Charles Lipson

teaches international politics at the University of Chicago. He also writes for students about academic success and honest work at the university level.
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E-mail: c-lipson@uchicago.edu

Voice: 773.702.8053

Fax:    773.702.1689

 

Charles Lipson

Professor of Political Science

University of Chicago

5828 S. University Ave.

Chicago, IL 60637
 		    

Syllabus
Core Values of the West
Political Science 261, 361
Charles Lipson
Tentative syllabus for Winter Quarter, 2011 (nearly complete) Prof. Lipson's office is Pick 418b
Course Time: 1:30 til 2:50--Tuesday, Thursday (expected time) Office Hours: TBA (plus immediately after class most days)
Classroom: E-mail: clipson@uchicago.edu  please put PS261 somewhere in subject line

The readings and class discussions combine three avenues of inquiry:

  1. The philosophical underpinnings of central Western values and the debates over them
  2. The intellectual history of these ideas and their development in the West, especially since 1500
  3. Political contestation concerning these values since 1500

Required background for this seminar:

This course presumes you have some university-level background in modern European history, American history, or history of philosophy, in addition to Core courses..
Beyond that, the stronger your interests and preparation in history, politics, and philosophy, the better. We will build on those foundations.
Although this course does not focus on law, any background in civil liberties would also be valuable since those liberties coincide with several core values.

Paper Assignments:

Each week, as we take up a new Core Value, you will do two short written assignments: a form and a short essay.

  1. For the first session (normally on Tuesday), you will fill out the weekly form. The form is available online at Chalk. Please use it and bring two printed copies to class (one for John Stevenson and one for me). Note: Please bring a copy for yourself to the second section each week. We may wish to discuss some questions, and you will want to refer to your written answers.
  2. For the second session (normally on Thursday), you will write a short paper on some aspect of this Core Value. Please give your paper a title and begin it by stating a specific question or problem you wish to address. Then address it in 500-700 words, the length an op-ed piece. Good, snappy writing is appreciated. You are welcome to cite assigned readings, but you don't need to. Papers should be stapled and pages numbered. Please bring two printed copies to class.

Reading Assignments:

Assignments listed as PDF at Chalk site are available in the “course documents” section of that site. (That site is restricted to students enrolled in the course.)
Wherever possible, I have also included hyperlinks to open-source sites so people not enrolled in the course can find the same items.
Required books to be purchased are listed below (click on this link).
Call numbers of assigned books  are listed.  If a call number says “Harper A,” the book is now on Regenstein’s A level, as part of the Harper collection.
I have asked Regenstein to place all books on time-limited reserve.

I will occasionally add brief items to other sections if I think they are particularly valuable, so please double-check that week's readings before class. Don't worry, I won't add a big, thick book at the last minute!

Sections of the Course (with links to each section):

Overview

 Kors, Alan Charles. “The West at the Dawn of the 21st Century: Triumph Without Self-Belief,” Watch on the West,vol. 2, no. 1, Center for the Study of America and the West, Foreign Policy Research Institute, February 2001
http://www.fpri.org/ww/0201.200102.kors.westatdawn.html

PDF at Chalk site

 Grayling, A. C. Toward the Light of Liberty: The Struggles for Freedom and Rights that made the Modern Western World. 1st U.S. ed. New York: Walker & Co., 2007

Required book
JC571 .G73 2007

 Berlin, Isaiah. Liberty: Incorporating Four Essays on Liberty , Edited by Henry Hardy and Ian Harris. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2002. Chapter on “Two Concepts of Liberty.”  Online only:
http://www.oxfordscholarship.com.proxy.uchicago.edu/oso/private/content/politicalscience/9780199249893/p068.html#acprof-019924989X-chapter-4

Required book
Library has only the electronic version

Also available as:
Berlin, Isaiah. “Two Concepts of Liberty.” In Berlin, Isaiah. Four Essays on Liberty.  London: Oxford University Press.  (New ed. 2002.)

