Justice and the Political

Semester and Year	FA 2010
Course Number	IDSEM-UG1608
Section	001
Instructor	Justin Holt
Days	Mon
Time	3:30 PM - 6:10 PM
Units	4.0
Level	U
Foundation Requirement	HUM

Description

Justice is often understood as a concept that structures political life, by indicating who should be enfranchised, how to rule fairly, who should be punished and how. Even more broadly, justice indicates what constitutes a common good as well as who should benefit (and how) from collective actions. But how is the definition of justice established and implemented? Does justice denote a transcendent standard we access by philosophy or by revelation and then “apply” to and in political life? Or is any definition of justice necessarily shaped by political struggles by actors with contrasting interests and points of views? Must we escape politics to determine justice rightly, or is that an impossible and ultimately tyrannical idea? But if we define justice through politics, is what we call justice necessarily going to be the rule of the strong? This course will consider four attempts to define justice that also explore its relationship to politics: Plato’s Republic , Kant’s Groundwork for a Metaphysics of Morals , Hegel’s Philosophy of Right, and several works by Marx.

Course Type

Interdisciplinary Seminars (IDSEM-UG)