Spring 2025 Student/Faculty Seminar — Topics in Philosophy: “Capitalism and its Discontents”

Spring 2025 Honors Student/Faculty Seminar

Honors: Topics in Philosophy — “Capitalism and its Discontents”

Professor Peter Hudis

R 2:00pm-4:45pm, Des Plaines Campus

Register for PHL 290 0H1 (CRN: 10763)

Gen Ed: Philosophy Elective

Description: Student/Faculty Seminar. One of the most widely discussed and debated issues in the world today concerns the nature and future of capitalism. Is capitalism’s pursuit of wealth and profit sustainable in the light of climate change and ecological destruction? Is today’s growing economic inequality compatible with political democracy? Is racism and sexism intrinsic to capitalism? How is capitalism’s changing character impacting technology and the workplace? How is it impacting the efforts of increasing numbers of people to migrate across international borders? These are difficult philosophical questions, and we will explore them by focusing on a thinker who is widely credited with producing the most systematic effort to understand the logic of capital—Karl Marx. We will also study contemporary theorists of racial capitalism, feminist social reproduction theory, decolonial studies, environmental studies and LGBTQ rights in attempting to come to a better understanding of the dynamics and trajectory of modern capitalism.