Modules

These pages give you a flavour of the types of modules available across the three subjects and within the School itself.

Please bear in mind that you will have to select modules that meet the requirements of your course structure.

Current students can find more detailed module information in the 'Your course' section of the School's website.

PPE Interdisciplinary modules
Economics
Philosophy
Politics

PPE Interdisciplinary modules

The interdisciplinary modules of the School of PPE are listed below. Please check your programme specifications for which modules are available to you.

Topics in PPE

This first-year module is compulsory for PPE students on Route 1 (the non-Econometrics route). It provides a basic introduction to certain core topics in each of the three disciplines, and is designed to enhance students' analytical skills and develop an awareness of the nature of interdisciplinary studies.

The Democratic Economy

A compulsory module for economics and politics students; optional module for all other students in the School.

Objectives: to explore some of the ways in which the disciplines of politics and economics complement each other, and how each discipline can bring insight to the study of social phenomena usually thought to be within the sphere of the other (for example, political science can help our understanding of the way governments manage the economy, while economics can tell us much about why people vote the way they do).

Philosophy of Social Science

An optional module for PPE students on Routes 1 and 2.

Objectives: to examine a number of issues related to the particular methods of social scientific enquiry, the nature of social reality and the scope and limits of social scientific explanations. Critical discussion of the naturalistic methods and the interpretivist methods will relate to the work of Marx, Mill, Durkheim, and Collingwood and to other contemporary authors. The nature of social reality, including social actions and social facts, will be considered through the work of Weber and Searle.

The scope and limits of social scientific investigation will be explored through contemporary debates on the role of values in social science, feminist methodology in social science, evolutionary explanations in social science and the autonomy of social science.

Ethics and Public Policy

A compulsory module for philosophy and politics students; optional module for all other students in the School.

Objectives: to explore the main areas of mutual concern to scholars of philosophy and politics, by examining the philosophical and political elements of public policy not merely with respect to what these disciplines can bring to decision about policy, but also as a means to consider the disciplines themselves. Indicative topics include animal experimentation, gambling, drug policy, health and disability, and crime and punishment.

Rationality, Morality and Economics

A compulsory module for economics and philosophy students; optional module for all other students in the School.

Objectives: to explore the main areas of mutual concern to economists and philosophers. Investigating the relation between rationality and morality will be a main focus of this course, as will introducing decision theory, game theory, and social choice theory to the student.

The PPE Dissertation

This is a piece of work to encourage independent study and research in a PPE related topic. The Dissertation offers students a different mode of working from that of normal course work.

During the writing of the Dissertation you will be supported by a disseration workshop and supervised by a Disseration supervisor. Empirical work is encouraged, and the project is a chance to put forward your ideas or research rather than simply drawing on that of others.

It is not compulsory, but students can choose to take it as an addition to the taught PPE modules.

We have summarised brief descriptions about Economics modules below, but if you want to find out more, please go to the Economics web pages

Year 1

Economics I

An introduction to micro and macroeconomic theory and how the theory can be applied to some of the problems of microeconomic policy in the UK.

Mathematics I

An introduction to the use of mathematics in economics. The module covers key mathematical techniques and ideas such as equation-solving, differentiation and integral calculus, and how these techniques can be used in economic analysis.

Probability I

This module introduces students to some basic ideas in probability and their application to the field of economics.

Statistics I

Designed to equip students with the techniques of statistical inference that are routinely used in economics, business and other social sciences. This module will serve to build a foundation for the intermediate-level econometric and statistical modules offered in stages 2 and 3.

Year 2

These summaries are just a selection of the second-year economics modules available to PPPE students.

Economics 2 (Microeconomics)

This is an intermediate microeconomics course. It aims to acquaint you with the most important concepts, methods, tools and techniques of economic analysis.

Economics 2 (Macroeconomics)

In this module, you will learn to analyse aggregate phenomena by using formal models. Past episodes from the histories of major world economies will motivate the models and they will then be used to analyse policy prescriptions.
There will be four major extensions of the core model – the role of expectations, economic growth, and international finance and policy issues.

Econometrics 2

An introduction to the techniques that are available to estimate models in economics. It will also consider the practical issues involved when applying these techniques.
Topics covered include least square estimation; choice of regressors and functional form; multicollinearity; model specification; autocorrelation; heteroscedasticity; and distributed lag models.

Development Economics

What is 'the development problem'? Would cancelling third world debt solve it? How does globalisation help or constrain development? Have the international financial markets made development more problematic? Should developed economies give more aid to assist undeveloped economies? How does corruption impede economic growth and development? To what extent are the real problems those of conflict and violence? Is it all a question of ‘bad’ and ‘good’ institutions? How will climate change affect the developing economies? All the above are crucial issues in today’s international economy and are addressed in this module.

