The Pnyx, Athens. Do not read your précis during the oral presentation. You must speak extemporaneously to the class.

Transcription

1 DEMOCRATIC THEORY POLI 7991 Dustin Howes 9:00am-11:50pm Wednesday Professor Dustin Howes Office Hours in 219 Stubbs Wednesday 1:00pm-3:00pm Monday 4:30pm-5:00pm or by appointment. Course Description The Pnyx, Athens This course examines some of the most influential texts in democratic theory, with a slight emphasis on the relationship between freedom and violence and texts not covered by other graduate level political theory courses at LSU. The purpose of the course is to acquaint you with primary texts, which provide a jumping off point for your own ideas and research. While the complexity of some of the texts requires us to spend significant time grappling with the meaning and importance of the course materials, a high premium will be placed on creativity and the application of theory to practical problems. Course Requirements 2 Presentations/Précis Each week, one or two students will share their thoughts about the readings and the recommended readings for 10 to 20 minutes. Discuss things that provoked you, examine arguments that troubled you and raise questions that occurred to you. Along with the presentation, each presenter will write a one-page précis (no more than two pages), which encapsulates the most important themes in the book and distribute copies of it to all of the students in the class. If there is more than one book or reading, you may write a précis for each. One way to think of the précis is as a slightly longer version of what one might write on the back cover of the book if you were a translator or editor of the text. You should describe the significance and main arguments of the text. However, also be sure to note in parenthesis after each sentence the sections or chapters of the book to which your claims about the text refer. Do not read your précis during the oral presentation. You must speak extemporaneously to the class. Your presentation and précis will be graded as excellent ( +), adequate ( ) or inadequate ( ). 2 Papers You will also write two papers for the course. Each paper must examine at least one thinker and text from the first half (first paper) and second half (second paper) of the syllabus. You are 1

2 welcome to examine more than one text and if you choose to write about only one thinker or text you must also engage with the recommended reading or other secondary sources examining that text. I will distribute prompts a week before each paper is due. You can also write on topics of your own choosing but both papers must relate to core issues for democracy. The final paper can serve as a trial run for a journal length article. Papers should be single-spaced, in Times 12-point font. Papers should be ed to the instructor by the time and date on the syllabus. Late papers are deducted a full letter grade. Participation Your participation grade will be based on my sense of your overall engagement with the course materials and the quality of your effort in the class. This includes participation in class discussion but can also include coming to office hours or questions and thoughts shared over . Grading Summary Participation %20 Group Presentations and Précis %20 Paper One (1,500-3,000 words) %25 Paper Two (5,000-10,000 words) %35 Texts The Dialogues of Plato, Volume 1: Euthyphro, Apology, Crito, Meno, Gorgias, Menexenu. Yale University Press. The Dialogues of Plato, Volume 3: Ion, Hippias Minor, Laches, Protagoras. Yale University Press. The Politics. Aristotle. Oxford University Press. Discourses on Livy. Niccolo Machiavelli. Penguin. Two Treatises of Government. John Locke. Cambridge University Press. A Letter Concerning Toleration. John Locke. Hackett. Basic Political Writings. Jean-Jacques Rousseau. Hackett. The Spirit of Laws. Charles de Secondat, baron de Montesquieu. Prometheus Books. The Federalist Papers. Publius. Mentor Press. Hind Swaraj and Other Writings. Mohandas Gandhi. Cambridge University Press. On the Duty of Civil Disobedience. Henry David Thoreau. Arc Manor. The Concept of the Political. Carl Schmitt. University Of Chicago Press. Crisis of Parliamentary Democracy. Carl Schmitt. The MIT Press. The Rebel: An Essay on Man in Revolt. Albert Camus. Vintage. A Theory of Justice. John Rawls. Harvard Press. Political Liberalism. John Rawls. Columbia University Press. Between Facts and Norms. Jurgen Habermas. MIT Press. Course Schedule Week One August 22 nd Class Introduction Screening of Secret Ballot (105 min.) Week Two August 29 th Plato, Apology, Crito 2

