McGill POLI 333: Recent Episodes
William Clare Roberts
Political theory as a project; the decline of political theory into ethics; the openness of the Greek world to major political transformation; the solidity of the Roman world; the transformation fo the meaning of democracy
Honestas and utile; virtue is its own reward, usually; it is better to be loved than feared, usually; when fear is a useful policy; why we shouldn’t think to much about rewards for vice; Cicero and Machiavelli
Cicero’s life & education; Epicureanism, Stoicism, and Peripateticism compared; Cicero’s conception of honestas; the four virtues; the special place of decorum; the world as a stage
The rise of philosophical schools; four tendencies in post-Socratic philosophy (Cynicism, skepticism, conventionalism, dogmatism); Aristotle’s continuities with Socrates; Epicureanism as a dogmatism; Epicurus and Lucretius; Lucretius’s continuities with — and challenges to — Socratism; philosophy as anti-fear; philosophy as anti-humanism
Aristotle’s basic political convictions; the principles of justice; the trouble with justice; the causes of civil strife; how to prevent revolution
Aristotle’s four concepts of “best political practice”; the unjust neglect of Book IV; the variety of regimes; Aristotle’s sociology of groups; the operation of laws; stabilizing and expanding the rule of law and the space for persuasion
Aristotle’s perfectionism; the best βιος; Aristotle vs. Hobbes; the conditions one would wish for; the life of leisure, lived well; players and spectators (and ball-carriers) in the game of politics
The scope of Book III; sharing is hard; sharing doesn’t work like Plato said it does; Aristotle’s method: words embody norms and fights over norms; the dispute over democracy; the dispute over monarchy; sharing intelligence in the city
Aristotle’s conception of virtue; the virtues of incomplete persons; Aristotle’s criticism of Plato on political unity; what makes political rule different; Aristotle’s conception of nature; the fullness of history
The historical institution of slavery; Aristotle’s lack of interest in real slavery; an ambivalent ideology of slavery; the argument of I.4-7; the domestic sphere vs. the sphere of politics; Aristotle’s free & equal citizens vs. Smith’s free and equal buyers & sellers
The origin of Aristotle’s texts in the Lyceum; the loss & recovery of Aristotle’s library; the damage to, and disorganization of, the Politics; the subject matter of the Politics; Aristotle’s argument with Plato about the forms of rule; home economics
Aristotle’s life & times; the different kinds of goods; the Good Itself? LOL!; the highest human good is a human life lived well; the analysis of action, choice, and deliberation
Odysseus in Hades; choose life, choose philosophy; Plato’s ethic; Plato against Homer; does Homer even lift?; a poetry of a new type; Plato’s infomercial
The interpretation of Plato as a totalitarian; Plato’s “anti democratic agenda” is actually an attempt to control the powerful; Plato on power and its abuses; the decline of the city as an argument for preserving democracy; Plato has no concept of political freedom
The structuring oppositions of Plato’s thought; the eye of the soul; true education; the divided line & the cave; intelligible paradigms; social media and the world of shadows; being oriented by the Good
Wanting to be just; what justice is; the three senses of ‘minding one’s own business’; Plato’s humanism; the 3 waves; the pursuit of philosophy; eristics vs. dialectics; we want what’s good (like, really good)
The education of Glaucon & Adeimantus; justice and happiness; the multiplicity of the soul; the virtues of the city and the virtues of the soul, justice and happiness, revisited
Glaucome & Adeimantus; the ring of Gyges; building a city in speech; educating the educators; the noble lie and keeping the powerful in check
Socrates vs. Callicles; the myth of divine justice in the afterlife; Plato’s literary project; the characters and argument of Republic, Book I; the shame of self-contradiction
Persuasive speech as a survival tool in Athens; Gorgias and the argument for rhetoric; Socrates and the argument against rhetoric; the debate between oligarchic elites and democratic elites
The making of classical Athens; military and socioeconomic transformations; political and constitutional developments
The shield of Achilles; πολις & χωρα; the ancient city and its surrounding landbase; δίκη and θεμις; fragile politics; lawgiving Zeus and elite competition.
How the middle of the world became the West — a brief primer on the creation of a tradition, why Athens was so odd, and how office politics tells you more about Ancient Greece than any comparative politics class can.