DOCSLIB.ORG

Government………………………………………………………………………16

Total Page：16

File Type：pdf, Size：1020Kb

Download full-text PDF Read full-text
Government………………………………………………………………………16 A COURSE GUIDE for the HARVARD HUMANIST 2nd Edition Compiled in 2019 by AAI Staff, Interns, and Harvard Student Fellows Order of Contents Literature and Art………………………………………………………………..2 Foreign Cultures…………………………………………………………………3 The Classics……………………………………………………………………...6 The Occident……………………………………………………………………..8 Religion and Philosophy…………………………………………………………11 Historical Imagination…………………………………………………………....14 Government………………………………………………………………………16 Economy………………………………………………………………………….18 1 Literature and Art Bargaining with the Devil: the Faust Legend COMPLIT 180 Professor John T. Hamilton Goethe's tragic play and its themes: the problem of evil, the human will, forbidden knowledge, and the lust for learning. What’s Love Got to Do With It; Love and Poetry of the Middle Ages and Early Modernity COMPLIT 193 Professor Luis Giron Negron Jewish, Christian, and Muslim love poetry; a study of love's intersection with philosophy and theology. Opera MUSIC 20 Professor Carolyn Abbate Opera as a multimedia performance to invoke the passions, focusing on evolution over time, famous works, and attending live performance. Marcel Proust and his Times FRENCH 110 Professor Virginie Greene 2 A close look at Proust’s In Search of Lost Times, especially his interest in the visual arts, visiting several important art museums in Boston. Milton’s Paradise Lost ENGLISH 131P Professor Gordon Teskey The greatest long poem in English: Milton’s generation of the sublime, scene development, and characterization of Satan. The Politics of Storytelling RELIGION 1920 Professor Michael Jackson Addressing Hannah Arendt’s understanding of storytelling as a bridge between the private and public. Foreign Cultures Power and Civilization: China GENED 1136 Professors William Kirby and Peter K. Bol In China today we see a new country built on the bedrock of an ancient civilization. China’s re-emergence as a global economic power and political model has deep roots. From Rome to the Romanovs, from Byzantium to the Ottomans, on to the global empires of the West, all the great multiethnic empires of the world have come and gone, while a unitary, multi-national, Chinese empire has endured. The ancient Chinese ideal of a single, unified civilized world has had consequences. It was, and still is, a grand vision: all peoples unified under a single ruler and an integrated social order that finds a place for every person in security and harmony. It created the first centralized bureaucratic state; it institutionalized meritocracy; its economy became the world’s greatest market; its philosophies provided models of humane governance; its inventions spread across the globe. And yet in practice it has also been a story of conflict and control, of warring states and competing peoples. We will discuss how the choices China has made in the past bear 3 on the challenges it faces today, when a modern “China model,” with ancient roots, competes with the United States for global leadership. The Greatest Chinese Novel CHNSLIT 140 Professor Wai-Yee Li The Story of the Stone (also known as The Dream of the Red Chamber) by Cao Xueqin (1715?-1763) is widely recognized as the masterpiece of Chinese fiction. It is also a portal to Chinese civilization. Encyclopedic in scope, this book both sums up Chinese culture and asks of it difficult questions. Its cult status also accounts for modern popular screen and television adaptations. Through a close examination of this text in conjunction with supplementary readings and visual materials, the seminar will explore a series of topics on Chinese culture, including foundational myths, philosophical and religious systems, the status of fiction, conceptions of art and the artist, ideas about love, desire and sexuality, gender roles, garden aesthetics, family and clan structure, and definitions of socio-political order. Japanese Religions in the 20th and 21st Centuries JAPNHIST 120 Professor Helen Hardacre An examination of religion and society from the end of the Meiji period (1912) to the present. This course explores the meaning of the modern in Japanese religions, the development of the public sphere and religion's relations with it, religion and nationalism, and the interconnections of religion and social change with materialism, consumerism, pacifism, and spiritualism. Permanent Impermanence: Why Buddhists Build Monuments GENED 1083 Professors Jinah Kim, Yukio Lippit, Eugene Wang Everything changes. This is, in its simplest and most fundamental formulation, one of the essential teachings of Buddhism. Buddhist communities throughout history have preached, practiced, and written about the ephemerality and illusoriness of our everyday lives and experiences. Ironically, however, many of these same communities have attempted to express these teachings in the form of monumental structures meant to stand the test of time. Some of the world’s greatest cultural heritage sites are a legacy of this 4 seeming contradiction between the impermanence that is a central presupposition of Buddhist thought and the permanence