Contemporary Political Philosophy
We commonly declare political arrangements to be just or unjust. For example, we might think that it is unjust that those who have worked hard and been successful in life should have to pay taxes to support the less industrious. Alternatively, we might think it unjust that some people get a better start in life than others (have richer parents, or better education), and we might therefore think that the state ought to compensate those who are disadvantaged. But by what criteria do we decide that political arrangements are just or unjust? What would a just society be like? And why?
These are the central questions of this module and our aim is to understand the reasons for thinking political arrangements to be either just or unjust. We shall do this via a detailed examination of some of the most important work on social justice to have been published during the past forty years. In Autumn term, we’ll carefully read the work of John Rawls, one of the most important philosophers of the twentieth century. In Spring term, we’ll examine some of the reactions and responses to Rawls’s work in the years since the publication of Rawls’s A Theory of Justice. Among the other philosophers studied will be Robert Nozick, Susan Moller Okin, Michael Sandel, Charles Taylor, G. A. Cohen, T. M. Scanlon, Derek Parfit, Harry Frankfurt, Ronald Dworkin, Richard Arneson and Elizabeth Anderson.
Convenor: Dr Martin O'Neill
Terms 4 and 5
40 credits
Assessment:
1. (a) One essay of up to 1500 words to be submitted in week 10 of Term 4 (Autumn Term) (25% of combined essay mark).
(b) One essay of up to 3,000 words to be submitted in week 10 of Term 5 (Spring Term) (75% of combined essay mark).
2. One 3 hour examination to be held in Week 1 of Term 6 (100% of exam mark).
Links:
Module guide and reading list (pdf)
Assessed Essay Questions (pdf)
Part II (Spring Term 2010) module guide (pdf)
Spring 2010 - Assessed Essay Questions (pdf)
Lecture 1 (pdf)
Lecture 2 (pdf)
Lecture 3 (pdf)
Lecture 4 (pdf)
Lecture 5
(pdf)