| Week | Topics | Study Materials | Materials |
| 1 |
Introduction and overview of the course
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| 2 |
Liberalism: Liberty, Equality and Justice
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John Rawls, “Fundamental Ideas” in John Rawls, Justice as Fairness: A Restatement, Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 2001, pp. 1-38.
Isaiah Berlin, “Two Concepts of Liberty” in Michael Sandel, ed., Liberalism and Its Critics, New York: NYU Press, 1984, pp. 15-36.
Ronald Dworkin, “Liberalism” in Michael Sandel, ed., Liberalism and Its Critics, New York: NYU Press, 1984, pp. 60-80.
Robert Nozick, “Moral Constraints and Distributive Justice” in Michael Sandel, ed., Liberalism and Its Critics, New York: NYU Press, 1984, pp. 100-122.
Friedrich A. Hayek, “Equality, Value, and Merit” in Michael Sandel, ed., Liberalism and Its Critics, New York: NYU Press, 1984, pp. 80-99.
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| 3 |
The Communitarian Critique of Liberalism: Community and Tradition
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Michael Sandel, “Introduction” in Michael Sandel, ed., Liberalism and Its Critics, New York: NYU Press, 1984, pp. 1-11.
Michael Walzer, “The Communitarian Critique of Liberalism,” Political Theory, Vol. 18, No. 1, 1990, pp. 6-23.
Michael J. Sandel, “The Procedural Republic and the Unencumbered Self,” Political Theory, Vol. 12, No. 1, 1984, pp. 81-96.
Alasdair MacIntyre, “The Virtues, the Unity of a Human Life and the Concept of Tradition” in Michael Sandel, ed., Liberalism and Its Critics, New York: NYU Press, 1984, pp. 125-149.
Charles Taylor, “Hegel: History and Politics” in Michael Sandel, Liberalism and Its Critics, New York: NYU Press, 1984, pp. 177-200.
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| 4 |
The Republican Critique of Liberalism: Freedom as Non-Domination and Civic Virtue
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Cecile Laborde and John Maynor, “The Republican Contribution to Contemporary Political Theory” in Cecile Laborde and John Maynor, Republicanism and Political Theory, Oxford: Blackwell Publishing, 2008, pp. 1-28.
Quentin Skinner, “Liberty as the Absence of Arbitrary Power” in Cecile Laborde and John Maynor, Republicanism and Political Theory, Oxford: Blackwell Publishing, 2008, pp. 83-101.
Philip Petit, “Liberalism and Republicanism,” Australian Journal of Political Science, Vol. 28, 1993, pp. 162-189.
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| 5 |
The Marxist Critique of Liberalism: The Theory of Alienation and Class Conflict
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The Marxist Critique of Liberalism: The Theory of Alienation and Class Conflict
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| 6 |
Gramsci and the Theory of Hegemony
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Antonio Gramsci, “The Intellectuals (pp. 3-23),” “The Concept of Passive Revolution (pp. 106-114),” “The History of Europe Seen as ‘Passive Revolution’ (pp. 118-120),” “Brief Notes on Machiavelli’s Politics (pp. 125-133),” “Machiavelli and Marx (pp. 133-136),” “Politics as an Autonomous Science (pp. 136-143),” “Elements of Politics (pp. 144-147),” “The Political Party (pp. 147-157),” “State and Civil Society: Introduction (pp. 206-210),” “Political Parties in Periods of Organic Crisis (pp. 210-219),” “Caesarism (pp. 219-223),” “Political Struggle and Military War (pp. 229-238,” “The Transition from the War of Manoeuver to the War of Position (pp. 238-239),” “The Conception of Law (pp. 246-247)” and “The State (pp. 257-264)” in Antonio Gramsci, Selections from the Prison Notebooks, New York: International Publishers, 1992.
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| 7 |
Midterm exam
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| 8 |
Weber and the Dark Side of Modernity
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Max Weber, “The Spirit of Capitalism” in Max Weber, The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism, New York: Routledge, 2001, pp. 13-38.
Max Weber, “The Institutionalization of Authority (pp. 56-77),” “The Concept of Legitimate Order (pp. 124-126),” “The Types of Legitimate Order (pp. 126-130)” and “The Bases of Legitimacy of an Order (pp. 130-132)” in Max Weber, Max Weber: The Theory of Social and Economic Organization, Glencoe, Illinois: The Free Press, 1964.
Max Weber, “Politics as a Vocation” in H. H. Gerth and C. W. Mills (eds.), From Max Weber: Essays in Sociology, New York: Oxford University Press, 1946, pp. 77-128.