to which these same monuments seem to aspire. If the world is characterized by emptiness and the Self is illusory, how does one account for the prodigious volume of art and architecture created by Buddhists throughout history? This Gen Ed course takes a multicultural and reflective engagement with the challenges presented by this conundrum through a study of Buddhist sites scattered throughout time and space. Pertinent topics such as cosmology, pilgrimage, materiality, relics, meditation, and world-making will be explored. Through these Buddhist monuments in South and Southeast Asia, the Himalayas, Central Asia, China, Korea, and Japan, students will learn about the rich, diverse world of Buddhist practice and experience. The Two Koreas in the Modern World GENED 1100 Professor Carter Eckert How and why did there come to be two competing and adversarial states on the Korean peninsula in our contemporary world, one a prosperous capitalist democracy of global reach, and the other an impoverished dictatorship, bordering on theocracy and almost totally estranged from the international community—both claiming exclusive rights to speak for the Korean people and the Korean “nation” as a whole? In this course, we will explore not only the two contemporary Korean societies, North and South, but also to Korea’s pre-modern and colonial periods, and to explore together the roles played by China, Japan, the United States, and Russia (Soviet Union) in shaping modern Korean history. We will look beyond the headlines to come to a more complex and nuanced understanding of the conflict on the Korean peninsula as one grounded in the history and legacies of the past hundred years. By showing the tumultuous changes, some good, some ill, on the Korean peninsula since the late 19th century, the course challenges us to confront the constantly shifting nature of historical forces, and to examine the ethical dimensions of particular historical choices. Readings will include primary source materials from each period, and assignments will culminate in a research paper or other capstone project that engages with the individual actors, historical forces, and global politics that have shaped the two Koreas. The Incas and their Empire GENED 1152 Professor Gary Urton The Incas forged an empire across altitudinal extremes and without writing, markets, and the wheel – all typical components of the standard conception of “empire.” How did they do it, and what made their civilization so different from other ancient empires? Did their empire’s collapse after the Spanish conquest eliminate the beliefs, values, and institutions 5 at the heart of Inca society, or might the Spaniards have been influenced by the Incas without knowing it? This course will engage you in conversations about empire and influence, power and defeat, contrasting what we know of the Inca Empire with our knowledge of other ancient civilizations, as well as the first global empire of early modern Spain. In addition to lectures, films and discussions, students will explore the cultural world of the Inca Empire through the hands-on study of ancient Peruvian artifacts in the Peabody Museum of Archaeology and Ethnology. Readings will include such texts as T. D’Altroy’s, The Incas (2015), on the nature and organization of the Inca Empire, and J. Sharman’s Empires of the Weak (2019), arguing against the long-held belief that European military superiority after 1500 was decisive in Europe’s global expansion. The Classics Introductory Ancient Greek I/Introductory Latin I GREEK I/LATIN I Professor Ivy Livingston Greek I is a starting point for those interested in learning to read ancient Greek. Participants will begin to gain direct access to the literature and culture of Greece through its writings. The specific dialect studied is that of Athens, which is the language of, e.g., Plato, Euripides, and Thucydides, as well as the basis for the language of the New Testament. History of Greek Literature I GREEK 112A A survey of early Greek poetry and prose, with readings from Homer, Hesiod, the Homeric Hymns, lyric poetry, and Herodotus. Discussions of genre in relation to performance, historical contexts, thematic (dis)continuities, oral tradition. The Ancient Greek Hero GENED 1074 Professor Gregory Nagy How to face death? Concentrating on this central human question, we will explore some of the greatest works of ancient Greek literature (in English translation). For 6 the Greeks, a special way to address the problem of death was to think long and hard about what they called heroes in their myths. Our purpose in this course is to extend that kind of thinking to the present. Assignments invite you to engage in personal reflections on the meaning of life and death in the light of what we read in Greek literature about the ordeals of becoming a hero. Horace: Satires and Epistles LATIN 111 Professor Richard Thomas Examines a selection of poems from both works in detail, to illuminate Horace's poetic development, attitudes to politics, patrons and power, and his philosophy of life. Ancient Greek Warfare CLS-STDY 118 Professor Natasha Bershadsky This course will introduce students to the history and myths of ancient Greek warfare.
