Week 2 — Readings & Resources

Introduction to Political Science Free sample edition

Your primary reading is Chapter 2 (in this module). Everything below is the optional, go-deeper layer — pick what helps, skip the rest.

How to use this page

This page has 10 items (4 readings and 6 videos). Allow 86–102 minutes for everything. Each group points back to the matching chapter section and class-session segment, so use the full menu when you want more, or take the quick path below.

Every video here has captions: turn them on with the CC button in the player. The chapter covers the same ideas in text.

Pick-one quick path (19–25 min total)

① Who has a right to rule? Authority and legitimacy

Chapter 2, Section “Sort authority with Weber's three types” · Session 1, Segment 2, “Weber's three types of authority” · Remember: authority is power people accept as rightful, and real leaders blend custom, devotion, and rules.

Max Weber - Types of Authority — Debra Marshall — an eight-minute talk on traditional, charismatic, and rational-legal authority as ideal types, with examples from family life, history, and religion; as you watch, name the type that carries the most weight in each example, and sort the speaker's own opinions about which type is dangerous as normative claims. Notice that it ties rational-legal authority to elected leaders; in the chapter's definition that authority rests on rules and offices, so an appointed clerk holds it too, and an election is one route to it, not its definition. Use it while working through the Week-2 module overview. (video, 8 min) (captions: automatic)
Political Legitimacy — online Encyclopedia of Philosophy (reference entry) — a reference article on what legitimacy means; read only its first section, which separates people's belief that rule is rightful from the question of whether it really is. This builds on Week 1's work with telling an empirical claim from a normative one. (reading, 8–12 min)

② What makes a state sovereign? Inside, outside, and 1648

Chapter 2, Section “Split sovereignty: inside and outside, and the 1648 marker” · Session 1, Segment 4, “Sovereignty and the Westphalia marker” · Remember: sovereignty is a claim to the final word, at home and against outsiders, not a measure of strength.

What Is Sovereignty? — CFR Education — a short explainer from a foreign-affairs education program on authority inside a country's borders and independence from outside interference; match each part to the chapter's internal and external sovereignty. (reading, 4–6 min)
States, Nations, Countries & Sovereignty — Geography Geek — a geography explainer on how a state, a nation, and a country differ, with examples; test each example against the chapter's four criteria and say which one, if any, it fails. (video, 9 min) (captions: automatic)
The Peace of Westphalia: How a 1648 Treaty Created the Modern State — Noah Zerbe — a longer history of how the sovereign state emerged; notice that despite its title it questions the idea that one treaty created the modern world, which is the chapter's caveat that 1648 is a marker, not a light switch. (video, 13 min) (captions: automatic)

③ Why obey anyone at all? Three social contract answers

Chapter 2, Section “Run the three lenses on a new country” · Session 2, Segment 5, “The social contract: Hobbes, Locke, and Rousseau” · Remember: Hobbes fears chaos, Locke fears tyranny, and Rousseau puts sovereignty in the people.

Hobbes vs. Locke vs. Rousseau - Social Contract Theories Compared — Korczyk's Class — a seven-minute side-by-side of the three thinkers; keep the chapter's memory hooks beside you and check that each idea lands on the right name. (video, 7 min) (captions: automatic)
Contractarianism: Crash Course Philosophy #37 — CrashCourse — a fast introduction to Hobbes's state of nature and why people might agree to be governed; it treats the idea as a theory of ethics, so translate its point back into the chapter's question of why anyone should obey. (video, 10 min) (captions: creator)
Introduction to Rousseau: The Social Contract — Then & Now — an introduction to Rousseau's book and the general will; listen for where sovereignty sits. Stop here before political ideologies; next week takes those up. (video, 9 min) (captions: automatic)
Social Contract Theory — Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy — a reference article; read only its section on modern social contract theory, with its parts on Hobbes, Locke, and Rousseau, and skip the later debates. (reading, 12–18 min)

Optional one-stop reference (free online reference)

Hobbes's Moral and Political Philosophy — online Encyclopedia of Philosophy (reference entry) — the reference entry on Hobbes; read the section on the state of nature to see how scholars read the war of all against all, and skip the later sections on the laws of nature and absolutism. (reading, 6–10 min)

Heads-up (links rot): these point to outside sites that occasionally move or rename pages. If a link ever fails, tell your instructor and use the reference above in the meantime.

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