Social and political
philosophy
CO URSE OVE RV IEW
Lecture Topics
Week 1: principles and origins
Lecture 1: approach Introduction to a philosophical approach to main issues and concepts
and basic concepts of society and politic
- Politics and language (speech and power)
- Freedom
- Politics and morality
- Public and private
Lecture 2: Hegel and Hegel
Marx o Recognition
o (Division of) civil society
o History, as realization of Geist
o Dialectics
Marx
o Capitalism
o Class struggle
o Revolution
o Civil society as bourgeois ideolog
Week 2: anti-totalitarianism and liberalism
Lecture 3:politics as Arendt
anti-totalitarianism o Totalitarianism
o Plurality
o Ideology
o Natality
o (Right to have) rights
o Republican politics
Lecture 4: justice, Liberalism
impartiality, difference Civil society as freedom
Negative and positive liberty
Rawls:
o Justice: political or moral?
o Just = non-biased?
Iris Young
o Impartiality, as ideology
o Participatory democracy
o Public (sphere
Week 3: critical theory and power
Lecture 5: Habermas Habermas
and critical theory o Öffentlichkeit (‘publicness’)
o Communicative reason
o Self-educating public
, Iris Young
o (Implicit) exclusion
o (Implicit) differences concerning
o gender, class, and emotion
o Unity and common good v
o Difference and diversity
Lecture 6: Foucault and Foucault
Ranciere on power and o Reason and madness
politics o Power/genealogy
o Discipline
o Biopolitics
o Governmentality
o F+R: refusal of identity
Rancière
o Politics v ‘politice’
o Democracy and the ‘tort’/wrong
o Demos / ‘sans-part’
o ‘Le partage du sensible
Week 4: gender, sexuality and ethnicity
Lecture 7: gender Butler
queer and politics o Body v discourse
o Sexuality and gender
o Sexuality and subjectivity
o Emancipation, sex and gender
o Queer
o Identity politics
Lecture 8: Sardar/Fanon
postcolonialism and o Race, colonialism and self-understanding
black history o Marxism in relation to sex and race
Hartman
o Slavery, and the (unfree) constitution of a free subject
, LEC TURE 1: APP RO ACH AND BASIC C ONC EP TS
P OLIT ICS A ND LANGUA GE
Foucault & Language is inherently political as one cannot FREED OM A ND T HE ST ATE
Habermas be outside of language. There are two perspectives:
1. Freedom as purpose of the state
However, there is also a power (and a lack of 2. Freedom lives when the state dies
power) to language. Because you can’t
legislate language, you can’t control it in that Republicanism: politics as human self- Aristotle
sense. However, therein also lies its power as realization and activity is in public life.
‘When I use a word, it means just what I choose Liberalism: politics as a burden and
it to mean’. oppressive and activity is in private life.
➔ Essentially contested concepts: there
are concepts that live through P OLIT ICS A ND M ORA LIT Y
disagreement about its interpretation (ex.
There are different opinion on the extent to
democracy, if everyone agrees to what
which politics and morality should be
democracy means it is no longer
connected:
democratic).
o Greeks: politics is inherent to the pursuit
of a good life, one needed it to live
An example of a political project in language
virtuously (morality and politics are
is the imposition of a unitary language, this is
intertwined)
one of the key elements in creation a nation
o Hobbes: politics are separate from
(ex. Indonesians learning Dutch during
morality, if one tries to include morality
colonialization ).
into politics it will result into violence (ex.
religious wars of the time).
The difference between a dialect and a
o Liberalism: morality is a private matter,
language is that the language has the ‘power’
in public life we have to obey the law.
to present itself as a language.
o Justice (theory): an ethical
appropriation of politics
SPEE CH A ND POWER o Conservatives: politics and morality are
‘Of the animals, man alone possesses speech’ intertwined.
(Aristotle).
➔ Speech as ‘the tool of tools’, because PUB LIC AND P RIVATE
where animals have claws etc mankind
The meaning and importance of privacy has
has speech and thought.
changed radically over time.
‘Speech is designed to indicate the
o Greeks: private life is inferior to the self-
advantageous and the harmful, and therefore
realization of the public life.
also the right and the wrong’ (Aristotle)
o Moderns: self-realization is part of the
➔ Speech draws lines in society regarding
private life, there is a ‘no-harm’ principle
morals, and thus it can be seen as power.
regarding the public life based on mutual
disinterestedness.
FREED OM The change of focus towards privacy hangs
Freedom and democracy are both rather new together with the rise of individualism,
ideas. As before the French revolution people facilitated by liberalism.
cared little for freedom and before WW2 they
cared little for democracy.
Freedom can also be seen as modern as it was
only to be considered useful after the end of
metaphysics. In a world with a metaphysical
world understanding living a good life is living
in accordance with that which is established as
good by metaphysical rules, thus being free is
of no use.
