ETHICS & POLITICS
ESSENTIAL INFORMATION
Times and Places:
Lectures: Lectures for this module will be held on Wednesdays, at 18:00, in [location].
Seminars: Seminars for this module will be held on Wednesdays at 19:00, in [location].
People:
Convenor: The module convenor is Professor X. If you have any queries or comments
concerning the organisation of the module as a whole, email him or her at X
Lecturers: The lecturers on this module are: Professor Hallvard Lillehammer
(h.lillehammer@bbk.ac.uk) and Professor Susan James (s.james@bbk.ac.uk). If you have
questions concerning a particular topic or lecture, contact the relevant lecturer.
Tutors: The module tutors are: [names and emails]. If for any reason you are unable to
attend a seminar, please contact your tutor in advance.
Set Readings and Essays:
Essential Reading: For every lecture there is assigned reading (listed below as ‘essential
reading’). This is reading that you must do in order to understand what is going on in the
lecture. Therefore, in addition to attending the lectures, you must plan each week to do
this reading in preparation for that week’s lecture.
Additional Reading: Each week there is also further, optional reading (marked below as
‘additional reading’). This is reading that you should do if you are writing an essay on a
topic, preparing to answer a question in the exam on the topic, or simply if the topic is of
particular interest to you.
Essays: Each student should submit two essays per term for formative assessment, one
before Reading Week and the other by the end of Term. Questions and readings are listed
in the final section of this document. If you are in any doubt concerning the topic on
which you are required to write, contact your module tutor.
Assessment:
This module is assessed by:
1) A pre-submitted 2500-word essay, to be submitted via Moodle, with a deadline of April 8th.
2) A two-hour examination in Term 3. The exam falls into two parts, one relating to Term 1, the
other to Term 2; you will have to answer one question from each part. Past papers may be
consulted at www.bbk.ac.uk/lib/elib/exam.
Moodle:
Electronic copies of course materials are available through Moodle,
http://moodle.bbk.ac.uk. You will need your ITS login name and password to enter.
at
LECTURE SCHEDULE
Autumn Term
Weeks 1-5: Consequentialism and its Critics: the Good, the Right and the Virtuous
(Lecturer: Prof. Hallvard Lillehammer)
Week 1: Understanding Consequentialism
Essential Reading:
• Philip Pettit, ‘Consequentialism’, in A Companion to Ethics, ed. P. Singer (Blackwell,
1991), pp. 230-240. Available online at: http://bit.ly/singer1991
Additional Reading:
• John Stuart Mill, Utilitarianism (various editions), extract in Ethical Theory, ed. R.
Shafer-Landau (Blackwell, 2007), pp. 457-62.
• John Rawls, A Theory of Justice (Harvard, 1971), pp. 22-7. Reprinted in S. Scheffler ed.,
Consequentialism and Its Critics (Oxford, 1988), pp. 14-19.
• Henry Sidgwick, ‘Utilitarianism’, ch 1 of his Essays on Ethics and Method, ed. M. G.
Singer (Oxford, 2000), pp. 3-9.
Week 2: Consequentialism and its Critics
Essential Reading:
• Bernard Williams, ‘Consequentialism and Integrity’, in B. Williams and J.J.C. Smart, eds.,
Utilitarianism: For and Against (Cambridge University Press, 1973), pp. 82-118.
Reprinted in S. Scheffler, ed., Consequentialism and Its Critics (Oxford:Oxford University
Press, 1988), pp. 20-50.
Additional Reading:
• Elizabeth Ashford, ‘Utilitarianism, Integrity and Partiality’, The Journal of Philosophy 97
(2000), pp. 421-39. Available online at http://www.jstor.org/stable/2678423
• Thomas Nagel, The View from Nowhere (Oxford University Press, 1986), pp. 164-88.
Reprinted as ‘Autonomy and Deontology’ in S. Scheffler, ed., Consequentialism and Its
Critics (Oxford:Oxford University Press, 1988), pp. 142-172.