Also available as a long PDF at Chalk JC585.B498

Religious Freedom, Religious Toleration

Blue square Virginia Statute for Establishing Religious Freedom (Thomas Jefferson, 1779)

PDF at Chalk site

Blue square George Washington’s Letter to the Hebrew Congregation at Newport, 1790

PDF at Chalk site
Blue square United States Constitution.  Article VI, plus  First Amendment  http://www.archives.gov/exhibits/charters/constitution_transcript.html PDF at Chalk site

Blue square Zagorin, Perez. How the Idea of Religious Toleration Came to the West. Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 2003.

Required book
BR1610 .Z34 2003 also Law; Harper A

Blue square Locke, John. “A Letter Concerning Toleration.” In Locke: Political Essays, Edited by Mark Goldie. Cambridge; Cambridge University Press, 1997.  Pp. 134-159

JC153 .L79 1997
also Harper A

Also available as:
Locke, John. The Second Treatise of Government and A Letter Concerning Toleration (Dover Thrift Editions)

Required book

Blue square Uzgalis, William. “Locke and Religious Toleration.” Section 4 of “John Locke” article in Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy (online). Edward N. Zalta (ed.).  http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/locke/  Section 4 is http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/locke/#LocRelTol

Online Link

Blue square Collins, Jeffrey R. “Redeeming the Enlightenment: New Histories of Religious Toleration.” Review Essay. Journal of Modern History. 81 (September 2009). Pp. 607-636.

PDF at Chalk site

Blue square OPTIONAL: Students with a special interest in philosophy should consider:
Forst, Rainer. “Toleration.” Article in Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy (online). Edward N. Zalta (ed.). http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/toleration/		 Online Link
Free Speech

Blue square Kors, Alan Charles. “A Note About Free Speech,” The Hornacle, Sept. 1, 2001. http://www.thefire.org/article/4834.html

PDF at Chalk site

Blue square Warburton, Nigel. Free Speech: A Very Short Introduction. New York: Oxford University Press, 2009.

Required book
JC591.W37 2009 at Law only

Blue square Mill, John Stuart. ‘On Liberty’ and other Writings. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1989 and reprinted 1998. Chapter II, “Of the Liberty of Thought and Discussion.”

Required book
JC585.M740 1989
also at: Harper A

Blue square Wilson, Fred.  “John Stuart Mill.” Section 13: Social and Political Philosophy.  Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy (online). Edward N. Zalta (ed.).  http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/mill/

Online Link
Property Rights and Market Competition

Blue square The Three Most Important Graphs You Will Ever See about World Economic History (from data compiled by Angus Maddison)

PDF at Chalk site

Blue square Heritage Foundation Scale of Property Freedom
    http://www.heritage.org/index/ (definition: economic freedom)
    http://www.heritage.org/index/Property-Rights.aspx (definition: property rights)		 PDF at Chalk site
Blue square North, Douglass C. “The Paradox of the West.” In Davis, Richard W., ed. The Origins of Modern Freedom in the West. Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 1995. Pp. 7-34. PDF at Chalk site
JC599.E9 O75 1995
Blue square Bernstein, William J. The Birth of Plenty: How the Prosperity of the Modern World was Created. New York: McGraw-Hill, 2004. Pp. 7-90, 161-92. Required book
HC79.W4 B47 2004
Blue square Muller, Jerry Z. The Mind and the Market : Capitalism in Modern European Thought. New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 2002.  Pp. xvii, 14-17,
76-77, 390-94, 400-405.		 PDF at Chalk site
HB501 .M84 2002 
Blue square Epstein, Richard A. Takings : Private Property and the Power of Eminent Domain . Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1985, Pp. 7-18.  PDF at Chalk site
XXKF5599.E670 1985;
also at: Law
Blue square Rosenberg, Nathan and L. E. Birdzell. How the West Grew Rich: The Economic Transformation of the Industrial World. New York: Basic Books, 1986. Pp. 3-36, 113-143. Required book
HC240 .R67 1985
Blue square W. Michael Cox and Richard Alm, “Creative Destruction,” in The Concise Encyclopedia of Economics.      http://www.econlib.org/library/Enc/CreativeDestruction.html Online Link
Blue square Pipes, Richard. Property and Freedom. 1st ed. New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1999.  Pp. xv-xvi, 3-120. Required book
JC605 .P56 1999 also at: Law
Blue square Waldron, Jeremy.  “Property.” Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy (online). Edward N. Zalta (ed.). http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/property/ Online Link
Self-Government (or Government by Consent)

Blue square Crick, Bernard R. Democracy: A Very Short Introduction. New York: Oxford University Press, 2002.

