The course provides an overview of crucial moments in political thought as they were expressed through the Liberal-Communitarian debate, the emergence of civic republicanism and the normative cleavages concerning the nature of democratic citizenship and multiculturalism. Students are introduced to the particular “chapters’’ of contemporary theoretical debate such as the controversy on individualism and atomism, the problem of a well-ordered or a good society, the different conceptions of freedom and rights, the crisis of civic values in advanced liberal capitalist societies, the theoretical turn towards communicative and deliberative patterns of public reason. The course provides a critical introduction to the basic normative issues of contemporary political theory and offers an understanding of political tensions that confront the West during the last thirty years.

Week 1. Introduction to the field of contemporary political theory. The moment of John Rawls and his Theory of Justice.
Week 2. The two principles of Justice and the definition of egalitarian liberalism.
Week 3. Rawls and Dworkin.
Week 4. Libertanism and the minimal state. Historical-political contexte and the reapproriation of classical liberal theories.
Week 5. The communitarian critique of liberal individualism. Neoaristotelism and civic republicanism.
Week 6. The righ and the good. Concepts and problems.
Week 7. Michael Walzer and Charles Taylor. The communitarian-liberal synthesis.
Week 8. The problem of citizenship and multiculturalism. Introduction to the field.
Week 9. Forms and types of multiculturalism.
Week 10.Procedural and deliberative democracy. Between Rawls and Habermas.
Week 11. Feminist political theory. Liberal and radical democratic feminism.
Week 12. Consensus and conflict. Radical critics and the theories of rational consensus and moral univerasalism.
Week 13. Final Recapitulation. Chosen topics for discussion.

Demonstrate an understanding of major contemporary political theories and concepts
Familiarity with fundamental aspects of political ideas
Synthesize, analyse and criticaly debating basic arguments

Course Bibliography (Eudoxus)
ΠΟΛΙΤΙΚΗ ΘΕΩΡΙΑ: ΜΙΑ ΕΙΣΑΓΩΓΗ (ΚΩΔΙΚΟΣ ΕΥΔΟΞΟΥ 86194663) ANDREW HEYWOOD ΕΠΙΚΕΝΤΡΟ 2019 ΑΘΗΝΑ
ΣΥΓΧΡΟΝΗ ΠΟΛΙΤΙΚΗ ΘΕΩΡΙΑ (ΚΩΔΙΚΟΣ ΕΥΔΟΞΟΥ 68379748) SHORTEN ANDREW ΚΡΙΤΙΚΗ Α.Ε. 2017 (1η έκδοση) ΑΘΗΝΑ

Additional bibliography for study
Michael Sandel, Δικαιοσύνη, Αθήνα, Πόλις.
Renaut, Alain, Τι είναι ένας ελεύθερος λαός; Φιλελευθερισμός ή
ρεπουμπλικανισμός, Πόλις.
Kymlicka, Will, Η πολιτική φιλοσοφία της εποχής μας, Αθήνα, Πόλις, 2004
Sandel, Michael, Ο φιλελευθερισμός και τα όρια της δικαιοσύνης, Αθήνα,
Πόλις, 2004
Hampsher, Ian, A history of modern political thought, Blackwell, 1992.
Walzer, Michael, Τhe communitarian critic of Liberalism, Political Theory, vol.
18 (1)
Χατζής, Αριστείδης, «Η αναβίωση της ρεπουμπλικανικής θεωρίας δικαίου: μια
κριτική προσέγγιση», Επιστήμη και Κοινωνία, Άνοιξη 2000, τ.4, 79-116
Plant, R. Modern Political Thought, Oxford, Blackwell, 1991.
Barry, Norman, An introduction to modern political theories, London,
Macmillan, 1995.
Raz, J. The morality of freedom, Oxford, Clarendon Press, 1986.
G. den Hartogh, The Good life as a Public Good, Dordnecht, Kluwer, 2000.
Rawls, John, Θεωρία δικαιοσύνης, Αθήνα, Πόλις.
Rawls, John, Πολιτικός Φιλελευθερισμός, Μεταιχμιο.