Year 3

These summaries are just a selection of the third-year economics modules available to PPE students.

Applied Economics

You will analyse major issues of economic policy by an application of the theories and empirical techniques of economics. There is an emphasis on the problems which currently face the UK and other European economies.
Topics recently covered include UK privatisation, monetary integration in Europe, the economics of higher education and the economics of an ageing population. It aims to provide some conclusions and recommendations for policy derivable from theory and empirical evidence.

Microeconomics III

This module applies some of the topics and methods of microeconomics in a problem solving format, and explores further topics and concepts representative of current research in microeconomic theory. You will learn to develop and analyse formal models, in the context of a variety of microeconomic problems, and become familiar with the central techniques, concepts and issues of contemporary microeconomics, such as optimality, equilibrium, uncertainty and information.

Macroeconomics III

The module introduces a select set of topics in modern macroeconomics. In term 1, growth models which emphasise shocks to the economy are introduced, along with real business cycle theory. Term 2 focuses on three issues: 1) intergenerational trade, social security and capital formation studied within the framework of an overlapping generation model with production; 2) the efficiency wage approach and the search approach to labour markets; 3) the role of liquidity and collateral in the economy.

International Economics

This module provides an analytical framework to help you understand important issues of the international economy and the economic interdependence of countries. It aims to complement the relevant economic theory on trade and international macroeconomics with empirical evidence.

Alternative Perspectives in Economics

The module looks at alternatives to orthodox neoclassical economics, such as Post Keynesianism, Neo-Ricardian economics, radical economics, institutionalism and Austrian economics. Topics covered include the labour process, firms and competition, the labour theory of value, the distribution of income, theories of the state, unemployment, inflation, technical change, Fordism/post-Fordism, Kondratieff cycles and unequal development.

We have summarised brief descriptions about Philosophy modules below, but if you want to find out more, please go to the Philosophy web pages

Year 1

Beginning Philosophy

This module aims to introduce you to the methods of thinking and writing typical of philosophy, and to some important philosophical topics that are not covered in your other modules.

Early Modern Philosophy

This module will give you experience in reading and studying passages of original philosophy, both to develop your sense of how philosophical arguments are structured and to confront some central issues in the subject. You will study passages from seventeenth- and eighteenth-century philosophers, most notably Descartes, Leibniz, Locke, Berkeley and Hume.

Ethics

This module introduces and explores the three main branches of moral philosophy: meta-ethics, which concerns the nature of morality; normative ethics, which attempts to answer big questions such as ‘How should I live?’; and applied ethics, which looks at specific moral issues like climate change.

Introduction to Ancient Philosophy

This module provides an introduction to ancient philosophy through the study of Plato’s dialogues. Examination of the Euthyphro, Meno, Phaedo and the Republic will offer the opportunity to study the intersection of ethics, epistemology, metaphysics and moral psychology typical of Greek philosophy.

Reason and Argument

This module considers ways in which formal logic can be applied to understanding and evaluating arguments and claims expressed in everyday language. The topics covered include: validity, logical form, ambiguity, quantification, and the semantics/pragmatics distinction.

Knowledge and Perception

This module introduces some fundamental issues in epistemology (the theory of knowledge). The first part of the course considers general questions about the nature of knowledge, before looking at different ways of acquiring knowledge, including perception.

Year 2

In the second year of the programme you'll choose from a range of modules which look in more depth at issues in some central areas of philosophy:

Ethics
Theory of knowledge
The philosophy of mind and language
Metaphysics
The work of key figures in the history of philosophy

These will help you to develop the knowledge, understanding and skills that you'll use in more specialised investigations in your third year.

Year 3

These summaries are just a selection of the third-year philosophy modules available to PPE students.

Issues in the Philosophy of Perception

The aim of the module is to look in some depth at some of the most considered questions in the philosophy of perception and some issues that arise from thinking about perception in its non-visual forms.
Issues to be addressed may include: Do we perceive the sources of sounds?; Is bodily awareness perceptual?; How does the representation of space differ across the senses?

Language and Mind

The aim of this module is to investigate some of the central philosophical issues surrounding our understanding of language.
Students will gain a critical understanding of how theories of truth and meaning are related to the psychology of the speakers of a language.

Issues in Moral Philosophy

This module examines important issues in moral philosophy, concentrating on ethical theory.
You will discuss issues including: What is consequentialism and is it defensible? Are moral obligations sensitive to variations in an agent’s non-moral beliefs and/or moral beliefs? Do they vary when different agents have different moral beliefs? Is a theory that allows world-based as well as mind-based normative facts consistent? Is the fact that more people will suffer some harm (or obtain some benefit) in itself a morally relevant consideration? Can something be simply good without being good for someone or something?

