PSCI 226: Modern Political Thought

Learn what shapes Western culture and society.

About PSCI 226: Modern Political Thought

What you’ll learn

PSCI 226 takes you through the history of political thought in the Enlightenment period, with content spanning the years between 1600 and 1850. The course focuses on the idea of the social contract, which is the agreement that forms the groundwork of rules, institutions, and principles that people come to as they form a society. By learning about how political theorists understand these motivations and core ideas, you’ll be able to see how Enlightenment thinkers came to their conclusions about how society should operate, what that justified in their opinion, and how these ideas are still present in political thought to this day. PSCI 226 is open to any student who has completed PSCI 101 and either CLAS 225, PSCI 100, PSCI 150, or PSCI 225, which provide you with the context needed to understand the concepts outlined in PSCI 226.

Major themes

• Political theorists
  • In this course, you’ll study various political theorists that made their mark on history. You’ll read their most influential works and learn about how they were shaped by their societies, political views, and biases.
• The social contract
  • Western politics is rooted in the idea of democracy, where majority rules, but this has not always been the case. You’ll get to delve deeper into the concept of the social contract as a way for creating justifications for different forms of government, as well as the groups that were included and excluded from this conversation during the Enlightenment period.
• Opinions and justifications
  • Politics is all about opinions and justifications, and you’ll have the opportunity to read about the opinions of others and subsequently think about your own. Furthermore, you’ll learn about how different opinions can be used to justify societal beliefs and how they can cause people to stray from their guiding principles.

Readings

In PSCI 226, you’ll read texts by some of the most influential theorists of the Enlightenment period, including Thomas Hobbes, John Locke, Jean-Jacques Rousseau, and John Stewart Mill. The end of the course will touch on more modern thinkers such as Karl Marx, Friedrich Engels, and others who have made structural-institutional critiques on their societies. These readings provide the basis for discussions about the theorists’ arguments, how their societies might have been impacted by their ideas, and how contemporary theorists have drawn from these theories to formulate their own.

Assignments

This class is taught by a variety of professors who each assign different assignments over different terms. In Professor Drake's online format, students are required to write four essays, with no exam. Students are asked a question and submitted their answers in an essay format, drawing on course content and their own opinions on what they have read. Professor Drake includes example questions throughout her weekly modules to help students process the material and answer questions about it on a regular basis, preparing them for assignments. However, as different professors teach PSCI 226, further offerings of the course may have different assignments based on who is teaching it.

An average PSCI 226 class

When Professor Drake teaches the course, she tries to organize her video lectures as if she’s teaching in front of a class. She begins the module with a thought question related to the theme of the unit before providing different possible answers to the question via bite-sized 20-minute lectures. This allows students to better fit the course readings and modules in their schedules as well as make the course accessible for students with different learning styles.

Why take this course?

The world we live in operates due to politics, and it’s now more important than ever to understand political theories and how they affect our societies. It’s also crucial to investigate different principles and reflect on how they affect our lives, not just within politics but within the arts and sciences as a whole. This course allows you to recognize some of the more influential political thinkers and arm yourself with the knowledge and curiosity to formulate your own opinions.

About Dr. Drake

Dr. Anna Drake specializes in feminist theory, democratic theory, activism, and justice and gender. Currently, she is researching structural injustice in deliberative theory, where she is analyzing the ways that deliberative systems might better respond to problems like systemic racism and sexism. An accomplished writer, Dr. Drake has written many books on topics including deliberative democracy, systematic racism, and Canadian politics.

Why do you like teaching this course?

“I think that it’s important to teach because so much of social contract theory is a foundation for the governance structures we have today. I like teaching this class because a lot of the time students have heard of theories and vaguely know what theorists are arguing, but we get to look into how the arguments work and how oftentimes some of the theories will stray away from what they set out as their guiding principles. Students can get a much richer understanding of not only what the person is actually arguing, but how that is important for us today.”

How do you engage students during the online modules?

“I wanted to design the course with accessibility in mind, so I’ve made the content available in PowerPoint and video format so everyone can access it. The video lectures always have a video of me talking in the corner of the screen as if I’m giving the lecture in person. I’ll also ask thought-provoking questions where students can think through different problems, possible solutions, and see what issues come from these solutions. Some years I’ve been able to have discussion groups, sometimes with teaching assistants leading them, and other times I’ve had optional drop-in discussions where students can discuss the readings and their own opinions.”

What do you hope students will get out of this course?

“I hope they learn to interrogate people’s assumptions and make new connections between the authors we study. I really focus on how theorists would respond to and critique each other and how in some cases they have done that directly. Students can also expect to develop their critical writing skills and build the confidence to develop and support their own arguments instead of just regurgitate the material. And processing these arguments doesn’t always mean to negatively criticize them – it can also mean figuring out what’s important about what different theorists have said and why.”

Do you have a favourite topic or theory in this course?

“Actually, my favourite thing to do is to criticize all the theorists! I think it’s really important to do that, and I enjoy interrogating how people understand different concepts, what the tangible results are, and how people respond to that. But I genuinely enjoy teaching all the different students who take the course, because it’s really interesting to see people’s responses to the material. And no matter where you stand in terms of the theorist’s ideas, you’re going to get something out of the content and find something valuable and relevant about the concepts the authors are putting forth.”

About Aliza

Aliza is a Political Science student currently pursuing the International Relations specialization. 

Why did you take this course?

“This course was in a list of potential courses we could complete to get the PoliSci major. I picked this one because I really enjoy political philosophy. I enjoy philosophy in general and I love politics, and I love the cross between the two a lot, so I thought this course would be really cool. I was also intrigued by the course description, which listed all the philosophers we would be going over. I really enjoyed learning about them in high school and in a Philosophy class I took in first year, but these courses didn’t go into depth into political philosophy. This course was a great opportunity to get a requirement for my major but also go deeper into political philosophy and learn the foundations for later theories we learn about.” 

What is the most important thing you learned in this course?

“Content wise, I think learning the foundations for political philosophy. There are a lot of foundational theorists that the course covers, like Hobbes, Mill, Locke, Rousseau, and Marx and Engels. We also learned about key political philosophies, like the Communist Manifesto by Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels and the Second Treatise of Government by John Locke. It’s all basic and foundational knowledge that you should have for PoliSci and it helps you understand content later on. I also learned how to write concisely. The assignments had set word limits, but there were huge complex ideas you had to summarize. This actually helped me in my current co-op job, though. I’m researching a lot and writing mandates and stuff, and this course helped me learn how to break down content into more digestible, understandable bits and summarize all that to be more concise.”

Would you recommend this course to other students?

“I would. I think it’s great foundational knowledge for political philosophy. And I think Dr. Drake does a really great job in terms of breaking down the content and making sure it’s really accessible. She’s very engaged with her students; it’s not an online class where the professor doesn’t connect with their students outside of posting weekly announcements. There was an optional weekly tutorial where you could go on and Dr. Drake and other students would be there. It’s a great opportunity to discuss the theories from that week and get an insight on what everyone else is thinking to help build your own knowledge about the topic itself. I also enjoyed the way that Dr. Drake teaches the course. I like that she calls out the ignorance and the racism because I feel like a lot of times in academia it’s a bit ignored. To have a course that focuses on historical philosophy and have certain lectures where you unpack how this might be ignorant or racist and the context of the text is really cool.”

Special thanks to Dr. Drake and Aliza for providing interviews for this article!