The main themes of this course are power, statesmanship
(leadership), and political wisdom. They will provide the lenses
through which we’ll read key texts in modern political thought and
attempt to answer the following questions: What do we mean when we
say that someone is a good or bad politician? What are the
requirements of effective leadership in politics and public life?
What is political power and how must it be exercised? How can one
combine ethical behavior with worldly success? Is compromise
desirable in politics? How can we distinguish between opportunism
and integrity? What role do words and rhetoric play in politics and
what does a successful political speech look like? What should be
the defining virtues of the legislator and the politician? And, last
but not least, is there a “science of politics” or only “an art of
politics”?

The class covers a select number of key authors and texts in modern
political thought from the Renaissance until the present day. The
required readings include Machiavelli’s The Prince, Baltasar
Gracián’s The Art of Worldly Wisdom, Locke’s Second Treatise on
Government, Rousseau’s Social Contract, The Federalist Papers, and
selected speeches and essays of Edmund Burke and Abraham Lincoln.
They will be no conventional papers in this class. The requirements
include a number of written assignments in which students will be
required to act like advisers to the “prince” and legislators and to
write their own speeches addressing specific contemporary topics in
light of the readings studied in class.