Government 264 - Out of this World: Utopianism in Modern Political Thought
Utopianism
Fall
2025
01
4.00
Naveed Mansoori
W 1:20 PM - 2:35 PM; M 1:40 PM - 2:55 PM
Smith College
GOV-264-01-202601
Neilson 102
nmansoori86@smith.edu
This is a course on utopianism as an impulse and a disposition in modern political thought. The course examines the French Revolution and feminist and anti-colonial reappraisals of the “Rights of Man;” efforts to re-imagine the social organization of power in Central and Western Europe, the United States, and British colonies in North Africa and the Middle East; the critique and diagnosis of the alienating and repressive conditions of life within an alien “utopia;” the theoretical and practical dissolution of “utopianism” into national histories and movements; the post-colonial efforts to rebuild the colonies in the wake of the grisly history of “mass utopias;” and finally, the contemporary reflections on “utopia” as a way of life and program for the future. Prerequisite: GOV 100. Enrollment limited to 30. (E)