• Peter Railton, ‘Alienation, Consequentialism, and the Demands of Morality’, Philosophy
& Public Affairs (1984): 134-71. Reprinted in S. Scheffler, ed., Consequentialism and its
Critics (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1988), pp. 93-133. Also in J. Rachels, ed.,
Ethical Theory 2 (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1998), pp. 222-55. Available online at
http://www.jstor.org/stable/2265273
Week 3: Reforming Consequentialism
Essential Reading:
• Brad Hooker, 'Rule-Consequentialism', in H. LaFollette, ed., The Blackwell Guide to
Ethical Theory (Oxford: Blackwell, 2000), pp. 183-204. Also available online at:
http://bit.ly/Lafollette2000.
Additional Reading:
• John J.C. Smart, ‘Outline of a System of Utilitarian Ethics’, in Utilitarianism: For &
Against, eds. J.J.C. Smart and B. Williams (Cambridge, 1973), 3-74.
• Raymond G. Frey, ‘Act-Utilitarianism’, in H. LaFollette, ed., The Blackwell Guide to
Ethical Theory (Oxford: Blackwell, 2000), pp. 165-82. Also available online at:
http://bit.ly/Lafollette2000.
• Robert Merrihew Adams, ‘Motive Utilitarianism’, The Journal of Philosophy 73 (1976),
pp. 467-81. Available online at http://www.jstor.org/stable/2025783
Week 4: Beyond Consequentialism I: the Virtues
Essential Reading:
• Philippa Foot, ‘Utilitarianism and the Virtues’, Mind 94 (1985), pp. 196-209. Reprinted in
S. Scheffler, ed., Consequentialism and its Critics (Oxford: Oxford University Press,
1988), pp. 224-242. Available online at http://www.jstor.org/stable/3131701
Additional Reading:
• Rosalind Hursthouse, ‘Normative Virtue Ethics’, in R. Crisp ed. How Should One Live?
(Oxford University Press, 1996), pp. 19-33. Reprinted in Ethical Theory, ed. R. ShaferLandau (Blackwell, 2007), pp. 701-709.
• Martha Nussbaum, ‘Non-relative Virtues: An Aristotelian Approach’, Midwest Studies in
Philosophy 13 (1988). Reprinted in Ethical Theory, ed. R. Shafer-Landau (Blackwell,
2007), pp. 684-700.
• Michael Slote, ‘Agent-based Virtue Ethics’, Midwest Studies in Philosophy 20 (1995), pp.
83-101. Reprinted in Ethical Theory, ed. R. Shafer-Landau (Blackwell, 2007), pp. 710721.
Week 5: Beyond Consequentialism II: rights
Essential Reading:
• Leonard Wayne Sumner, ‘Rights’, in H. La Follette, ed. The Blackwell Guide to Ethical
Theory (Blackwell, 2000), pp. 288-305. Available online at http://bit.ly/lafollette2000
Additional Reading:
• Matthew Kramer, Nigel E. Simmonds, and Hillel Steiner, A Debate Over Rights (Oxford
University Press, 1998), pp. 60-100; 195-232; 283-302. Available online at:
http://bit.ly/kramer1998
• Joseph Raz, The Morality of Freedom (Oxford University Press 1986), chs. 7-8. Available
online at http://www.oxfordscholarship.com
• Leif Wenar, ‘Rights’, in E.N. Zalta, ed., Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, Available
at: http://plato.stanford.edu/archives/fall2011/entries/rights/
---------------------------
READING WEEK
---------------------------
Weeks 6-10: Beyond Consequentialism: Intention, Responsibility and Value
(Lecturer: Professor Hallvard Lillehammer)
Week 6: The Doctrine of Double Effect
Essential Reading:
• Gertrude Elizabeth Margaret Anscombe, ‘Action, Intention, and Double Effect’, ch. 15 of
her Human Life, Action and Ethics, ed. by M. Geach & L. Gormally (Imprint Academic,
2005), pp. 207-26.
Additional Reading:
• Philippa Foot, ‘The Problem of Abortion and the Doctrine of Double Effect’, in her
Virtues and Vices (Oxford: Blackwell, 1978), 19-32. [Available via Birkbeck elibrary.]
Also reprinted in B. Steinbock and A. Norcross, eds., Killing and Letting Die, 2nd ed.
(New York: Fordham University Press, 1994), pp. 266–279; and in D. Oderberg, Moral
Theory: A Non-Consequentialist Approach (Oxford: Blackwell, 2000), ch. 3.
