Conservatism and its Critics
GOV 1023
Subject & Catalog Number
Course Information
Description
What is conservatism? Is it merely a temperament or sensibility? Or is it a coherent approach to political theory and practice? Should conservatives defend free markets? Must they reject the discourse of natural rights? Can a liberal be conservative? Can a socialist? This course will explore such questions and others like them through a close reading of conservative writers and their critics. We will begin with the rise of conservatism as a political force in the wake of the French Revolution and follow its fortunes across the next two centuries, in works of political theory as well as literature. Authors will include Edmund Burke, Mary Wollstonecraft, Samuel Taylor Coleridge, Ford Madox Ford, Friedrich Hayek, Michael Oakshott, Robert Nozick, and Tom Stoppard. We will be interested throughout in asking what, if anything, is conservative about the Conservative Movement in contemporary American politics.
Class Notes
theory_subfield
This course requires students to choose timed sections during registration.
Available for Harvard Cross Registration
NOTE: This course requires additional sections; you will be prompted to choose secondary components during the Add to Cart process
