Philosophy 291: On Communitarianism

Readings in Contemporary Political Philosophy

Course Description: Communitarianism is generally known as an alternative response to the individualist and revolutionist political theories of the modern and contemporary period.  It started a robust discourse among philosophers and political thinkers across millennia. This means that the notions and positions of Aristotle, Augustine, Hobbes, Kant, Rawls and others are now given novel perspectives. This is because contemporary thinkers contending with recent events and phenomena have to take all these into consideration while using these classic political ideas as frameworks.

We will discuss how different communitarians define the notion of community and how they argue for its continued relevance in a globalized world. We will analyse how their theories hold up against the established classical ideas of political philosophy in general. How do we contextualize the challenges of our times using this communitarian stance? What is the value of individual rights in such a framework?