Modern Political Thought: Text and Traditions

This course offers a critical survey of Western political thought from the 16th century onward, focusing on the modern notion of "politics" that first and foremost designates the relationship between the nation state and its subjects, social individuals. What is the state and how does the state structure social life? How does it legitimize its power? And finally, what does philosophy offer us in terms of critiques of and alternatives to the bourgeois nation state? To answer these questions, we will read a number of important texts by political theorists and critical social theorists such as Thomas Hobbes, John Locke, G.W.F. Hegel, Karl Marx, W.E.B Du Bois, Rosa Luxemburg, and Angela Davis. Our discussion will focus on topics such as ideology, state and violence; labor, property and freedom; and finally, the entanglement of race, class, and gender.
Course Attributes: EN H; BU Hum; BU IS; AS HUM; AS LCD; FA HUM; AR HUM; AMP

Modern Political Thought: Text and Traditions

LEGAL STUDIES 207C

Section 01

Section 02