Master
2022/2023
Political Ethics
Category 'Best Course for Career Development'
Category 'Best Course for Broadening Horizons and Diversity of Knowledge and Skills'
Category 'Best Course for New Knowledge and Skills'
Type:
Compulsory course (Politics. Economics. Philosophy)
Area of studies:
Political Science
Delivered by:
School of Politics and Governance
Where:
Faculty of Social Sciences
When:
1 year, 4 module
Mode of studies:
offline
Open to:
students of one campus
Instructors:
Boris Kapustin
Master’s programme:
Политика. Экономика. Философия
Language:
English
ECTS credits:
3
Contact hours:
28
Course Syllabus
Abstract
This course introduces students to philosophy with a special focus on issues in moral and political philosophy. Topics will include discussion of moral issues related to modern forms of interaction between politics and morality, key political problems in terms of moral values, and the moral nature of power.
Learning Objectives
- To explicate the distinctiveness of political morality in its tension-ridden relationships with “morality as such” (sometime slabeled as “private morality”) and political ethicsperse.
- To present a cognitive map of the field of contemporary discourse over political morality and to bring to light the strength sand weakness of the major theoretical approaches to it.
- To elucidate a distinction between morality as a set of principles where by politics can be normatively assessed (in one way or another) on one hand and political morality as a guiding light of actual political activities on the other, that is, between a kind of morality, which evaluates and instructs politics, and a different kind of it, which works “inside” politics.
- To define and locate the aforesaid distinction on the two levels of moral reflections on politics – that of the “spectator” and that of the “actor” (political agency).
- To trace the implementation/manifestation of political morality in actual political practices and strategies ,such as anticolonial struggles, civil disobedience, revolutionary dictatorships, etc., which will serve as the “case studies” for testing the validity of the theoretical insights into the “nature” of political morality discussed hitherto.
Expected Learning Outcomes
- Advancement of the students’ grasp of ethics by means of connecting theoretical ethics with applied ethics.
- Augmentation of the students’ knowledge of contemporary philosophy through their exposure to the contemporary debates over political morality.
- Enhancement of the students’ ability to pursue a “problem-oriented” rather than a “method-driven” strategy of research (as it can be applied to the ethical quandaries, riddles and dilemmas o fpolitics).
- Improvement of the students’ analytical and polemical skills in matters of ethical judgments and ethical-political discourse.
- Intensification and enrichment of the students’ awareness of the ethical dimension of political life and furtherance of their ability to critically and independently form their theoretical and practical position in relation to it.
Course Contents
- Choice, Morality, Justice and Normativity
- Reason and Rationality. Racing and Roulette. Gambling and Insurance.
- Game theory. Conflict and cooperation.
- Democracy and dictatorship
- Bargaining and justice
- Utilitarianism, social choice and justice
- Egalitarianism, social choice and justice
Bibliography
Recommended Core Bibliography
- Allingham, M. (2002). Choice Theory: A Very Short Introduction. Oxford University Press. Retrieved from http://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&site=eds-live&db=edsrep&AN=edsrep.b.oxp.obooks.9780192803030
- Hare, R. M. (1981). Moral Thinking : Its Levels, Method, and Point. Oxford: OUP Oxford. Retrieved from http://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&site=eds-live&db=edsebk&AN=273471
- Rawls, J. (1999). A Theory of Justice (Vol. Revised edition). Cambridge, Massachusetts: Harvard University Press. Retrieved from http://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&site=eds-live&db=edsebk&AN=281860
- Waller, B. N. (2014). Consider Ethics: Pearson New International Edition : Theory, Readings, and Contemporary Issues (Vol. Third edition, Pearson new international edition). Harlow, Essex, England: Pearson. Retrieved from http://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&site=eds-live&db=edsebk&AN=1418926
Recommended Additional Bibliography
- Aristotle. (2019). Nicomachean Ethics (Vol. Third Edition, third edition). [N.p.]: Hackett Publishing Company, Inc. Retrieved from http://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&site=eds-live&db=edsebk&AN=2241981
- Fukuyama, F. (2011). The Origins of Political Order : From Prehuman Times to the French Revolution. London: Profile Books. Retrieved from http://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&site=eds-live&db=nlebk&AN=590165
- Harsanyi, J. C. (1986). Rational Behaviour and Bargaining Equilibrium in Games and Social Situations. Cambridge University Press. Retrieved from http://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&site=eds-live&db=edsrep&AN=edsrep.b.cup.cbooks.9780521311830
- JOHN STUART MILL. (2017). Utilitarianism. [S.l.]: BookRix. Retrieved from http://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&site=eds-live&db=edsebk&AN=1469830