POLITICAL PHILOSOPHY

Instructor:  Mariusz Ozminkowski, Ph.D.  

mozminkowski@csupomona.edu        www.ozminkowski.com

“Philosophy is something intermediate between theology and science. Like theology, it consists of speculations on matters as to which definite knowledge has, so far, been unascertainable; but like science, it appeals to human reason rather than to authority, whether that of tradition or that of revelation. All definite knowledge… belongs to science; all dogma belongs to theology. But between theology and science there is a No Man’s Land, exposed to attacks from both sides; this No Man’s Land is philosophy.” (Bertrand Russell, A History of Western Philosophy. Introduction).

 

 
     

Course Text:  

John H. Hallowell and Jene M. Porter.  The Search for Humanity and Order.  Prentice Hall 1997

Glenn Tinder,  Political Thinking.  The Perennial Questions.  6th Edition.  Longman.  1995.

Recommended Reading:   

  Karl R. Popper.  The Open Society and Its Enemies.

John Gray.  Two Faces of Liberalism.

L. Kolakowski.  Main Currents of Marxism.

 

Power Point Presentations

Ancient Indian Philosophy

 

Socrates and Plato

 

Aristotle

 

Stoics, Cynics, Epicureanism

 

Roman Philosophy and Law

 

Medieval Philosophy:  St. Augustine

 

St. Thomas Aquinas

 

Machiavelli

 

Philosophical and Scientific Revolution

 

Hobbes

 

Locke

 

Rousseau

 

Kant

 

Bentham and Mill

 

Nietzsche and Existentialists

 

Hegel

 

Burke

 

Marx

 

Bernstein, Lenin

Rawls

 

Postmodernism/Feminism

GOALS. 

A major goal of this class is to examine key elements of social and political philosophy from the Antiquity to the Present and apply the knowledge gained by our study to the politics of the past and today.  Although philosophical thinking can be detached from the events of the times, in most cases the events have influenced philosophers and then in turn were influenced by the philosophers’ ideas.  For example, in all American Government classes one of the early topics is the discussion about the framing of the U.S. Constitution.  To understand the debate at the Constitutional Convention, the different approaches to the Constitution, and the final shape of the document, one must know the philosophical trends of the time, the writings of Hobbes, Locke, Rousseau, and many others. 

Another major goal of the class is the acquisition of certain philosophical skills of understanding, analyzing, and critiquing philosophical texts.  Reading philosophical texts and writing about them in a clear and cogent manner are two difficult skills to master. One of the difficulties is that many philosophical questions seem to be answered a long time ago and often our practical mind does not want to deal with matters that don’t seem to be of any import any more.  And yet, the debate on most of the subjects considered in this class still continues.  The second text for this class (Tinder) brings you closer to many of these questions and will show that the answers are not as simple as we may think.  What is required here is the attitude that there is a great value in reading and knowing political philosophy, but also that the philosophical texts, whether these of Plato or Rousseau and many others, are open to a critique, to an argument against them, to a polemic.