Load more

Recommended publications
  • Political Science 41/Classics 45/Philosophy 41 Western Political Thought I Tufts University Fall Semester 2011
    Political Science 41/Classics 45/Philosophy 41 Western Political Thought I Tufts University Fall Semester 2011 Socrates is said to have brought philosophy down from the heavens to examine “the human things.” This course will examine the revolution in Western thought that Socrates effected. In the process, we will study such topics as the manner in which political communities are founded and sustained, the claims for virtue, the various definitions of justice, the causes and ramifications of war, the relation between piety and politics, the life of the philosopher, and the relation between philosophy and politics. Finally, we will examine Machiavelli’s challenge to classical political thought when he charges that imaginary republics—some of which we will have studied—have taught people their ruin rather than their preservation. Office Hours Vickie Sullivan [email protected] Packard Hall 111, ex. 72328 Monday, 1:30-3 p.m. Thursday, 1-2:30 p.m. Other times by appointment Teaching Assistants Nate Gilmore [email protected] Tuesday, 12-1:30 p.m. Packard Hall, 3rd-floor lounge Other times by appointment Mike Hawley [email protected] Wednesday, 12-1:30 p.m. Packard Hall, 3rd-floor lounge Other times by appointment Required Books Thucydides, The Peloponnesian War, ed. Robert B. Strassler, Touchstone (Simon & Schuster). Plato and Aristophanes, Four Texts on Socrates, trans. Thomas West and Grace Starry West, Cornell University Press. 2 Plato, Symposium, trans. Seth Benardete, University of Chicago. Plato, Republic, trans. Allan Bloom, Basic Books. Aristotle, The Politics, trans. Carnes Lord, University of Chicago Press. Machiavelli, The Prince, trans.
    [Show full text]
  • How Philosophers Rise and Empires Fall in the Work of Leo Strauss
    City University of New York (CUNY) CUNY Academic Works All Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects 2-2019 Ungodly Freedom: How Philosophers Rise and Empires Fall in the Work of Leo Strauss Eli Karetny The Graduate Center, City University of New York How does access to this work benefit ou?y Let us know! More information about this work at: https://academicworks.cuny.edu/gc_etds/2819 Discover additional works at: https://academicworks.cuny.edu This work is made publicly available by the City University of New York (CUNY). Contact: [email protected] UNGODLY FREEDOM: HOW PHILOSOPHERS RISE AND EMPIRES FALL IN THE WORK OF LEO STRAUSS by Eli Karetny A dissertation submitted to the Graduate Faculty in Political Science in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy, The City University of New York 2019 © 2018 Eli Karetny All Rights Reserved ii This manuscript has been read and accepted for the Graduate Faculty in Political Science in satisfaction of the dissertation requirement for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy. PROFESSOR COREY ROBIN _________________ ____________________________________ Date Committee Chair _______________ PROFESSOR ALYSON COLE Date ____________________________________ Executive Officer Supervisory Committee: Corey Robin Alyson Cole Carol Gould THE CITY UNIVERSITY OF NEW YORK iii Abstract UNGODLY FREEDOM: HOW PHILOSOPHERS RISE AND EMPIRES FALL IN THE WORK OF LEO STRAUSS by Eli Karetny Advisor: Professor Corey Robin This dissertation argues that to fully understand the work of Leo Strauss, scholars must look beyond the Platonic and Machiavellian elements in Strauss and explore how Nietzsche’s ideas about nihilism, the will to power, the eternal return, and the ubermensch influence Strauss’s critique of modernity, his understanding of the relationship between philosophy and politics, and his redefinition of the philosopher as a prophetic lawgiver.
