Debates in contemporary political philosophy. An anthology

This textbook provides a comprehensive collection of essays that present a balanced survey of the major ideas that have come out of the study of political philosophy in the 1980s and 1990s. Each article has been carefully chosen to enable any student of political philosophy to grasp the main debates within the topic. The book is clearly divided into two parts. Part One deals with fundamental philsophical issues: the nature of social explanation; distributive justice and liberalism and communitarianism. Part Two contains papers in more specific areas: citizenship and multiculturalism; nationalism; and democracy and criminal justice. Readings from the following thinkers are included: Lukes, Nozick, Rawls, Parekh, Walzer, Elster, Frankfurt, Gutmann, Barry, Duff, Cohen, Parfit, Taylor, Scruton, von Hirsch, Wright, Sandel, Young and MacIntyre.The readings represent a range of views and demonstrate the richness of the philosophical contribution to political thought. Each section has an introduction by the editors that situates the papers in the ongoing debate and further reading sections feature at the end of each chapter.This book is a resource for any student studying a course in political philosophy.