Topics in Indian Philosophy

This module introduces a range of philosophical issues and debates in Classical Indian philosophy.
It focuses on Buddhist philosophy in India, from c. 500 B.C.E. to 800 C.E.. You will study the metaphysical, epistemological and ethical positions which the Buddhists sought to articulate, as these views were refined under pressure from non-Buddhist Indian philosophers.

We have summarised brief descriptions about Politics modules below.

Year 1

What is Politics

This module introduces you to the main theoretical concepts use in political science, and academic practices used to study it. The first term introduces you to the major traditions in studying politics including constructivism, behaviouralism, Marxism, post-modernism and the normative tradition. The second term moves on to analyse different approaches to understanding power and the state and challenges to the authority of the state. It covers issues including globalisation, terrorism, the EU, migration and climate change.

Introduction to / Aspects of Democratic Politics

This module gives an introduction to the key principles and institutional forms of democracy in the different political systems of the UK, the EU and India.

Introduction to / Aspects of International Politics

This module gives an introduction to some of the major concepts, issues and debates in international politics. It illuminates how the theory and practice of international politics in the twentieth- and twenty-first centuries deals with three sets of enduring political concerns: war and peace; stability and instability; and inequality and development.

Introduction to / Aspects of Political Theory

This module aims to introduce ideas and debates in political theory since antiquity through an engagement with key thinkers and texts in the history of political thought.

Year 2

These summaries are just a selection of the second-year politics modules available to PPE students.

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. 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.

History of Political Thought

This module examines central texts by major political thinkers: Hobbes, Locke, Rousseau, Hume and Kant. It introduces and investigates their ideas, their methods of argument, and the historical and political contexts in which they were developed. Among the topics addressed are political obligation (why should one obey the law?), the criteria for legitimate government, the meaning of freedom, the nature and justification of punishment, the role of private property, and various kinds of equality.

Politics of Development

The module has three main parts. The first part covers the contested role of the state and markets as constitutive of individual freedom and social development. The second part introduces paradigmatic cases, including in Latin America, East Asia and Africa, with contrasts to Europe. The third part covers themes such as the relation between democracy and development; work and human development; aid and self-reliance; and international governance dimensions of development.

War and Peace

This module will focus on the main debates and controversies surrounding issues of war, security and peace-making in the post-Cold War period.
It draws on a range of methodological approaches and sources and will draw frequently on examples and case studies, such as the ‘new wars’, changing patterns of warfare in contexts such as Afghanistan and Iraq, and the nature of the ‘War on/of Terror’.

British Politics since 1945

The first half of the module introduces the key concepts and theoretical frameworks relating to the question of where power lies in British politics. It then goes on to provide a range of lectures and seminars on the trajectory of British politics from 1945 to the present, covering such themes as the Postwar Consensus, British decline, the ‘ungovernable’ 1970s, Thatcherism and New Labour.

Year 3

These summaries are just a selection of the third-year politics modules available to PPE students.

Governing the Global Economy

The conventional wisdom within international political economy holds that the size and complexity of the contemporary global economy renders it largely ‘ungovernable’. Moreover, so the story goes, international economic organisations (IEOs) serve to promote globalisation as an end in itself, thereby increasing the global economy’s ungovernability further still. The purpose of this module is to provide the opportunity for you to critically engage with these ideas, and to broadly reflect on the question of ‘who governs the global economy’? To this end, the module explores the operations of a range of key sites of international economic governance (formal and informal, public and private), and investigates how IEOs influence states and markets – and how states and markets influence them.

Authority and the Liberal Tradition

Authority has been one of the central concerns of political philosophy since its inception, and is usually regarded as one of the preconditons of political life itself. This module seeks to answer questions such as 'Has authority really disappeared from the liberal world?', and 'If so, (how) can liberal societies do without authority?' The module investigates a series of thinkers within the liberal tradition, including Thomas Hobbes, John Locke, David Hume and Adam Smith. Their work will serve as a means of developing, deepening and challenging our own understanding of authority and liberalism.

US Power and International Security

The module introduces the concepts of power, security and hegemony in the context of US national security since the end of the Cold War. It will explore frameworks for analysing and understanding policy under the four post-Cold War presidencies of George H. W. Bush, Bill Clinton, George W. Bush, and Barack Obama. It will examine the ‘grand strategies’ of political realism, liberal internationalism and primacy/neo-conservatism.

Violence and International Politics

Violence shapes – and is shaped by – international politics in significant ways. It underpins many of the key issues in international politics, including war, peace, security, terrorism and international intervention. But what is violence and how can it be approached or understood? How does it affect international politics, and how do international actors and organizations respond to the problems raised by violence? This module examines the various ways in which international politics is structured, influenced and shaped by its relationship to violence. To this end, it engages with a range of approaches to violence, from within and outside the field of international relations, including social anthropology, sociology, ethics, and international political philosophy. It is also firmly grounded in concrete examples drawn from historical and contemporary events.