• Frances Kamm, ‘The Doctrines of Double and Triple Effect and Why a Rational Agent
Need Not Intend the Means to His Effect’, ch. 4 of her Intricate Ethics: Rights,
Responsibilities, and Permissible Harm (Oxford University Press, 2006), pp. 91-129.
• Warren Quinn, ‘Actions, Intentions and Consequences: The Doctrine of Double Effect’,
Philosophy and Public Affairs 18:4 (1989): 334-51. [Available online at
http://www.jstor.org/stable/2265475.] Also reprinted in his Morality and Action
(Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1993), pp. 175-193.
Week 7: Doing and Allowing
Essential Reading:
• Judith J. Thomson, ‘Killing, Letting Die, and the Trolley Problem’, in her Rights,
Restitution and Risk (Cambridge, Massachusetts: Harvard University Press, 1986), 78-93.
Additional Reading:
• Peter Unger, Living High and Letting Die (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1996), chs. 24. [Available via Birkbeck elibrary.]
• Warren Quinn, ‘Actions, Intentions and Consequences: The Doctrine of Doing and
Allowing’, Philosophical Review 98 (1989): 287-312. [Available online at
http://www.jstor.org/stable/2185021.] Also reprinted in his Morality and Action
(Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1993), pp. 149-174.
• Eric Rakowski, ‘Taking and Saving Lives’, Columbia Law Review 93 (1993): 1063-1156.
[Available online at http://www.jstor.org/stable/1122960.] Also reprinted in J. Harris (ed.),
Bioethics (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2001), pp. 205-299. [esp. § 4-5.8]
Week 8: Moral Responsibility, Freedom, and Voluntariness
Essential Reading:
• Harry G. Frankfurt, The Importance of What We Care About (Cambridge University Press,
1988), chs. 1 & 2. [Chapter 1 available online at http://www.jstor.org/stable/2023833;
chapter 2 available at http://www.jstor.org/stable/2024717.]
Additional Reading:
• John Martin Fischer, ‘Responsibility and Alternative Possibilities’, in Moral
Responsibility and Alternative Possibilities, edited by S. Widerker & M. McKenna
(Aldershot: Ashgate, 2003), pp. 27-52.
• Peter F. Strawson, ‘Freedom and Resentment’, in Freedom and Resentment and Other
Essays (London: Methuen, 1974), pp. 1-25. Also reprinted in G. Watson (ed.), Free Will,
2nd ed. (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2003), pp. 59-80.
• T. M. Scanlon, Moral Dimensions (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 2008), Chapter
4.
Week 9: Moral Luck
Essential Reading:
• Bernard Williams, ‘Moral Luck’, Proceedings of the Aristotelian Society, Suppl. Vol. 50
(1976), 115-35. [Available online at http://www.jstor.org/stable/4106826.] Also reprinted
as ch. 2 of his Moral Luck (Cambridge University Press, 1981), pp. 20-39.
Additional Reading:
• Thomas Nagel, ‘Moral Luck’, Proceedings of the Aristotelian Society, Suppl. Vol. 50
(1976), 137-151. [Available online at http://www.jstor.org/stable/4106826 (follows
Williams’ paper in the PDF).] Reprinted, with revisions, in Nagel’s Mortal Questions
(Cambridge University Press, 1979), pp. 24-38.
• Judith J. Thomson, ‘Morality and Bad Luck’, in D. Statman (ed.), Moral Luck (Albany:
State University of New York Press, 1993).
• Michael Zimmerman, ‘Taking Luck Seriously’, Journal of Philosophy, 99 (2002): 553576. [Available online at http://www.jstor.org/stable/3655750.]
Week 10: The Incommensurability of Value
Essential Reading:
• Thomas Nagel, ‘The Fragmentation of Value’, ch. 9 of his Mortal Questions (Cambridge
University Press, 1979), pp. 128-141.
Additional Reading:
• Bernard Williams, ‘Conflicts of Values’, ch. 5 of his Moral Luck (Cambridge University
Press, 1981), pp. 71-82.
