Political Philosophy (Level 7)

• Credit value: 15 credits at Level 7
• Convenor and tutor: Michael Garnett
• Assessment: a 3500-word essay (100%)

Political philosophy is the study of how to live together. Like ethics, it is concerned with the normative: with what is good and bad, right and wrong, just and unjust, and so on. But political philosophy differs from ethics in its exclusive concern with the institutions that regulate and govern our social relations (such as the state, the economy and the family), and with the concepts that are essential to thinking about such institutions, such as those of power, freedom, authority, justice and equality. This module offers an in-depth investigation into some of the most central questions in political philosophy. It includes systematic discussion of a selection of some of the following topics: freedom, equality, democracy, liberalism, socialism, feminism, power, states and global justice. We will study contemporary thinkers and also classic texts, such as Thomas Hobbes’s Leviathan, Jean-Jacques Rousseau’s The Social Contract, Karl Marx’s Economic and Philosophical Manuscripts and Isaiah Berlin’s ‘Two Concepts of Liberty’.

Indicative module content

• Freedom
• Equality
• Democracy
• Liberalism
• Socialism
• Feminism
• Power
• States
• Global justice

By the end of this module, you will be able to:

• understand philosophical debates and arguments in some central areas of political philosophy
• deploy relevant philosophical concepts and distinctions
• understand one or more key theories in political philosophy
• formulate philosophical questions with precision and clarity
• support or challenge philosophical theories by constructing objections and defences.