Required book
JC421 .C75 2002

Blue square Pipes, Richard. Property and Freedom. 1st ed. New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1999.  Pp. 121-158.

Required book
JC605 .P56 1999 also at: Law

Blue square Mandelbaum, Michael. Democracy's Good Name: The Rise and Risks of the World's most Popular Form of Government . New York: PublicAffairs, 2007. Pp. xi-xviii, 1-135.

Required book
JC423 .M35 2007

Blue square Christiano, Tom.  “Democracy.” Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy (online). Edward N. Zalta (ed.). http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/democracy/

Online Link
Equal Treatment Under Law

Blue square Poggi, Gianfranco. The Development of the Modern State : A Sociological Introduction . Stanford, Calif.: Stanford University Press, 1978.  Pp. 101-113.

PDF at Chalk site
JN5.P630

Blue square Berman, Harold Joseph. Law and Revolution : The Formation of the Western Legal Tradition . Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1983. Pp. 520-521; 527-539.

PDF at Chalk site
XXK150.B470 1983

Blue square Berman, Harold Joseph. Law and Revolution II : The Impact of the Protestant Reformations on the Western Legal Tradition . Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 2003.  Pp. ix-xii; 1-5; 373-379.

PDF at Chalk site
K147 .B47 2003
also at: Law

Blue square Epstein, Richard A. What Do We Mean By the Rule of Law? New Zealand Business Roundtable, 2005. Pp. 1-15.

PDF at Chalk site

Blue square Barry, Brian M. Culture and Equality : An Egalitarian Critique of Multiculturalism . Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 2001.  Pp. 3-17

PDF at Chalk site
HM1271 .B37 2001 also at: SSA 

Blue square Levy, Jacob T. "Liberal Jacobinism," a review essay of Brian Barry, Culture and Equality, Ethics 114(2), 2004, p. 328 only 

PDF at Chalk site

The Dark Side: Slavery, Racism, Empire, Inequality, Domination
(Assigned readings focus on slavery and empire, but students may focus on any topic. Your weekly form and paper should focus on only one topic.)

Empire

 

Blue square Howe, Stephen. Empire : A Very Short Introduction . New York: Oxford University Press, 2002.

Required book
D217 .H68 2002

Blue square Pitts, Jennifer. A Turn to Empire : The Rise of Imperial Liberalism in Britain and France . Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 2005.  Introduction and Conclusion.

PDF at Chalk site
JC359 .P54 2005
also: Harper A-Level at Reg

Slavery

 

Blue square Davis, David Brion. The Problem of Slavery in Western Culture. Ithaca, N.Y.: Cornell University Press, 1966.  Ch. 1, Pp. 3-28

PDF at Chalk site
HT871.D26

Blue square Davis, David Brion. Inhuman Bondage : The Rise and Fall of Slavery in the New World. New York: Oxford University Press, 2006. Ch. 9, Pp. 175-192.

PDF at Chalk site
E441 .D2495 2006 also at: Law

Blue square Davis, David Brion. Slavery and Human Progress. New York: Oxford University Press, 1984.  Pp. xvii-xviii, 107-106.

PDF at Chalk site
HT861.D380 1984 also at: Law

Blue square Stark, Rodney. For the Glory of God : How Monotheism Led to Reformations, Science, Witch-Hunts, and the End of Slavery.
Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 2003. Chapter 4: "God's Justice: The Sin of Slavery," Pp. 291-365.

PDF at Chalk site
BL221 .S747 2003.

Blue square Lincoln, Abraham. Second Inaugural Address.  March 4, 1865. http://www.nationalcenter.org/LincolnSecondInaugural.html

PDF at Chalk site
Online Link

Blue square Fox-Genovese, Elizabeth and Eugene D. Genovese. The Mind of the Master Class: History and Faith in the Southern Slaveholders' Worldview.
New York: Cambridge University Press, 2005. Pp. 2-4, 28, 52-53, 69-70, 526-28, 565, 709.