    [Show full text]
  • American Political Thought
    American Political Thought Professor Nicholas Tampio Hamilton College, Fall 2007, GOV 336 [email protected] Class hours: TR 10:30-11:45, KJ 222 Office hours: TR 4-5, KJ 135 Course Overview Contemporary debates in American politics often revolve around a few basic questions: What are the greatest problems facing America? What does it mean to be an American? What are the principles of American politics? Americans often answer these questions by drawing upon seminal texts in American political thought. The aim of this course is to study several of these texts so that we may participate more thoughtfully and effectively in contemporary politics. We begin with The Declaration of Independence (1776), Thomas Jefferson’s statement of America’s founding ideals. Then, we read The Federalist, the 1787-88 essays penned by Alexander Hamilton, James Madison, and John Jay to outline the principles of the United States Constitution. Subsequently, we consider Alexis de Tocqueville’s epochal account of American individualism and civil society in Democracy in America (1835, 1840). Afterwards, we look at W.E.B. Du Bois’s The Souls of Black Folk (1903), a book that portrays the “double consciousness” of virtually all Americans. Next, we examine Anarchism (1917), a classic of American radicalism written by the anarchist-feminist Emma Goldman. Then, we study Leo Strauss’s Natural Right and History (1950), a guiding text for conservatives such as George Will and Paul Wolfowitz. Subsequently, we turn to A Theory of Justice (1971), John Rawls’s great work of Anglo-American liberal theory. We conclude with William E.
    [Show full text]
  • {PDF} Tocqueville: a Very Short Introduction Ebook
    TOCQUEVILLE: A VERY SHORT INTRODUCTION PDF, EPUB, EBOOK Harvey C. Mansfield | 136 pages | 13 Jul 2010 | Oxford University Press Inc | 9780195175394 | English | New York, United States Tocqueville: A Very Short Introduction - Harvey C. Mansfield Forgot password? Don't have an account? Sign in via your Institution. You could not be signed in, please check and try again. Sign in with your library card Please enter your library card number. Search within Informal democracy 4. Democratic despotism 5. Rational administration 6. Democratic despotism Harvey C. Request Examination Copy. No one has ever described American democracy with more accurate insight or more profoundly than Alexis de Tocqueville. After meeting with Americans on extensive travels in the United States, and intense study of documents and authorities, he authored the landmark Democracy in America , publishing its two volumes in and Ever since, this book has been the best source for every serious attempt to understand America and democracy itself. Yet Tocqueville himself remains a mystery behind the elegance of his style. Now one of our leading authorities on Tocqueville explains him in this splendid new entry in Oxford's acclaimed Very Short Introduction series. Harvey Mansfield addresses his subject as a thinker, clearly and incisively exploring Tocqueville's writings--not only his masterpiece, but also his secret Recollections , intended for posterity alone, and his unfinished work on his native France, The Old Regime and the Revolution. Tocqueville was a liberal, Mansfield writes, but not of the usual sort. The many elements of his life found expression in his thought: his aristocratic ancestry, his ventures in politics, his voyages abroad, his hopes and fears for America, and his disappointment with France.
