B.A. PHILOSOPHY, POLITICS, ECONOMICS AND LAW

• Law

• Public policy

• Business

Career Pathways About

• Research Consortia

• Nonprofits & NGOs

• Government

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Core Skills

• Logical Thinking

• Complex Conceptual Analysis

• Writing

• Problem Solving

• Economic Analysis

This major aims to promote sustained philosophical reflection on the interrelations of political, legal, and economic activities and institutions. Although students learn the basic tools of economic analysis, the major is also grounded on the humanistic tradition, encouraging analytical and critical reflection on the fundamental values that shape, or should shape, the economic, political, and legal domains.

Core Courses

• PPEL 326: Law and Legal Theory - Explore basic legal doctrine and legal theory in one or another central area of the law. In general, philosophical or economic analysis will be brought to bear on substantive areas of law. In a given semester, this writing-intensive course might focus on basic constitutional law and constitutional theory, basic property law and theory, the law of torts and tort theory, or criminal law and the philosophy of criminal law.

• PPEL 410: Philosophy, Politics and Economics - Introduces students to the ways in which economic analysis has been applied to issues in social philosophy and the study of politics. Game theory, axiomatic social choice theory, and public choice theory are discussed.

• PPEL 440: Justice and Welfare - Considers what constitutes a better economic distribution, or a fair way to sustain social and economic cooperation. The course centers around two broad families of approaches: those that focus on fairness or justice and those that evaluate on the basis of welfare improvements. Topics to be considered include the morality of markets, egalitarianism, the Pareto criterion, economic desert, and mutual gain.