• Ruth Chang, ‘Incommensurability (and Incomparability), in H. LaFollette (ed.), The
Blackwell Guide to Ethical Theory, Second Edition (Wiley Blackwell, 2013). Online:
http://ruthchang.net/wp-content/uploads/2012/11/I_Lafollette_030-1correctedproofs1.pdf
• James Griffin, ‘Incommensurability: What’s the Problem?’, in R. Chang, (ed.),
Incommensurability, Incomparability, and Practical Reason (Harvard University Press,
1997), pp. 35-51.
Spring Term
Weeks 1-5:
(Lecturer: Prof. Susan James)
Weeks 6-10:
(Lecturer: Prof. Susan James)
ESSAY QUESTIONS
Autumn Term
1.
‘It is right to promote the good’. What is the most plausible interpretation of that
claim?
Essential Reading:
· Philip Pettit, ‘Consequentialism’, in A Companion to Ethics, ed. P. Singer (Blackwell,
1991), pp. 230-240. Available online at: http://bit.ly/singer1991
Additional Reading:
· John Stuart Mill, Utilitarianism (various editions), extract in Ethical Theory, ed. R.
Shafer-Landau (Blackwell, 2007), pp. 457-62.
· John Rawls, A Theory of Justice (Harvard, 1971), pp. 22-7. Reprinted in S. Scheffler
ed., Consequentialism and Its Critics (Oxford, 1988), pp. 14-19.
· Henry Sidgwick, ‘Utilitarianism’, ch 1 of his Essays on Ethics and Method, ed. M. G.
Singer (Oxford, 2000), pp. 3-9.
2.
Is there a convincing consequentialist explanation of the moral significance of
partial considerations, such as a concern for oneself, one’s friends and family?
Essential Reading:
· Bernard Williams, ‘Consequentialism and Integrity’, in B. Williams and J.J.C. Smart,
eds., Utilitarianism: For and Against (Cambridge University Press, 1973), pp. 82118. Reprinted in S. Scheffler, ed., Consequentialism and Its Critics (Oxford:Oxford
University Press, 1988), pp. 20-50.
Additional Reading:
· Elizabeth Ashford, ‘Utilitarianism, Integrity and Partiality’, Journal of Philosophy 97
(2000), pp. 421-39. Available online at http://www.jstor.org/stable/2678423 .
· Thomas Nagel, The View from Nowhere (Oxford University Press, 1986), pp. 164-88.
Reprinted as ‘Autonomy and Deontology’ in S. Scheffler, ed., Consequentialism and
Its Critics (Oxford:Oxford University Press, 1988), pp. 142-172.
· Peter Railton, ‘Alienation, Consequentialism, and the Demands of Morality’,
Philosophy & Public Affairs (1984): 134-71. Reprinted in S. Scheffler, ed.,
Consequentialism and its Critics (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1988), pp. 93133. Also in J. Rachels, ed., Ethical Theory 2 (Oxford: Oxford University Press,
1998), pp. 222-55. Available online at http://www.jstor.org/stable/2265273
3.
Does rule consequentialism collapse into act consequentialism? If so, so what? If
not, which is the more plausible view?
Essential Reading:
· Brad Hooker, 'Rule-Consequentialism', in H. LaFollette, ed., The Blackwell Guide to
Ethical Theory (Oxford: Blackwell, 2000), pp. 183-204. Also available online at:
http://bit.ly/Lafollette2000.
Additional Reading:
· John J.C. Smart, ‘Outline of a System of Utilitarian Ethics’, in Utilitarianism: For &
Against, eds. J.J.C. Smart and B. Williams (Cambridge, 1973), 3-74.
· Raymond G. Frey, ‘Act-Utilitarianism’, in H. LaFollette, ed., The Blackwell Guide to
Ethical Theory (Oxford: Blackwell, 2000), pp. 165-82. Also available online at:
http://bit.ly/Lafollette2000.
· Robert Merrihew Adams, ‘Motive Utilitarianism’, The Journal of Philosophy 73
(1976), pp. 467-81. Available online at http://www.jstor.org/stable/2025783.
4.
To what extent, if any, does a focus on the virtues present a real advance upon a
focus on consequences in the moral assessment of action?
Essential Reading:
· Philippa Foot, ‘Utilitarianism and the Virtues’, Mind 94 (1985), pp. 196-209.