    [Show full text]
  • Introduction to Western and Jewish Political Thought Yeshiva College, Fall 2019
    1 Great Political Thinkers: Introduction to Western and Jewish Political Thought Yeshiva College, Fall 2019 Instructors: Rabbi Dr. Meir Soloveichik and Dr. Neil Rogachevsky [email protected], [email protected] Course Summary Political philosophy examines the fundamental problems faced by human beings both as individuals and as a members of associations that, in the Western tradition, have come to be called political. It asks two decisive questions: “how should I live my life?” and “how should we live together?” Together these questions point to central dilemmas of human life that the great thinkers of the Western tradition have explored with tremendous depth. What is justice? How does the good of the individual relate to the good of the political community? Is thought superior to action or is action superior to thought? What is virtue? Piety? Courage? The inquiry into these questions has profoundly shaped our lives as well as the countries we inhabit, including the United States. In this class, we will study seminal thinkers in the history of Jewish and Western political thought, including Plato, Aristotle, Abarbanel, Maimonides, and Machiavelli. Because the West was founded on a synthesis of biblical and Greek traditions, we shall also compare the seminal Greek philosophical texts with political texts from the Hebrew Bible, and ponder the impact that both worldviews had on the development of Western Civilization. For Poli Sci majors: toward Intro course requirement or Political Theory distribution. Expectations Students will be expected to carefully read between 100 and 150 pages a week. Prior to every class, students will be expected to have read and reflected upon the readings of that week, and to participate in class discussions about them.
    [Show full text]
  • Olin Foundation in 1953, Olin Embarked on a Radical New Course
    THE CHRONICLE REVIEW How Right­Wing Billionaires Infiltrated Higher Education By Jane Mayer FEBRUARY 12, 2016 ​ If there was a single event that galvanized conservative donors to try to wrest control of higher ​ education in America, it might have been the uprising at Cornell University on April 20, 1969. That afternoon, during parents’ weekend at the Ithaca, N.Y., campus, some 80 black students marched in formation out of the student union, which they had seized, with their clenched fists held high in black­power salutes. To the shock of the genteel Ivy League community, several were brandishing guns. At the head of the formation was a student who called himself the "Minister of Defense" for Cornell’s Afro­American Society. Strapped across his chest, Pancho Villa­style, was a sash­like bandolier studded with bullet cartridges. Gripped nonchalantly in his right hand, with its butt resting on his hip, was a glistening rifle. Chin held high and sporting an Afro, goatee, and eyeglasses reminiscent of Malcolm X, he was the face of a drama so infamous it was regarded for years by conservatives such as David Horowitz as "the most disgraceful occurrence in the history of American higher education." John M. Olin, a multimillionaire industrialist, wasn’t there at Cornell, which was his alma mater, that weekend. He was traveling abroad. But as a former Cornell trustee, he could not have gone long without seeing the iconic photograph of the armed protesters. What came to be ​ ​ known as "the Picture" quickly ricocheted around the world, eventually going on to win that year’s Pulitzer Prize.
    [Show full text]
  • Editors' Interview with Michael Walzer
    [50] JOURNAL OF POLITICAL THOUGHT INTERVIEW [with Michael Walzer] Michael Walzer is a prominent American political theorist and public intel- lectual. A professor emeritus at the Institute for Advanced Study in Princ- eton, New Jersey, he is co-editor of Dissent, an intellectual magazine that he has been affiliated with since his years as an undergraduate at Brandeis University. He has written about a wide variety of topics in political theory and moral philosophy, including political obligation, just and unjust war, nationalism and ethnicity, economic justice, and the welfare state. He has played a critical role in the revival of a practical, issue-focused ethics and in the development of a pluralist approach to political and moral life. Wal- zer’s books include Just and Unjust Wars (1977), On Toleration (1997), and Spheres of Justice (1983). We sat down with him in May for a wide- ranging conversation on the interplay between personal identity and po- litical thought, the state of political theory today, and the overlapping chal- lenges posed by religion and ethnicity for the contemporary nation-state. I. Identity and the Political interested in left-issue politics. Theory License My teachers at Brandeis told me I should apply to graduate school JPT: What first drew you to the in political science, because it field of political theory? wasn’t really a field and you could do whatever you wanted. Whereas MW: When I was a history major in history you would be commit- at Brandeis, I was first interested ted to archival research, in politi- in studying the history of ideas.
