FREE COURSE: Yale’s Stephen B. Smith on Political Philosophy

There are some remarkable free resources for the world’s highest quality educational content — like Michael Sandel’s “Justice” series, which brings to your desktop engaging examinations of philosophy.

Another is Stephen B. Smith’s series on political philosophy. In his Yale course, Smith looks closely at the underpinnings of political philosophy to which many other political science professors give too little attention. I’ve been in those courses myself; it’s not uncommon to be told to read Plato and discuss it for 10 minutes in a group, and then it disappears into that repository of knowledge you should master and be familiar with for the rest of your life.

It really doesn’t work that way — especially with a complex topic like political philosophy, which requires careful study and consideration. You need a knowledgeable expert like Smith to guide you through those intellectual waters.

And now you’ve got Professor Smith free of charge, on demand, and you don’t even have to get into Yale. Consider his first video, an introduction to the course called “What is Political Philosophy?”

Smith is engaging and easy to listen to. If you’re hooked and want the rest of the series, you can subscribe in a few different ways:

The Course site
iTunes audio
iTunes video