Objectives and course outcomes

This class has three objectives. First: to introduce the political philosophies of the major thinkers listed below and to gain a working knowledge of different types of democratic theories and critiques of them. Second: to sharpen your critical reading skills and broaden your ideas about democracy and politics. Third: to improve your ability to think and write about complex political topics.

This class, like most philosophy and theory classes, is discussion-based. I will introduce the readings with a prepared lecture, but your participation, questions, and conversations will drive the direction of the class.

Lastly, like most classes in the humanities and social sciences, this class requires you to read. If you read the assigned texts, take notes, and review readings in preparation for exams and writing assignments, you will get a lot out of this course. College-level texts can be frustrating, boring (at first), and time-consuming: that’s okay! It’s my hope that by engaging with these texts – keeping an open mind and challenging yourself to engage with the readings in this class – you will gain the ability to think and read more deeply, critically, and capaciously about the world around us.

Course mechanics: website and sourcing class materials

This course will not use Brightspace. Instead, you will access all course materials through our course website.

This course website will have everything you need for the class: links to the readings, the syllabus, and course information. To access the course website, you may need to create an account on the CUNY Academic Commons, an open-source hub for education materials.

Most of your readings will come from a reader that I assembled for this on Manifold how?:

The benefit of this course reader is that most of your course readings are in one place, and that your classmates will share a similar format when reading a text.

A few of your readings or podcasts will be linked on the syllabus and course website. Follow the links to the course content and complete the reading as requested in the syllabus.

Students should expect to read about 50 pages per week.

Academic integrity and AI policy for this class

Don’t plagiarize. Plagiarism is when you pass off someone else’s ideas, research, or writing as your own. While I do grade assignments on accuracy and rigor, I largely grade writing assignments on effort. This means that if you follow standard writing conventions, cite source material correctly, and engage with the course, you will do more than fine on writing assignments. Please write in your own voice and cite your sources to show that you are a scholar.

Submitting work produced with AI is an automatic failure. My hunch is that students use AI because they think it will get them an A (cheating), because they think their own writing is not up to snuff (anxiety), or that they just don’t care and they want to avoid reading and writing (laziness). However, it is my view that most AI writing is quite bad, that students’ voices are infinitely far more interesting than a machine’s, and that the only way you will get better at writing and thinking is by trying, making some mistakes, and getting better. AI, while not only plagiarizing other people’s works without attribution, steals from you the very purpose of a college education.

My policy with students who have used AI text bots is as follows: I ask students I suspect have used AI to confirm or deny whether they used it to write their paper. When asked, some students admit they used AI to write their paper, while other students continue to claim that they did not. Regardless, I give those students the opportunity to rewrite the paper (with the usual caveats that it will count as a late paper, and points will be taken off) and most take the opportunity to do so. I have found this to be helpful in getting students to actually do the assignment while trying not to be punitive.

Class conduct

As mentioned above, you will come to class prepared. This means having done the readings to both inform your participation and to show respect to your fellow students. When participating in class, be respectful and considerate. We are discussing politics, after all, and we may feel passionately at times. If there is a continued issue with class conduct, I will speak to you outside of class time.

Importantly, you cannot have your cell phone out in class. I will ask you to put your cell phone away during class. Consider printing the course readings and taking notes in a notebook to consult important points from the readings during class.  The only time you will be asked to take out a laptop or electronic device is when we read a text together in class. Repeated use of your cell phone will cause your participation grade to drop and may result in me speaking with you outside of class time.

Support services

Office of Student Disability Services: Shuster Hall, room 238, or (718) 960-8441, and Academic Center for Excellence (ACE): provides workshops in social sciences, writing, and academic skills. You can visit the website for the Instructional Services Support Program or call (718) 960-8175 to receive help navigating different student services.

Students with disabilities or other needs that may affect course performance are encouraged to meet with me early in the semester to discuss accommodations for the class.

Syllabus

[.doc of the syllabus]