    [Show full text]
  • The Dialectical Logic of Thucydides'
    THE DIALECTICAL LOGIC OF THUCYDIDES' MELIAN DIALOGUE* by HAYWARD R. ALKER, JR. M.I.T. - 16J ... This political necessity, the mere mathematics of power politics, is defined [by Thucydides] as the true cause ... of the war. 1 We can discern something of the "tragic" grammar behind the Greek proverb's way of saying "one learns by experience"; "ta pathemata mathemata," the suffered is the learned.4 THE DIALECTICAL LOGIC OF THUCYDIDES' MELIAN DIALOGUE* by HAYWARD R. ALKER, JR. M.I.T. *The substance of this paper was first given in 1979 as a talk at the University of Maryland, College Park; a revised version was pre- sented in March 1980 at the Los Angeles annual meeting of the Inter- national Studies Association, for a panel on Dialectical Approaches to International Studies. The rewriting of this paper has been financed by NSF grant #7806707 to the Center for International Studies at M.I.T. I am indebted to F.J. Tickner for lively discussions of Greek history and to Dwain Mefford for the suggestion that Thucydides was a dialectical writer. Other bibliographic suggestions and in- terpretations from Roger Hurwitz, Harvey Mansfield, Jr., Patrick McGowan and Charles Roig are also gratefully acknowledged. None of the above is responsible for the views expressed or implied here. (c) H. Alker, 1980 Reading Martin Wight's claim that "one of the supreme books on power politics is the history by Thucydides of the great war between Athens and Sparta, commonly called the Peloponnesian War" 3 recalls the message of my own teacher during the Cold War.
    [Show full text]
  • Political Science 2060: Introduction to Political Theory Spring 2005
    Political Science 2060: Introduction to Political Theory Spring 2005 Class Time: T Th, 1:40-3:00 pm Location: 211 Tureaud Hall Instructor: Geoffrey Plauché Stubbs Hall, #324 E-mail: [email protected] Office Hours: M 12:30-2 pm, T Th 3-4 pm, or by appointment. Course Objectives: Political theory is concerned with the fundamental questions of public life. It encompasses political ethics, which defines the proper role of discourse and the use of force in man’s relationships with other men as well as with man’s relationship to the State. Consequently, political theory is concerned with such themes as liberty, justice, war, the proper functions of the State, religion, and so on. It is also concerned with the idea of the best regime, with the various different types of government, their institutions, and how and why they do and should function. Though this is a course in political theory, throughout there will be an emphasis on issues overlapping with perennial and contemporary themes in international relations, particularly the relationship between man, the state, and war. This course will be divided into three parts. In the first, we will discuss the ancient perspective on political philosophy, focusing on the political thought of Plato and Aristotle. In the second part, we will discuss modern alternatives. The radical break between modern and ancient political philosophy will be emphasized, in particular in what ways the moderns have lowered and raised the bar for political philosophy. The political thought of Machiavelli, Hobbes, Locke, and the Federalists and Anti-Federalists will be explored.
    [Show full text]
  • Conversations with Bill Kristol
    Conversations with Bill Kristol Guest: Harvey Mansfield, Professor of Government, Harvard University Taped June 19, 2019 Table of Contents I: Liberal Democracy as a Mixed Regime (0:15 – 55:52) I: Liberal Democracy as a Mixed Regime (0:15 – 55:52) KRISTOL: Hi, I’m Bill Kristol, welcome to CONVERSATIONS. I’m pleased to be joined again by Harvey Mansfield, Professor of Government at Harvard University. MANSFIELD: Always a pleasure, I have to say. KRISTOL: I thought we would discuss today your excellent essay, which made a big impression on me when I read it when it came out when I was in graduate school, “Liberal Democracy as a Mixed Regime.” It appeared in The American Spectator, which was then called The Alternative before it became more mainstream, I guess, and became The American Spectator. And, was republished in your excellent book from 1978, I think, The Spirit of Liberalism. So people should look at the essay. But I thought it’s not – the book is out of print, unfortunately and disgracefully, really. A terrible statement about the publishing profession, that that’s the case. MANSFIELD: Well, that’s Harvard Press – all right. KRISTOL: Things have declined at Harvard. And the essay, I was reminded of it, and looked at it recently and was struck by how interesting it is. And though people can look at it online, it’s not as accessible as some of your other works, so I thought worth really walking people through it. And we had a discussion recently about it, and I thought other people also were, at a seminar and other people, as you know, were very struck by the formulation.