Reprinted in S. Scheffler, ed., Consequentialism and its Critics (Oxford: Oxford
University
Press,
1988),
pp.
224-242.
Available
online
at
http://www.jstor.org/stable/3131701.
Additional Reading:
· Rosalind Hursthouse, ‘Normative Virtue Ethics’, in R. Crisp ed. How Should One
Live? (Oxford University Press, 1996), pp. 19-33. Reprinted in Ethical Theory, ed. R.
Shafer-Landau (Blackwell, 2007), pp. 701-709.
· Martha Nussbaum, ‘Non-relative Virtues: An Aristotelian Approach’, Midwest
Studies in Philosophy 13 (1988). Reprinted in Ethical Theory, ed. R. Shafer-Landau
(Blackwell, 2007), pp. 684-700.
· Michael Slote, ‘Agent-based Virtue Ethics’, Midwest Studies in Philosophy 20 (1995),
pp. 83-101. Reprinted in Ethical Theory, ed. R. Shafer-Landau (Blackwell, 2007), pp.
710-721.
5.
What is the most plausible explanation for why rights constrain the pursuit of
goods?
Essential Reading:
· Leonard Wayne Sumner, ‘Rights’, in H. La Follette, ed. The Blackwell Guide to
Ethical Theory (Blackwell, 2000), pp. 288-305. Available online at
http://bit.ly/lafollette2000.
Additional Reading:
· Matthew Kramer, Nigel E. Simmonds, and Hillel Steiner, A Debate Over Rights
(Oxford University Press, 1998), pp. 60-100; 195-232; 283-302. Available online at:
http://bit.ly/kramer1998
·
·
6.
Joseph Raz, The Morality of Freedom (Oxford University Press 1986), chs. 7-8.
Available online at http://www.oxfordscholarship.com
Leif Wenar, ‘Rights’, in E.N. Zalta, ed., Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy,
Available at: http://plato.stanford.edu/archives/fall2011/entries/rights/
Given that a certain harm is going to be caused, does it make a difference if the
harm is intended or merely foreseen?
Essential Reading:
· Gertrude Elizabeth Margaret Anscombe, ‘Action, Intention, and Double Effect’, ch.
15 of her Human Life, Action and Ethics, ed. by M. Geach & L. Gormally (Imprint
Academic, 2005), pp. 207-26.
Additional Reading:
· Philippa Foot, ‘The Problem of Abortion and the Doctrine of Double Effect’, in her
Virtues and Vices (Oxford: Blackwell, 1978), 19-32. [Available online via Birkbeck
elibrary.] Also reprinted in B. Steinbock and A. Norcross, eds., Killing and Letting
Die, 2nd ed. (New York: Fordham University Press, 1994), pp. 266–279; and in D.
Oderberg, Moral Theory: A Non-Consequentialist Approach (Oxford: Blackwell,
2000), ch. 3.
· Frances Kamm, ‘The Doctrines of Double and Triple Effect and Why a Rational
Agent Need Not Intend the Means to His Effect’, ch. 4 of her Intricate Ethics: Rights,
Responsibilities, and Permissible Harm (Oxford University Press, 2006), pp. 91-129.
· Warren Quinn, ‘Actions, Intentions and Consequences: The Doctrine of Double
Effect’, Philosophy and Public Affairs 18:4 (1989): 334-51. [Available online at
http://www.jstor.org/stable/2265475.] Also reprinted in his Morality and Action
(Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1993), pp. 175-193.
7.
‘The reason why killing is generally morally worse than letting die is that the
former is a breach of a negative duty, while the latter is a breach of only a positive
duty, if it is a breach of duty at all’. Discuss.
Essential Reading:
· Judith J. Thomson, ‘Killing, Letting Die, and the Trolley Problem’, in her Rights,
Restitution and Risk (Cambridge, Massachusetts: Harvard University Press, 1986),
78-93.
Additional Reading:
· Peter Unger, Living High and Letting Die (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1996),
chs. 2-4. [Available online via Birkbeck elibrary.]
· Warren Quinn, ‘Actions, Intentions and Consequences: The Doctrine of Doing and
Allowing’, Philosophical Review 98 (1989): 287-312. [Available online at
http://www.jstor.org/stable/2185021.] Also reprinted in his Morality and Action
(Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1993), pp. 149-174.
