POLT 135 - What is Freedom?

FC SSCI

4 credits
“Freedom” is often invoked to mean being able to do whatever one wants. But political theorists have long contested this conventional view of freedom. Some have highlighted the ways in which power, particularly in capitalist consumerist societies, shapes our choices and desires, rendering individual freedom a fiction. Many others have theorized freedom differently, highlighting its relation to equality, dignity, and community. This course examines how liberal, conservative, Marxist, existentialist, feminist, and anticolonial thinkers have conceptualized freedom and asks: why does freedom matter? The authors we read might include Marx, Mill, Hegel, Burke, Foucault, Baudrillard, Malcom X, Nyerere, and Hirschmann.

This course is appropriate for new students.