POL200Y1Y L5101
Political Theory: Visions of the Just/Good Society
Themes
This course introduces students to the subfield of political theory. Political theory is characterized by its close scrutiny of concepts, ideas, language, and values. This course will also introduce students to a cosmopolitan array of thinkers from the pre-modern world whose influence on political ideas persists to this day. In this course, students will learn the historical origins of the ideas they take for granted as both good and evil. This course challenges students to consider the relationship between a perfectly just and purely good society. What would a just or good society look like? Are justice and goodness the same, or do we sometimes have to pick between them? This course will further develop students’ reading skills, as necessary to understand complex and ambiguous texts, as well as the writing skills needed to articulate sophisticated ideas in a concise and precise manner.
Texts
Machiavelli. The Prince; translated by H.C. Mansfield, Jr. (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1998)
Elizabeth. Collected Works; ed. Leah Marcus et al., (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2000)
Hobbes. Leviathan; ed. Edwin Curley. (Indianapolis: Hackett Publishing Co., 1994)
Mengzi. Mencius; trans. Irene Bloom (New York: Columbia University Press, 2013)
Locke. The Second Treatise of Civil Government; (Peterborough: Broadview Press, 2015)
Plato. The Trial and Death of Socrates; ed. G.M.A. Grube (Indianapolis: Hackett Publishing Co., 2010)
Aristotle. Nicomachean Ethics; trans. Bartlett & Collins. (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2011)
Augustine, Political Writings; ed. Atkins & Dodaro. (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2001)
Format and Requirements
Attendance and Participation (15%), Writing development paper (10%) Exegetical Essay (20%), Comparative Essay (25%), Final Exam (30%)