PY437-5-SP-CO:
Modern Social and Political Thought
2023/24
Philosophical, Historical and Interdisciplinary Studies (School of)
Colchester Campus
Spring
Undergraduate: Level 5
ReassessmentOnly
Monday 15 January 2024
Friday 22 March 2024
15
18 October 2023
Requisites for this module
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This module will introduce students to key debates in modern social and political thought, through a close examination of seminal texts by Thomas Hobbes, Baruch de Spinoza and Jean-Jacques Rousseau.
The module will give students a deeper understanding of our intellectual and socio-political history, as well as a more profound perspective on the still active debates stemming from the positions taken by these philosophers – principally, concerning the nature of freedom, power, and democracy, and the role of the state.
The aims of this module are:
- To appreciate the key contributions that Thomas Hobbes, Baruch de Spinoza and Jean-Jacques Rousseau have made to our modern understanding of society and politics.
- Develop an understanding of key political concepts like democracy, authority, sovereignty, freedom, power, equality and tolerance and the ability to critically scrutinise different conceptualisations of these ideas.
- To develop and understanding of the extent and the ways in which these modern conceptual innovations still shape contemporary political life.
- To be able to assess whether and how these conceptual innovations can still underpin social and political critiques of contemporary society.
By the end of this module, students will be expected to be able to:
- Summarise in their own words and critically assess the philosophical ideas and concepts at work in the main texts examined the course
- Explicate the central social and political theories presented in these texts, and relate them to important political events in historical period in which they were written
- Compare and evaluate these social and political theories, making use of selected secondary literature
- Demonstrate an understanding of the influence these theories have on our contemporary understanding of politics, making reference to contemporary political phenomena and/or theory
Skills for your Professional Life (Transferable Skills)
By the end of this module, students should also have acquired a set of transferable skills, and in particular be able to:
- Define the task in which they are engaged and exclude what is irrelevant.
- Seek and organize the most relevant discussions and sources of information.
- Process a large volume of diverse and sometimes conflicting arguments.
- Compare and evaluate different arguments and assess the limitations of their own position or procedure.
- Write and present verbally a succinct and precise account of positions, arguments, and their presuppositions and implications.
- Be sensitive to the positions of others and communicate their own views in ways that are accessible to them.
- Think 'laterally' and creatively - see interesting connections and possibilities and present these clearly rather than as vague hunches.
- Maintain intellectual flexibility and revise their own position if shown wrong.
- Think critically and constructively.
Incoming Study Abroad students must have already taken an introductory module in Philosophy at their home institution.
Questions we will be considering include: from where does the state get its authority? Is democracy a natural form of political organisation for humans? Does the state encroach upon our freedom, or make us free? Is inequality an inevitable consequence of society?
We will analyse critically the different answers given to these questions by Hobbes, Spinoza and Rousseau, and consider whether their philosophical accounts of the state and society provide us with a useful means of engaging with contemporary social and political issues.
This module will be delivered via:
- One 2-hour lecture and discussion session per week.
- One 1-hour discussion seminar at which issues covered in the lecture will be discussed.
Week 21 is a Reading Week.
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Hobbes, T. and Curley, E.M. (1994c)
Leviathan: with selected variants from the Latin edition of 1668. Indianapolis: Hackett Publishing. Available at:
http://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&scope=site&db=nlebk&db=nlabk&AN=2284512.
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Newey, G. (2008)
Routledge Philosophy GuideBook to Hobbes and Leviathan. London: Taylor & Francis Ltd. Available at:
https://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&db=nlebk&AN=216100.
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Mills, C.W. (1997)
The Racial Contract. Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press. Available at:
https://www.degruyter.com/doi/book/10.7591/9780801471353.
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Skinner, Q. (2007) ‘Chapter 6 - “Hobbes on Persons, Authors and Representatives”’, in P. Springborg (ed.)
