This course is designed to introduce major issues of political philosophy and approaches to these issues offered by major Chinese and European thinkers. Particular attention will be paid to theories of state, rights, and liberty. This course is a study of the major political thinkers and issues in European and Chinese political philosophy.

Political philosophy would be focused on the lives and ideas of selected political philosophers. The course will teach the Chinese political philosophy of Confucianism, Mohism, Taoism and Legalism, Neo-Confucianism. Moreover, European political philosophers of Plato, Hobbes, John Locke, Karl Marx, and John Stuart Mill will also be taught respectively.