Political Science & International Relations Optional Syllabus For UPSC Mains
PART-I
Political Theory and Indian Politics:
1.Political theory: meaning and approaches.
2.Theories of the state: Liberal, Neo-liberal, Marxist, Pluralist, Post-colonial and feminist.
3.Justice: Conceptions of justice with special reference to Rawl’s theory of justice and its communitarian critiques.
4.Equality: Social, political and economic;relationship between equality and freedom; Affirmative action.
5.Rights: Meaning and theories; different kinds of rights; concept of Human Rights.
6.Democracy: Classical and contemporary theories; different models of democracy-representative, participatory and deliberative.
7.Concept of power: hegemony, ideology and legitimacy.
8.Political Ideologies: Liberalism, Socialism, Marxism, Fascism, Gandhism and Feminism.
9.Indian Political Thought: Dharamshastra, Arthashastra and Buddhist traditions; Sir Syed Ahmed Khan, Sri Aurobindo, M.K. Gandhi, B.R. Ambedkar, M.N. Roy.
10.Western Political Thought: Plato, Aristotle, Machiavelli, Hobbes, Locke, John S. Mill, Marx, Gramsci, Hannah Arendt.