Fall/Winter Timetable

POL330Y1Y L0101

Politics and Morality

Themes

In this course, we will study the works of key figures in 20th-century political thought, for whom the moral possibilities of politics were thrown into radical question by the horrors of two world wars, genocide, and colonialism. All the thinkers we will study situate the problem of political morality within a particular period of human history, what we will sum up as “modernity.” What are the features of modernity that render the morality of politics so uncertain? What sort of freedom, justice or legitimacy is possible for creatures like us, shaped so thoroughly by modern science, technology and capitalism? What are the distinctive forms of unfreedom and injustice to which we are subject?

Texts

Weber, The Vocation Lectures; Arendt, The Human Condition; Fanon, The Wretched of the Earth: Foucault, The History of Sexuality, Vol. I; Gandhi, Hind Swaraj; Rawls, Justice as Fairness: A Restatement; Habermas, The Inclusion of the Other; secondary readings TBA.

Format and Requirements

The class will meet for one two-hour session per week and one one-hour discussion session.. Requirements include participation, exams, and two essays.

Prerequisites

POL200Y1 or POL200Y5 or (POLC70H3, POLC71H3)

Exclusions
POL330H1 or POL330Y1 (taken before 2012-13)