POL 184a : Global Justice
Spring 2016
Olin-Sang
W 2:00 – 4:30PM
Professor Jeffrey Lenowitz
Lenowitz@brandeis.edu
Olin-Sang 206
Office Hours: Thursdays, 2:00-4:30
Course Description:
Over 840 million people in the world are undernourished; 98% of these live in
developing countries. Do developed states and their citizens have moral duties to
eradicate or at least lessen this starvation? How do these duties compare to those
citizens might have to the needy of their own country? Today, numerous countries abuse and persecute their own citizens, depriving them of basic political,
economic, and social goods. Can or should other states intervene to correct this
mistreatment? Each year, wealthy and stable states let in only a small percentage
of those seeking to emigrate in order to improve their quality of life. What justifies the maintenance of such immigration restrictions? On what grounds can
states close their borders to those in need?
This course will focus on these and related questions, all of which fall under the
header of global justice. In contemporary political philosophy and theory, global
justice is now a central topic of concern. As states and their citizens become increasingly politically, legally, and economically connected to other states and
their citizens, more and more people have come to see the confinement of norms
of justice within nation-state borders as arbitrary. If we care about wealth inequality domestically, perhaps we should care about it internationally. If we believe that domestic poverty is a moral wrong, than global poverty might be even
worse.
Specifically, this course will address global justice in three parts. First, we will
analyze the origins of contemporary discussions of the topic. This involves looking at Rawls’ domestic theory of justice and how both Rawls and his students applied it internationally. Second, we will look at the general distinction in the literature between so-called statists, those who believe our obligations to compatriots
fundamentally trump those we have to members of other states, and cosmopolitans, those who believe that in some instances our obligations to human beings,
wherever they are, trump whatever special obligations we have to our compatriots. Most of these discussions, as we will see, involve questions of global economic justice. Third, we will focus on three additional topics to which global justice
applies: humanitarian intervention, immigration, and climate change.
Objectives & Learning Goals:
This course has four primary objectives and learning goals: (1) to impart
knowledge about the general terrain and topics in contemporary discussions of
global justice; (2) to enable students to project their own conceptions of justice
outside their immediate communities and nation-states and enlist them in evaluating events around the world; (3) to increase students ability to think critically
about arguments, especially by teaching them how to separate competing normative claims from competing empirical claims, and how to evaluate both sorts of
disagreement separately and in combination; and (4) to improve student’s ability
to formulate their own powerful oral and written arguments.
Prerequisites:
This seminar is designed for advanced undergraduates and graduate students.
The readings are challenging and numerous, the subject matter complex, and
students will engage with ideas and arguments drawn from the history of political
thought, contemporary political philosophy/theory, moral philosophy, and international relations. As such, students should have a foundation in some of these
areas, meaning that they have taken at least one or two courses drawn from any
of the following: political philosophy, moral philosophy, political theory, or international relations. Students who do not have this base but still wish to take the
course may email me and we can discuss the possibility of an exception.
Requirements and Grading:
This course will be an intense discussion-based seminar. Completing the readings
on time and actively discussing them in class are therefore essential requirements. Students should not expect this to be a passive class. Everyone enrolled in
the course will engage in what will surely be lively and instructive discussions
about each week’s readings and topics. In addition, attendance is mandatory unless
accompanied by a legitimate explanation given ahead of time.
Note that this is Four-Credit Course with three hours of class-time per week. This
means that success is based on the expectation that students will spend a minimum
of 9 hours of study time per week in preparation for class (readings, papers, exam
preparation, etc.).
The breakdown of the grading is as follows:
Undergraduate Students:



Seminar Participation, 15%
Reading Responses / Pop Quiz, 20%
Class Presentation, 15%


Two papers (8 pages), 50%
Undergraduates will receive writing intensive course credit
Graduate Students:




Seminar Participation, 15%
Reading Responses, 15%
Class Presentation, 10%
Term paper (20-25 pages), 60%
**Please note that if you are a student with a documented disability on record at
Brandeis University and wish to have a reasonable accommodation made for you
in this class, please see me immediately.
Academic Integrity:
All students are expected to be familiar with and to follow the University’s policies on academic integrity (see http://www.brandeis.edu/studentlife/sdc/ai).
Faculty may refer any suspected instances of alleged dishonesty to the Office of
Student Development and Conduct. Instances of academic dishonesty may result
in sanctions including but not limited to, failing grades being issued, educational
programs, and other consequences.
Technology Policy:
No phones or computers should be visible during the class. Checking either of them
will result in a reduced participation grade. However, if there are exceptional circumstances that require you to use a computer, come talk to me and we can see
about the possibility of an exception.
Assigned Texts:
The initial readings will be uploaded on Latte. After that, most readings will be
available in a course packet. However, the following books should be purchased:

(Suggested) Beitz, Charles. Political Theory and International Relations:
with a new afterword. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1999

Carens, Joseph. The Ethics of Immigration. Oxford: Oxford University
Press, 2013

Pogge, Thomas. World Poverty and Human Rights. Second Edition. Cambridge: Polity Press, 2008.

