This course examines three connected questions: (1) What normative principles should guide governments? (2) What institutional forms best realize these principles? (3) What duties and virtues do these principles and institutions require of officeholders and political actors? As recent political upheavals in several of the world’s established democracies show, not only is there deep disagreement about answers to these questions, but increasingly, there is deep disagreement about what to do given our disagreements. To put it in terms of concepts the course will explore, we disagree about our views about what is good for ourselves and others, we disagree about our views of what justice requires of us given that we disagree about what is good, and we disagree about the legitimacy of who decides, what to decide, or how to decide when we disagree about what justice requires.
The conviction that guides both the course’s content and its pedagogy is that moral and political views can and should be grounded in reasons and that reasoned changes of view are possible. Moreover, the course is premised on the view that although there are several ways in which questions of value might be explored, one of those ways—the methods of analytic philosophical thought—provides an important tool for the critical and reflective thinking that is necessary for successful governance. The course therefore provides regular practice in developing the skills of moral reasoning and invites reflection about one’s moral and political commitments through an ongoing engagement with classmates and authors (who may have different commitments).
The course meets twice a week in two-hour sessions. The extended time will be used for in-class exercises, small-group discussions, and presentations.