This course is an introduction to theories that have shaped our thinking about power, authority, justice, and social change in modern liberal societies. We examine the meanings and moral foundations of rights; the idea of a social contract; state sovereignty vs. individual autonomy; competing conceptions of human nature; the role of reason in politics; the concepts of justice, liberty, equality, individualism, and democracy; the way in which political ideals can have different meanings in different historical contexts; exploitation and class struggle; patriarchy and feminism; violence and non-violence; the re-emergence of political authoritarianism; and the economic and political roots of the ecological crisis. Students critically analyze selections from the primary texts by Machiavelli, Hobbes, Locke, Rousseau, Thoreau, Mill, Marx, Dewey, and Gandhi as well as those of selected contemporary theorists. The relevance of these thinkers and their theories to contemporary social and political issues will be a concern throughout the course.