Miller, David. National Responsibility and Global Justice. Oxford: Oxford
University Press, 2007

Rawls, John. The Law of Peoples
Class Schedule:
1.
Introduction – Rawls in a Nutshell (January 13)
[The readings for this session, and only this session, are recommended
rather than required.]

Rawls, John. Justice as Fairness: A Restatement. Cambridge, MA:
Harvard University Press, 2001

Freeman, Samuel. “Introduction.” In The Cambridge Companion to
Rawls. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2003
2. Extending Rawls Globally (January 27)

Pogge, Thomas. “Rawls and Global Justice.” Canadian Journal of Philosophy 18, No. 2 (1988)

Beitz, Charles. Political Theory and International Relations. Princeton: The University Press, 1979. (Part 3)
3. Rawls Applies Rawls Globally (February 3)

Rawls, John. The Law of Peoples. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University
Press, 1999. [Introduction and sections: 2 - 4, 7-9, 15-16]

Beitz, Charles. “Rawls’s Law of Peoples.” Ethics 10, No. 4 (2000): 669696
4. Does Distance Matter? (February 10)

Singer, Peter. “Famine, Affluence, and Morality.” Philosophy & Public
Affairs 1 (1972): 229-243.

Kamm, Frances M. “The New Problem of Distance in Morality.” In The
Ethics of Assistance, edited by D.K. Chatterjee. Cambridge: Cambridge
University Press, 2004.
5. Statism (February 24)

Nagel, Thomas. “The Problem of Global Justice.” Philosophy & Public
Affairs 33 (2005): 113-147

Sangiovanni, Andrea. “Global Justice, Reciprocity, and the State.” Philosophy & Public Affairs 35 (2007): 3-39
First Paper Due
6. Cosmopolitanism (March 2)

Cohen, Joshua and Charles Sabel. “Extra Rempublicam Nulla Justitia?”
Philosophy and Public Affairs 34 (2006)

Valentini, Laura. “Coercion and (Global) Justice.” American Political
Science Review 105: 1 (2011)

Caney, Simon. “Global Distributive Justice and the State. Political
Studies 56 (2008)
7. Pogge on Poverty (March 9)

Pogge, Thomas. World Poverty and Human Rights. Second Edition.
Cambridge: Polity Press, 2008. Chapters 4 and 5
8. Critics of Pogge (March 16)

Miller, David. National Responsibility and Global Justice. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2007 (Chapter 9)

Patten, Alan. “Should we stop thinking about poverty in terms of helping the poor?” Ethics and International Affairs 19:1 (2005)

Risse, Matthias. "How Does the Global Order Harm the Poor?" Philosophy
and Public Affairs, Vol. 33 (2005), No. 4: 349-376.
Revised First Paper Due
9. Humanitarian Intervention I (March 23)

Walzer, Michael. Just and Unjust Wars, 4th Edition. New York: Basic
Books, 2006. Chapter 6.

Selected chapters from Nardin, Terry and Melissa S. Williams, eds.
NOMOS XLVII: Humanitarian Intervention. New York: New York
University Press, 2006.
10. Humanitarian Intervention II (March 30)

International Commission on Intervention and State Sovereignty. The
Responsibility to Protect. International Development Research Centre
(2001).

Buchanan, Allen and Robert O. Keohane. “The Preventive Use of Force:
A Cosmopolitan Institutional Proposal.” Ethics & International Affairs
18, No. 1: (2004).

Lu, Catherine. “Humanitarian Intervention: Moral Ambition and Political Constraints.” International Journal 62, no. 4 (2007).
11. Immigration, Borders, and Refugees I (April 6)

Carens, Joseph. The Ethics of Immigration. Oxford: Oxford University
Press, 2013. (Introduction, 7, 11, 12)
12. Immigration, Borders, and Refugees II (April 13)

Miller, David. National Responsibility and Global Justice. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2007 (Chapter 8)

Michael Blake. “Immigration, Jurisdiction, and Exclusion.” Philosophy
& Public Affairs 41 (2013): 103-130
13. Climate Change (April 20)

Caney, Simon. “Cosmopolitan Justice, Responsibility, and Global Climate Change.” Leiden Journal of International Law 18 (2005)

Posner, Eric A. & Cass R. Sunstein. “Climate Change Justice.”
Georgetown Law Journal 96 (2007-2008)
Final Paper Due May 2