· Eric Rakowski, ‘Taking and Saving Lives’, Columbia Law Review 93 (1993): 10631156. [Available online at http:www.jstor.org/stable/1122960.] Also reprinted in J.
Harris (ed.), Bioethics (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2001), pp. 205-299. [Read
esp. § 4-5.8]
8. Is moral responsibility consistent with the inability to act otherwise than we do?
Essential Reading:
• Harry G. Frankfurt, The Importance of What We Care About (Cambridge University Press,
1988), chs. 1 & 2. [Chapter 1 available online at http://www.jstor.org/stable/2023833;
chapter 2 available at http://www.jstor.org/stable/2024717.]
Additional Reading:
• John Martin Fischer, ‘Responsibility and Alternative Possibilities’, in Moral
Responsibility and Alternative Possibilities, edited by S. Widerker & M. McKenna
(Aldershot: Ashgate, 2003), pp. 27-52.
• Peter F. Strawson, ‘Freedom and Resentment’, in Freedom and Resentment and Other
Essays (London: Methuen, 1974), pp. 1-25. Also reprinted in G. Watson (ed.), Free Will,
2nd ed. (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2003), pp. 59-80.
• T. M. Scanlon, Moral Dimensions (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 2008), Chapter
4.
9. Is the idea of moral luck coherent? If so, how? If not, why not?
Essential Reading:
• Bernard Williams, ‘Moral Luck’, Proceedings of the Aristotelian Society, Suppl. Vol. 50
(1976), 115-35. [Available online at http://www.jstor.org/stable/4106826.] Also reprinted
as ch. 2 of his Moral Luck (Cambridge University Press, 1981), pp. 20-39.
Additional Reading:
• Thomas Nagel, ‘Moral Luck’, Proceedings of the Aristotelian Society, Suppl. Vol. 50
(1976), 137-151. [Available online at http://www.jstor.org/stable/4106826 (follows
Williams’ paper in the PDF).] Reprinted, with revisions, in Nagel’s Mortal Questions
(Cambridge University Press, 1979), pp. 24-38.
• Judith J. Thomson, ‘Morality and Bad Luck’, in D. Statman (ed.), Moral Luck (Albany:
State University of New York Press, 1993).
• Michael Zimmerman, ‘Taking Luck Seriously’, Journal of Philosophy, 99 (2002): 553576. [Available online at http://www.jstor.org/stable/3655750.]
10. Are there any genuinely incomensurable values?
Essential Reading:
• Thomas Nagel, ‘The Fragmentation of Value’, ch. 9 of his Mortal Questions (Cambridge
University Press, 1979), pp. 128-141.
Additional Reading:
• Bernard Williams, ‘Conflicts of Values’, ch. 5 of his Moral Luck (Cambridge University
Press, 1981), pp. 71-82.
• Ruth Chang, ‘Incommensurability (and Incomparability), in H. LaFollette (ed.), The
Blackwell Guide to Ethical Theory, Second Edition (Wiley Blackwell, 2013). Online:
http://ruthchang.net/wp-content/uploads/2012/11/I_Lafollette_030-1correctedproofs1.pdf
• James Griffin, ‘Incommensurability: What’s the Problem?’, in R. Chang, (ed.),
Incommensurability, Incomparability, and Practical Reason (Harvard University Press,
1997), pp. 35-51.
ETHICS AND POLITICS
Spring Term
Lecturer: Prof. Susan James
Learning to Live Freely: Hobbes, Rousseau and Marx
What are the main threats to freedom and how can political societies limit or overcome them?
This is a central question within political philosophy. In this module we shall consider a range of
answers by focusing on the contrasting ideas of three philosophers: Thomas Hobbes (15881679); Jean-Jaques Rousseau (1712-78); and Karl Marx (1818-83). Each of these authors has a
different conception of a free way of life and a different diagnosis of the obstacles that stand in
the way of realising it. Furthermore, as we shall see, their views remain both challenging and
influential today.
There is one ‘essential reading’ for each session. You need to read this before you come to class.
The ‘additional reading’ is optional, but it is advisable to read it if you can. At the start of term I
shall provide fuller reading lists to go with each essay title. If you want to write an essay on a
different topic, please consult me before you start.