PDF at Chalk site
F213 .F69 2005

Liberty and Human Autonomy (or Human Independence)

Blue square Schneewind, J. B. The Invention of Autonomy : A History of Modern Moral Philosophy . Cambridge ; New York: Cambridge University Press, 1998.  P. 483.

PDF at Chalk site

Blue square Lindley, Richard Charles. Autonomy . Atlantic Highlands, NJ: Humanities Press International, 1986. P. 6.

PDF at Chalk site

Blue square Christman, John. “Autonomy in Moral and Political Philosophy” excerpt, Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy (online). Edward N. Zalta (ed.) http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/autonomy-moral/

PDF at Chalk site

Blue square Berlin, Isaiah. Liberty: Incorporating Four Essays on Liberty , Edited by Henry Hardy and Ian Harris. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2002. Chapter on “Two Concepts of Liberty.”  Online only.
http://www.oxfordscholarship.com.proxy.uchicago.edu/oso/private/content/politicalscience/9780199249893/p068.html#acprof-019924989X-chapter-4

Required book
Library has only the electronic version

Also available as:
Blue square Berlin, Isaiah. “Two Concepts of Liberty.” In Berlin, Isaiah. Four Essays on Liberty.  London: Oxford University Press.  (New ed. 2002.)

JC585.B498

Blue square Carter, Ian.  “Positive and Negative Liberty.”  Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy (online). Edward N. Zalta (ed.). http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/liberty-positive-negative/

Online Link

Blue square Machan, Tibor R. Private Rights and Public Illusions . New Brunswick, N.J.: Transaction Publishers, 1995. Pp. 62; 91 (just those two pages)

PDF at Chalk site
JC599.U5M2650 1995

Blue square Gaylin, Willard and Bruce Jennings. The Perversion of Autonomy : The Proper Uses of Coercion and Constraints in a Liberal Society . New York: Free Press, 1996. Pp. 4-11; 29-51

PDFs at Chalk site (2 files )
JC599.U5G360 1996 also at: Law, SSA

Blue square Steven Wall, “Freedom as a Political Ideal,” Social Philosophy and Policy 20 (2), July 2003, Pp. 307-311; 333-334 (those interested in philosophy may wish to read the entire article, Pp. 307-334).

PDF at Chalk site

Scientific Inquiry

Blue square Watson, Peter. Ideas : A History of Thought and Invention, from Fire to Freud . 1st American ed.
New York: HarperCollins, 2005, pp. 328-330; 474-495 (Ch. 23: “The Genius of the Experiment”).

PDF at Chalk site
CB69 .W38 2005 
Blue square Murray, Charles A. Human Accomplishment : The Pursuit of Excellence in the Arts and Sciences, 800 B.C. to 1950. New York: HarperCollins, 2003, Pp. 233-243. PDF at Chalk site
BF416.A1 M87 2003

Blue square Review of Bill Bryson, ed., Seeing Further: The Story of Science and the Royal Society, The Economist January 21, 2010, 81.
http://www.economist.com/books/displaystory.cfm?story_id=15328215

PDF at Chalk site

Blue square Nagel, Ernest, “Scientific Revolution” in Garraty, John A. and Peter Gay, eds. The Columbia History of the World . 1st ed.
New York: Harper & Row, 1972. Pp.681-84, 690-92

PDF at Chalk site
Blue square “The Scientific Revolution, c. 1650: Introduction.” In Thackeray, Frank W. and John E. Findling, eds. Events that Changed the World in the
Seventeenth Century. Westport, CT.: Greenwood Press, 1999.  Pp. 115-120		 PDF at Chalk site
Blue square DeKosky, Robert K.  “Interpretive Essay [on The Scientific Revolution, c. 1650].” In Thackeray, Frank W. and John E. Findling, eds. Events that Changed
the World in the Seventeenth Century. Westport, CT.: Greenwood Press, 1999.  Pp. 121-136 		PDF at Chalk site

Blue square Okasha, Samir. Philosophy of Science : A Very Short Introduction . Oxford ; New York: Oxford University Press, 2002. Pp. 1-94.