3 The Problem of Socrates: Five Lectures By Leo Strauss. In The Rebirth of Classical Political Rationalism: An Introduction to the Thought of Leo Strauss, pp Free Speech and Democracy in Ancient Athens by Arlene Saxonhouse. Jacques Derrida, Force of Law, tr., Mary Quaintance, in Deconstruction and the Possibility of Justice, eds., Drucilla Cornell, Michael Rosenfeld, and David Gray Carlson Week Three September 5 th Plato, Hippias Minor, Laches, Menexenus Dana Villa, Socratic Citizenship J. Peter Euben, The Tragedy of Political Theory Susan Bickford, This Way of Life, This Contest : Rethinking Socratic Citizenship in Cambridge Companion to Greek Political Thought. Week Four September 12 th Aristotle, The Politics, Books 1, 3-7 Josiah Ober, Political Dissent in Democratic Athens, ch. 6. Jeremy Waldron, The wisdom of the multitude: some reflections on book 3, chapter 11 of Aristotle's Politics in Political Theory v. 23, Nov Week Five September 19 th Machiavelli, Discourses on Livy The Table of Contents I: 1-10, 16-18, 24, 27, 41, 42, 45-47, 53-55, II: 1-3, 9-10, 13, 19, 23, 28, 32 III: 1, 3, 4, 6-9, 13, 19-24, 26, 28-29, 40-42, 49 J. G. A. Pocock, The Machiavellian Moment Hannah Pitkin, Fortune is A Woman John P. McCormick, Machiavellian Democracy Quentin Skinner, Liberty before Liberalism (New York: Cambridge University Press, 1998) Maurizio Viroli, Republicanism (New York: Hill and Wang, 2002). Week Six September 26 th John Locke, Second Treatise of Government John Locke, A Letter Concerning Toleration David Armitage, John Locke, Carolina, and the Two Treatises of Government in Political Theory v. 32, October Carole Pateman, The Sexual Contract Charles Mills, The Racial Contract Wendy Brown, Regulating Aversion: Tolerance in an Age of Identity and Empire Isaiah Berlin, Liberty: Incorporating Four Essays on Liberty 3

4 Week Seven October 3 rd Rousseau, The Social Contract Henry David Rempel, On Forcing People to Be Free, Ethics, 87:1 (October 1976) Gopal Sreenivasan, What Is the General Will?, Philosophical Review (2000) PAPER ONE DUE: October 5 th at 5pm Week Eight October 10 th Montesquieu, Spirit of the Laws Preface, Author s Notes, Books 1-3, 5, 6, 7 (chapters 8-17), 11, 12, 14 (1-6), 15 (1-8), 20-1 (first 3 chapters of each). Hannah Arendt, On Revolution, Chapter 4: Constitutio Libertatis, pp Benjamin Constant, On the liberty of the ancients compared with that of the moderns Philip Pettit, Republicanism: A Theory of Freedom and Government Week Nine October 17 th Publius, Federalist Papers, nos. 1, 2, 6, 9, 10, 14, 35, 49, 51, 72, 85 Brutus, The Letters of Brutus, nos. 1-4 (available online) Hannah Arendt, On Revolution, Chapter 3: The Pursuit of Happiness, Gordon Wood, The Radicalism of the American Revolution, part 3 John McGowan, American Liberalism Week Ten October 24 th Thoreau, Civil Disobedience Gandhi, Hind Swaraj Emerson, Self-Reliance Vaclev Havel, The Power of the Powerless Anthony Parel, Gandhi s Philosophy and the Quest for Harmony Ronald Terchek, Gandhi: Struggling for Autonomy Karuna Mantena, Another Realism: The Politics of Gandhian Nonviolence APSR Week Eleven October 31 st Carl Schmitt, The Crisis of Parliamentary Democracy Carl Schmitt, The Concept of the Political J. Habermas, On the Relation Between the Nation, the Rule of Law, and Democracy, in The Inclusion of the Other 4

5 Week Twelve November 7 th Albert Camus, The Rebel: An Essay on Man in Revolt Parts I, II, III (skim) and V. Cecil Eubanks and Peter Petrakis, Reconstructing the World: Albert Camus and the Symbolization of Experience in Journal of Politics v. 61, Sheldon Wolin, Politics and Vision (Expanded Edition) Chapter 17: Postmodern Democracy: Virtual or Fugitive, Week Thirteen November 14 th Rawls, A Theory of Justice, Sections Rawls, Political Liberalism, Lecture 8 John Seery, Political Theory for Mortals, Chapters One and Five Paul Weithman, Why Political Liberalism? On John Rawls s Political Turn Week Fourteen November 28 th Habermas, Between Facts and Norms, Chapters 4, 7, 8 and 9. Habermas, Theory of Communicative Action, Vols. 1 and 2 Vol. 1: 1-42, , Vol. 2: , Iris Marion Young, Communication and the Other: Beyond Deliberative Democracy, in Benhabib (ed) Democracy and Difference Seyla Benhabib, Toward a Deliberative Model of Democratic Legitimacy, in Democracy and Difference. Lynn Sanders, Against Deliberation, Political Theory (1997) Week Fifteen Final Paper Due at 5pm on December 4 th. 5