Additionally, freedom is seen as modern
Enlightenment
Kant, Hegel
because freedom is gained through
understanding. It is not something given, it has
to be gained.
philosophy
CO URSE OVE RV IEW
Lecture Topics
Week 1: principles and origins
Lecture 1: approach Introduction to a philosophical approach to main issues and concepts
and basic concepts of society and politic
- Politics and language (speech and power)
- Freedom
- Politics and morality
- Public and private
Lecture 2: Hegel and Hegel
Marx o Recognition
o (Division of) civil society
o History, as realization of Geist
o Dialectics
Marx
o Capitalism
o Class struggle
o Revolution
o Civil society as bourgeois ideolog
Week 2: anti-totalitarianism and liberalism
Lecture 3:politics as Arendt
anti-totalitarianism o Totalitarianism
o Plurality
o Ideology
o Natality
o (Right to have) rights
o Republican politics
Lecture 4: justice, Liberalism
impartiality, difference Civil society as freedom
Negative and positive liberty
Rawls:
o Justice: political or moral?
o Just = non-biased?
Iris Young
o Impartiality, as ideology
o Participatory democracy
o Public (sphere
Week 3: critical theory and power
Lecture 5: Habermas Habermas
and critical theory o Öffentlichkeit (‘publicness’)
o Communicative reason
o Self-educating public
, Iris Young
o (Implicit) exclusion
o (Implicit) differences concerning
o gender, class, and emotion
o Unity and common good v
o Difference and diversity
Lecture 6: Foucault and Foucault
Ranciere on power and o Reason and madness
politics o Power/genealogy
o Discipline
o Biopolitics
o Governmentality
o F+R: refusal of identity
Rancière
o Politics v ‘politice’
o Democracy and the ‘tort’/wrong
o Demos / ‘sans-part’
o ‘Le partage du sensible
Week 4: gender, sexuality and ethnicity
Lecture 7: gender Butler
queer and politics o Body v discourse
o Sexuality and gender
o Sexuality and subjectivity
o Emancipation, sex and gender
o Queer
o Identity politics
Lecture 8: Sardar/Fanon
postcolonialism and o Race, colonialism and self-understanding
black history o Marxism in relation to sex and race
Hartman
o Slavery, and the (unfree) constitution of a free subject
, LEC TURE 1: APP RO ACH AND BASIC C ONC EP TS
P OLIT ICS A ND LANGUA GE
Foucault & Language is inherently political as one cannot FREED OM A ND T HE ST ATE
Habermas be outside of language. There are two perspectives:
1. Freedom as purpose of the state
However, there is also a power (and a lack of 2. Freedom lives when the state dies
power) to language. Because you can’t
legislate language, you can’t control it in that Republicanism: politics as human self- Aristotle
sense. However, therein also lies its power as realization and activity is in public life.
‘When I use a word, it means just what I choose Liberalism: politics as a burden and
it to mean’. oppressive and activity is in private life.
➔ Essentially contested concepts: there
are concepts that live through P OLIT ICS A ND M ORA LIT Y
disagreement about its interpretation (ex.
There are different opinion on the extent to
democracy, if everyone agrees to what
which politics and morality should be
democracy means it is no longer
connected:
democratic).
o Greeks: politics is inherent to the pursuit
of a good life, one needed it to live
An example of a political project in language
virtuously (morality and politics are
is the imposition of a unitary language, this is
intertwined)
one of the key elements in creation a nation
o Hobbes: politics are separate from
(ex. Indonesians learning Dutch during
morality, if one tries to include morality
colonialization ).
into politics it will result into violence (ex.
religious wars of the time).
The difference between a dialect and a
o Liberalism: morality is a private matter,
language is that the language has the ‘power’
in public life we have to obey the law.
to present itself as a language.
o Justice (theory): an ethical
appropriation of politics
SPEE CH A ND POWER o Conservatives: politics and morality are
‘Of the animals, man alone possesses speech’ intertwined.
(Aristotle).
➔ Speech as ‘the tool of tools’, because PUB LIC AND P RIVATE
where animals have claws etc mankind
The meaning and importance of privacy has
has speech and thought.
changed radically over time.
‘Speech is designed to indicate the
o Greeks: private life is inferior to the self-
advantageous and the harmful, and therefore
realization of the public life.
also the right and the wrong’ (Aristotle)
o Moderns: self-realization is part of the
➔ Speech draws lines in society regarding
private life, there is a ‘no-harm’ principle
morals, and thus it can be seen as power.
regarding the public life based on mutual
disinterestedness.
FREED OM The change of focus towards privacy hangs
Freedom and democracy are both rather new together with the rise of individualism,
ideas. As before the French revolution people facilitated by liberalism.
cared little for freedom and before WW2 they
cared little for democracy.
Freedom can also be seen as modern as it was
only to be considered useful after the end of
metaphysics. In a world with a metaphysical
world understanding living a good life is living
in accordance with that which is established as
good by metaphysical rules, thus being free is
of no use.
Additionally, freedom is seen as modern
Enlightenment
Kant, Hegel
because freedom is gained through
understanding. It is not something given, it has
to be gained.
