in Paris (with Ricouer, Hyppolite, Lacan, and Benveniste), in Freiburg/iBr (with Lohmann) and at Harvard (with Putnam, Cavell, Erikson, Jakobson, Kagan, and Brow). He also obtained an M.A. in economics at Georgetown University. Professor Ver Eecke has been teaching at Georgetown since 1967, where he was also Chairman of the Philosophy Department from 1980-1983. He was awarded research grants from the Belgian Science Foundation, the French Government, and the von Humboldt Stiftung. In 1973, he received the annual prize of the Belgian Academy of Sciences and Humanities for a manuscript later published as Negativity and Subjectivity.

His research interests include (1) Hegel; (2) philosophy of psychoanalysis with an emphasis on Lacan -- including ethical problems with the treatment of mentally ill persons; (3) ethics and economics -- including public policy implications; (4) Contemporary Continental philosophy; (5) the concept of person; and (6) political and social philosophy -- including distributive justice.