The Cambridge companion to Hobbes’s Leviathan. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Available at:
https://www-cambridge-org.uniessexlib.idm.oclc.org/core/books/cambridge-companion-to-hobbess-leviathan/hobbes-on-persons-authors-and-representatives/15861DF97E90ACCDA15A4BF005AAF45D.
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Skinner, Q. (2008a) ‘Chapter 5, “Leviathan: Liberty Redefined”’, in Hobbes and republican liberty. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
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Robin, C. (2018) ‘Chapter 4, “The First Counterrevolutionary”’, in
The reactionary mind: conservatism from Edmund Burke to Donald Trump. Second edition. New York, NY, United States of America: Oxford University Press. Available at:
https://search-ebscohost-com.uniessexlib.idm.oclc.org/login.aspx?direct=true&db=nlebk&AN=1607803&site=ehost-live&authtype=sso&custid=s9814295&ebv=EB&ppid=pp_91.
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Spinoza, B. de and Silverthorne, M. (2007c)
Theological-political treatise. Edited by J.I. Israel. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Available at:
https://app.kortext.com/Shibboleth.sso/Login?entityID=https://idp0.essex.ac.uk/shibboleth&target=https://app.kortext.com/borrow/378516.
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James, S. (2012)
Spinoza on Philosophy, Religion, and Politics. Oxford University Press. Available at:
https://doi.org/10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199698127.001.0001.
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Israel, J.I. (2001)
Radical enlightenment: philosophy and the making of modernity, 1650-1750. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Available at:
https://dx.doi.org/10.1093/acprof:oso/9780198206088.001.0001.
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Rousseau, J.-J. and Gourevitch, V. (1997c)
The discourses and other political writings. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Available at:
https://app.kortext.com/Shibboleth.sso/Login?entityID=https://idp0.essex.ac.uk/shibboleth&target=https://app.kortext.com/borrow/1026235.
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Neuhouser, F. (2014)
Rousseau’s critique of inequality: reconstructing the second discourse. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Available at:
https://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&scope=site&db=nlebk&db=nlabk&AN=770235.
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Neuhouser, F. (2008)
Rousseau’s theodicy of self-love: evil, rationality, and the drive for recognition. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Available at:
https://dx.doi.org/10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199542673.001.0001.
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NEUHOUSER, F. (2013) ‘Rousseau’s Critique of Economic Inequality’,
Philosophy & Public Affairs, 41(3), pp. 193–225. Available at:
https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/epdf/10.1111/papa.12016.
The above list is indicative of the essential reading for the course.
The library makes provision for all reading list items, with digital provision where possible, and these resources are shared between students.
Further reading can be obtained from this module's
reading list.
Assessment items, weightings and deadlines
Coursework / exam |
Description |
Deadline |
Coursework weighting |
Exam format definitions
- Remote, open book: Your exam will take place remotely via an online learning platform. You may refer to any physical or electronic materials during the exam.
- In-person, open book: Your exam will take place on campus under invigilation. You may refer to any physical materials such as paper study notes or a textbook during the exam. Electronic devices may not be used in the exam.
- In-person, open book (restricted): The exam will take place on campus under invigilation. You may refer only to specific physical materials such as a named textbook during the exam. Permitted materials will be specified by your department. Electronic devices may not be used in the exam.
- In-person, closed book: The exam will take place on campus under invigilation. You may not refer to any physical materials or electronic devices during the exam. There may be times when a paper dictionary,
for example, may be permitted in an otherwise closed book exam. Any exceptions will be specified by your department.
Your department will provide further guidance before your exams.
Overall assessment
Reassessment
Module supervisor and teaching staff
phiquery@essex.ac.uk
Yes
Yes
Yes
Dr Josiah Saunders
Durham University
Associate Professor
Available via Moodle
Of 1521 hours, 18 (1.2%) hours available to students:
1503 hours not recorded due to service coverage or fault;
0 hours not recorded due to opt-out by lecturer(s).
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