Weeks 1-2: THOMAS HOBBES
Week 1: Escaping insecurity: the justification of the state
Required reading
Thomas Hobbes, Leviathan, chs. 13, 17, 18.
Additional reading
Jean Hampton, Hobbes and the Social Contract Tradition (Cambridge University Press, 1986), ch. 2.
Week 2: Living freely in the state
Required reading:
Thomas Hobbes, Leviathan, ch. 21.
Additional reading
A. J. Martinich, Hobbes, (Routledge 2005), ch. 4.
Weeks 3 – 6: JEAN JACQUES ROUSSEAU
Week 3: ‘Man is born free but is everywhere in chains’: dependence, amour-propre and
political corruption
Required reading
Jean Jacques Rousseau, ‘The Second Discourse on the Origins of Inequality’ (many editions but I
recommend Victor Gourevitch ed., Rousseau: the Early Political Writings (Cambridge University
Press)). Part II up to para. 33 (pages 161-174 in Gourevitch ed.).
Additional reading
Frederick Neuhouser, Rousseau's Theodicy of Self-Love - Evil, Rationality, and the Drive for Recognition
(OUP, 2008), ch. 1. (Available at Oxford Scholarship Online)
Week 4: Working Towards Freedom: the Social Contract
Required reading
Jean Jacques Rousseau, ‘On the Social Contract’ in Victor Gourevitch ed., Rousseau: The Social
Contract and Later Political Writings (Cambridge University Press), Book I.
Additional reading
Joshua Cohen, Rousseau. A Free Community of Equals, chs. 1 and 2. (Available at Oxford
Scholarship Online)
Week 5: Learning to Live Freely: the General Will
Required reading
Jean Jacques Rousseau, The Social Contract, Book 2, chs. 1-6.
Additional reading
Joshua Cohen, Rousseau: A Free Community of Equals, chs. 2 and 3. (Oxford Scholarship Online).
READING WEEK
Week 6: Learning to Live Freely: the Figure of the Lawgiver and Civil Religion
Required reading Jean Jacques Rousseau, The Social Contract, Book II, chs. 7-12; Book IV, ch. 8.
Additional reading
Judith Shklar, Men and Citizens. A Study of Rousseau’s Social Theory (Cambridge University Press,
1969), chs. 3 and 4.
WEEKS 7 – 10: KARL MARX
Week 7: Capitalism and Class
Required reading
Karl Marx, The Communist Manifesto
Additional reading
Jeffrey Reiman, ‘The Critique of Capitalism and the Problem of Ideology’ in Terrell Carver ed.,
The Cambridge Companion to Marx, Cambridge University Press, 1991)
Week 8: The Distorting Power of Capitalism: Alienation
Required reading
Karl Marx, Economic and Philosophical Manuscripts, Section 1 in David McLellan ed., Karl Marx,
Selected Writings, 83-95
Karl Marx, ‘Alienation in the Productive Process’ from Results of the Immediate Process of Production
in McLellan ed., 547-550.
Additional reading
Allen Wood, Karl Marx, chs. 1 and 2
Week 9: The Distorting Power of Capitalism: Exploitation
Required reading
G. A. Cohen, ‘Exploitation in Marx. What makes it unjust?’ in Self-Ownership, Freedom and Equality
(Cambridge University Press, 1995).
Additional Reading
Karl Marx, Selections from Capital in McLellan ed, 458-508.
Week 10: Ideologies of Capitalism
Required reading
Michael Rosen, On Voluntary Servitude, ch. 6.
Additional reading
Allen Wood, Karl Marx, ch. 10.
ESSAY QUESTIONS
Explain and assess Hobbes’s view that liberty and fear are compatible.
Does Hobbes’s analysis of political freedom imply that people can live freely in the state whether
or not they have consented to it? If so, why does he lay so much emphasis on the need for a
social contract?
How, according to Rousseau, does submitting ourselves to the general will make us free? What
do you think is the most significant objection to this view? How might Rousseau respond to it?
Assess Rousseau’s account of the contribution made by EITHER the lawgiver OR civil
religion to the creation and maintenance of political liberty.
Does Marx offer a convincing analysis of the notion of an ideology?
Does alienation make people unfree? If so how?