    [Show full text]
  • Democracy and Its Friendly Critics: Tocqueville and Political Life Today (Book Review) Steven Michels Sacred Heart University, [email protected]
    Sacred Heart University DigitalCommons@SHU Government, Politics & Global Studies Faculty Government, Politics & Global Studies Publications 2005 Democracy and Its Friendly Critics: Tocqueville and Political Life Today (Book Review) Steven Michels Sacred Heart University, [email protected] Follow this and additional works at: http://digitalcommons.sacredheart.edu/gov_fac Part of the Political Theory Commons Recommended Citation Michels, Steven. "Democracy and Its Friendly Critics: Tocqueville and Political Life Today" (Book Review). Perspectives on Political Science 34.2 (2005): 116. This Book Review is brought to you for free and open access by the Government, Politics & Global Studies at DigitalCommons@SHU. It has been accepted for inclusion in Government, Politics & Global Studies Faculty Publications by an authorized administrator of DigitalCommons@SHU. For more information, please contact [email protected]. Lawler, Peter Augustine, ed. Democracy and Its Friendly Critics: Tocqueville and Political Life Today Lanham, MD: Rowman and Littlefield, 2004. Peter Augustine Lawler, Dana Professor of Government at Berry College, is the author of many books and countless articles on public philosophy and political theory, including de Tocqueville. His latest book, Democracy and Its Friendly Critics , is an edited volume of essays highlighting de Tocqueville’s contribution to the study and practice of politics. Democracy is not perfect, and friends of democracy are not flatterers, as Lawler instructs. De Tocqueville would not disagree. In the first chapter (the highlight of the book), Harvey Mansfield and Delba Winthrop provide a concise overview of “What Tocqueville Says to Liberals and Conservatives Today.” Conservatives are right to stress self- interest, rightly understood, but they should not envision the market or religion as universal solutions.
    [Show full text]
  • In Socialism's Twilight: Michael Walzer and the Politics of the Long New
    In Socialism’s Twilight: Michael Walzer and the Politics of the Long New Left David Marcus Submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy in the Graduate School of Arts and Sciences COLUMBIA UNIVERSITY 2019 ©2019 David Marcus All Rights Reserved Abstract “In Socialism’s Twilight: Michael Walzer and the Politics of the Long New Left” David Marcus In Socialism’s Twilight is a study of the thought and politics of Michael Walzer and the travails of “democratic socialism” in the second half of the twentieth century. Using the methods of intel- lectual and political history, it situates Walzer’s political theory and criticism in the context of what might be called the “long New Left,” the overlapping generations of radicals that stretched from the beginning of the Cold War to its end and that supplemented the left’s traditional com- mitments to socialism with a politics of national liberation, radical democracy, and liberalism. By doing so, the dissertation hopes to trace the development not only of Walzer’s own commit- ments but also those of the socialist left. Caught in a period of frequent defeat and bitter contro- versy, socialists found themselves forced into a state of constant revision, as they moved from the libertarian socialism of the 1950s and 60s to the social democratic coalitions of the 1970s and 80s to the liberalism and humanitarianism of the 1990s and 2000s. Opening with the collapse of the Popular Front after World War II, the study follows Walzer’s search for a new left with radi- cals around Dissent and through his involvement in civil rights and antiwar activism.
    [Show full text]