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| 9 |
Nihilism and Politics
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Friedrich Nietzsche, “Preface (pp. 3-4),” “On the prejudices of philosophers (pp. 5-24),” “The free spirit (pp. 25-42)” “On the natural history of morals (pp. 75-92)” and “What is noble? (pp. 151-177)” in Friedrich Nietzsche, Beyond Good and Evil, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2001.
Friedrich Nietzsche, “Nietzsche’s Preface (pp. 15-23” and “‘Good and evil,’ ‘Good and bad’ (pp. 24-56)” in Friedrich Nietzsche, On the Genealogy of Morals and Ecce Homo, New York: Vintage Books, 1989.
Martin Heidegger, “The Question Concerning Technology” in Martin Heidegger, Basic Writings, San Francisco: Harper Collins, 1993, pp. 307-341.
Jürgen Habermas, “The Entry into Postmodernity: Nietzsche as a Turning Point” in Jürgen Habermas, The Philosophical Discourse of Modernity, Cambridge: Polity Press, 1987, pp. 83-105.
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| 10 |
Critical Theory: Emancipation and Beyond
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Jürgen Habermas, “An Alternative Way Out of the Philosophy of the Subject: Communicative versus Subject-Centered Reason” in Jürgen Habermas, The Philosophical Discourse of Modernity, Cambridge: Polity Press, 1987, pp. 294-326.
Jürgen Habermas, “Morality, Society and Ethics: An Interview with Torben Hviid Nielsen” in Jürgen Habermas, Justification and Application: Remarks on Discourse Ethics, Cambridge, MA: The MIT Press, 1993, pp.147-176.
Axel Honneth, “The Social Dynamics of Disrespect: On the Location of Critical Theory Today” in Disrespect: The Normative Foundations of Critical Theory, Cambridge: Polity, 2007, pp. 63-79.
Axel Honneth, “From Struggles for Recognition to a Plural Concept of Justice: An Interview with Axel Honneth,” Acta Sociologica, Vol. 47, No. 4, 2004, pp. 383-391.
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| 11 |
Post-Foundationalism: Groundless Existence
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Oliver Marchart, “Introduction: On the Absent Ground of the Social (pp. 1-10),” “The Contours of ‘Left Heideggerianism’: Post-foundationalism and Necessary Contingency (pp. 11-34)” and “Politics and the Political: Genealogy of a Conceptual Difference (pp. 35-60)” in Oliver Marchart, Post-Foundational Political Thought: Political Difference in Nancy, Lefort, Badiou and Laclau, Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 2007.
Carl Schmitt, “The Concept of the Political” in Carl Schmitt, The Concept of the Political, Chicago: The University of Chicago Press, 2007, pp. 19-79.
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| 12 |
Poststructuralism: Power and Subject
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Michel Foucault, “What is Enlightenment? (pp. 32-50),” “Truth and Power (pp. 51-75)” and “Politics and Ethics: An Interview (pp. 373-380)” in Paul Rabinow (ed.), The Foucault Reader, New York: Pantheon Books, 1984.
Michel Foucault, “The Subject and Power,” Critical Inquiry, Vol. 8, No. 4, 1982, pp. 777-795.
Jürgen Habermas, “Some Questions Concerning the Theory of Politics: Foucault Again” in Jürgen Habermas, The Philosophical Discourse of Modernity, Cambridge: Polity Press, 1987, pp. 266-293.
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| 13 |
Democracy: Competing Approaches
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Jürgen Habermas, “Three Normative Models of Democracy” in Jürgen Habermas, The Inclusion of the Other: Studies in Political Theory, Maldon, MA: Polity Press, 1998, pp. 239-252.
Carl Schmitt, The Crisis of Parliamentary Democracy, Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 1988, pp. 22-50.
Claude Lefort, “The Question of Democracy,” Democracy and Political Theory, Maldon, MA: Polity Press, 1988, pp. 9-20.
Chantal Mouffe, “For an Agonistic Model of Democracy” in Noel E. Sullivan, (ed.), Political Theory in Transition, London and New York: Routledge, 2000, pp. 113-130.
Joseph A. Schumpeter, Capitalism, Socialism and Democracy, London and New York: Routledge, 2003, pp. 269-283.
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| 14 |
Populism: A Contested Concept?
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Jan-Werner Müller, What is Populism? Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2016.
Chantal Mouffe, For a Left Populism, London and New York: Verso, 2018.
Cas Mudde and Cristobal R. Kaltwasser, “What is Populism?” in Populism: A Very Short Introduction, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2017, pp. 1-20.
Ernesto Laclau, “Populism: What’s in a Name?” David Howarth, (ed.), Ernesto Laclau: Post-Marxism, Populism and Critique, London and New York: Routledge, 2015, pp. 152-164.
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