Power and oppression shape many aspects of human life, influencing the opportunities people have, the choices available to them, and the ways they are treated within social, political, economic, and interpersonal relationships. Questions about power and oppression arise in discussions of race, gender, class, disability, poverty, immigration, policing, education, healthcare, and intimate relationships. Yet despite their centrality to public debate, both concepts remain difficult to define and deeply contested.
This course examines philosophical approaches to power and oppression and explores how these concepts can help us understand contemporary social and political problems. We begin by asking foundational questions: What is power? Where does it come from? How does it operate in individual relationships, institutions, and broader social structures? When does the exercise of power become oppressive, and what distinguishes oppression from other forms of disadvantage or inequality?
Drawing on philosophy as well as political theory, sociology, feminist theory, and critical race theory, the course investigates competing accounts of power and oppression. Particular attention will be given to the ways power functions through laws, institutions, economic arrangements, social norms, cultural expectations, and everyday interactions. Students will examine how these mechanisms shape patterns of privilege, domination, marginalization, and resistance.
A distinctive feature of the course is its emphasis on applying philosophical theories to real-world issues and case studies. Rather than treating concepts such as power, oppression, responsibility, and justice as purely abstract ideas, students will use them to analyze concrete social phenomena, including systemic inequality, discrimination, political authority, social movements, institutional injustice, and forms of interpersonal domination. Throughout the course, we will consider how different theoretical frameworks illuminate—or obscure—particular dimensions of these problems.
By comparing competing theories and applying them to contemporary controversies, students will develop the conceptual tools needed to critically assess claims about power, responsibility, privilege, resistance, and social change. The course aims not only to introduce major philosophical debates but also to equip students with the analytical skills necessary to evaluate how power operates in the world around them and what, if anything, justice requires in response.