Required book
Q175 .O4555 2002

Required books to buy for course

 

CALL NUMBER

ISBN

Blue square Grayling, A. C. Toward the Light of Liberty: The Struggles for Freedom and Rights that made the Modern Western World. 1st U.S. ed. New York: Walker & Co., 2007.  

JC571 .G73 2007

ISBN-10: 0747592993
ISBN-13: 978-0747592990
Bloomsbury Publishing

Blue square Warburton, Nigel. Free Speech: A Very Short Introduction. New York: Oxford University Press, 2009.

JC591.W37 2009 at Law Library only.

ISBN-10: 0199232350
ISBN-13: 978-0199232352
Oxford University Press

Blue square Mill, John Stuart. ‘On Liberty’ and other Writings. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1989 and reprinted 1998. Chapter II, “Of the Liberty of Thought and Discussion.”

JC585.M740 1989 also at: Harper A-level in Reg

ISBN-10: 0521379172
ISBN-13: 978-0521379175
Cambridge University Press

Blue square Zagorin, Perez. How the Idea of Religious Toleration Came to the West. Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 2003.  

BR1610 .Z34 2003 also at: Law; Harper.

ISBN-10: 0691121427
ISBN-13: 978-0691121420
Princeton University Press

Blue square Locke, John. Locke: Political Essays , Edited by Mark Goldie. Chapter: “A Letter Concerning Toleration.” Cambridge; Cambridge University Press, 1997.  Pp. 134-159 (Students specializing in political philosophy should be buy this book.)

    Or

Blue square Locke, John. The Second Treatise of Government and A Letter Concerning Toleration (Dover Thrift Editions)
(Students who are not specializing in political philosophy should buy the Dover Thrift Edition.  It is much cheaper.)

Regenstein will have the Cambridge book on reserve

JC153 .L79 1997 also at Harper A-level in Reg; also available as electronic version 

ISBN-10: 0486424642
ISBN-13: 978-0486424644
Dover Thrift Editions

Blue square Bernstein, William J. The Birth of Plenty: How the Prosperity of the Modern World was Created. New York: McGraw-Hill, 2004. Pp. 7-90, 161-92. 

HC79.W4 B47 2004

ISBN-10: 0071421920
ISBN-13: 978-0071421928
McGraw-Hill, only in Hardcover

Blue square Rosenberg, Nathan and L. E. Birdzell. How the West Grew Rich: The Economic Transformation of the Industrial World. New York: Basic Books, 1986. Pp. 3-36, 113-143. 

HC240 .R67 1985

ISBN-10: 0465031099
ISBN-13: 978-0465031092
Basic Books

Blue square Pipes, Richard. Property and Freedom. 1st ed. New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1999.  Pp. xv-xvi, 3-120.

JC605 .P56 1999 also at: Law

ISBN-10: 0375704477
ISBN-13: 978-0375704475
Vintage

Blue square Crick, Bernard R. Democracy: A very Short Introduction. New York: Oxford University Press, 2002.

JC421 .C75 2002

ISBN-10: 019280250X
ISBN-13: 978-0192802507 Oxford University Press

Blue square Mandelbaum, Michael. Democracy's Good Name: The Rise and Risks of the World's most Popular Form of Government . New York: PublicAffairs, 2007. Pp. xi-xviii, 1-135.

JC423 .M35 2007

ISBN-10: 1586486640
ISBN-13: 978-1586486648
PublicAffairs

Blue square Berlin, Isaiah. Liberty: Incorporating Four Essays on Liberty.  2nd ed. London: Oxford University Press, 2002.

JC585.B498 plus new edition

ISBN-10: 019924989X
ISBN-13: 978-0199249893
Oxford University Press

Blue square Howe, Stephen. Empire : A Very Short Introduction . New York: Oxford University Press, 2002.

D217 .H68 2002

ISBN-10: 0192802232
ISBN-13: 978-0192802231
Oxford University Press

Blue square Okasha, Samir. Philosophy of Science : A Very Short Introduction . Oxford ; New York: Oxford University Press, 2002.

Q175.O4555 2002 at Crerar

ISBN-10: 0192802836
ISBN-13: 978-0192802835
Oxford University Press
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