political theory

PLSC 300B: 19th Century Political Thought
Professor Mayer
T 4:15pm / LSC

Toward what future are the forces of history carrying us? Toward progress or decay? Toward freedom or slavery? These questions seemed to obsess the nineteenth-century mind. To a greater extent than during the centuries that preceded or followed it, political thought in the hundred years after the French Revolution tended to be historicist or concerned with uncovering the deepest laws of history. In this seminar we will critically review some of the most important arguments about the movement of history published during this era of social, economic, and political change. Works by Kant, Hegel, Marx, Tocqueville, Spencer, and Nietzsche will be examined.

PLSC 303: Conservatism
Professor Whidden
MWF 11:30am / LSC

This course focuses on the rise of the American conservative movement starting in 1955 with William F. Buckley and the founding of National Review magazine.  Students should expect to carefully examine the subsequent development of conservative thought that culminated in practice with the election of President Reagan in 1980.  Particular emphasis will be given to conservative criticisms of both progressivism and communism, as well as conservative defenses of limited government, free markets, private property, and intermediate associations.  Attention will also be given to the current state of conservatism, including the ongoing debates between paleoconservatives, neoconservatives, and libertarians.  Representative authors include Friedrich Hayek, Richard Weaver, Robert Nisbet, Whittaker Chambers, Barry Goldwater, William F. Buckley, Irving Kristol, Ronald Reagan, Jonah Goldberg, and others.

PLSC 306: Modern Political Thought
Professor Danford
TTh 1:00pm / LSC

The Renaissance is often regarded as a time of the rediscovery of classical principles in a world which had lost sight of man's humanity, a world dominated by the convoluted theology of scholasticism and the dark ages. The earliest modern thinkers, however, understood themselves to be not so much recovering the understanding of the ancients as challenging that understanding in its most fundamental aspects. They attempted to establish a new kind of humanism, what Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn has called "autonomous humanism," which proclaimed man above and apart from the rest of the natural order. The understanding introduced by these thinkers, and above all by Machiavelli and Francis Bacon, continues to dominate our lives and our minds in important respects. As this course will attempt to show, the new understanding was advanced as a self-conscious challenge to and rejection of the classical understanding of man, of the city, of God, of nature and the cosmos. The aim of the course is to help students to come to terms with this radical modern understanding, along with the powerful justification advanced in support of it. We will proceed by studying the writings of the great thinkers responsible for the modern revolution, and consider some of the responses of critical successors.

PLSC 307: Democratic Theory
Mr. Seitzer
MWF 12:35pm / LSC

Democracy is widely viewed as the sole legitimate form of government, and yet there is very little agreement about what democracy means.  The course provides no conclusive answer to this question.  However, by examining competing understandings of the underlying purpose and appropriate institutions for democratic government, both ancient and modern, students will gain a deeper appreciation of the importance of and challenges for democratic government in our times.   Everyone agrees, for example, that the people should rule, but who is “the people” and how is its will determined?  Moreover, are there any substantive limitations to the people’s will?  And, if so, what are the sources of such limitations and how, if at all, are they enforceable? 

PLSC 308: Contemporary Political Thought
Dr. Yoksas
MWF 2:45pm / LSC

The dawn of the Twentieth Century was marked by an increase in skepticism at the prospect of "modern progress."  Modern political institutions, though rational and scientific, were revealed to be places devoid of any lasting human meaning or purpose.  Though modern societies could boast an increase in individual freedom as one of their stated objectives, the members themselves started to exhibit traits of universal conformity and a lack of individual volition.  This notion of a "mass society" devoid of any individual distinction was seen as an ultimately unfulfilling condition.  It was also dangerously susceptible to the manipulations of those in positions of authority. What resulted is the rise of the dictatorial state: a new type of regime that rested on the powerful new tools of science, mass communication, and the general apathy inherent in a modern apolitical population.  This course is a reexamination of the fundamental assumptions of political theory in light of the horrific failings of political practice in recent history.  If it is the case that we live in a perfectly rational political system, then why are human beings so empty of real fulfillment within them?  Is a “better way” even possible?

PLSC 312: Feminist Theory
Ms. Staudinger
MWF 10:25am / LSC

This course is in introduction to the theoretical origins and history of feminist thought, with a secondary focus on feminist debates of the last twenty years. We will explore canonical thinkers such as Mary Wollstonecraft and Simone de Beauvoir, but we will also take up more recent debates about sexuality, work, global inequalities, race and class. After this course, students will be able to speak confidently about the sources of feminist theory, as well as explain some of the current tensions in feminist thinking. No prior work in women's studies is required; a commitment to attentive reading of difficult texts is.