Politics and Nature

Examines the relationship between human beings and the earth as it has been conceived in the tradition of Western political thought from the ancient Greeks to the present day. The first part of the course draws from the history of political thought to understand the background against which our contemporary environmental problems have evolved and the conceptual resources that current theory draws from. The second part of the course investigates environmental political theory at the cutting edge today, engaging a wide range of perspectives and methods in the field.