Social and political philosophy asks how institutions governing collective life ought to be

arranged and why. Historically, political philosophers have focused attention on the nation-
state, asking how shared decision-making should be conducted, what limits there should be on
state power, what justice demands in terms of the distribution of the benefits from social
cooperation, and what is the nature and value of freedom. As globalization has increased,
political philosophers have increasingly turned their attention to questions about the nature
and kinds of institutions that should govern international political and nonpolitical
interactions. Additionally, several of our faculty engage in what might usefully be called applied
political philosophy, applying tools and frameworks from political philosophy in ways that
overlap with the department’s strengths in applied ethics.
So what exactly are social and political philosophy? I think it has been practiced for as
long as human beings have regarded their collective arrangements not as immutable and part
of the natural order but as potentially open to change, and therefore as standing in need of
philosophical justification. It can be found in many different cultures, and has taken a wide
variety of forms. In my own experience and based on what I observe nowadays, there are two
reasons for this diversity. First, the methods and approaches used by political philosophers
reflect the general philosophical tendencies of their epoch. Developments in epistemology and
ethics, for instance, alter the assumptions on which political philosophy can proceed. But
second, the political philosopher’s agenda is largely set by the pressing political issues of the
day.