SOCI0064-1 : Sociological Approach of Social Justice

University of Liege | Version française

Academic year 2014-2015

Value date : 12/05/2015

Version 2013-2014

SOCI0064-1

Sociological Approach of Social Justice

Duration :

30h Th

Number of credits :

Bachelor in Human and Social Sciences, 3rd year		6

Bachelor in Sociology and Anthropology, 3rd year		6

One-year preliminary programme leading to the Master in Sociology		6

Bachelor in Information and Communication, 3rd year		5

Bachelor in Information and Communication, 3rd year		4

Lecturer :

Mohamed Nachi

Language(s) of instruction :

French language

Organisation and examination :

Teaching in the first semester, review in January

Course contents :

The study of social justice can come in many forms and requires a multi-angle approach. There are certainly a number of theoretical directions which can be taken. The objective of the course is to address a few of the more significant of these to build a sociological approach to the ordinary sense of "fair". Particular attention will be paid to pragmatic sociology insofar as it makes a new contribution to the study of justice in particular and morality in general. This approach consists of placing the concept of compromise at the heart of analysis, as the sense of justice is often the expression of compromise between a plurality of principles of justice and moral values. Taking the ordinary sense of justice serious, is the basic concern of the sociology of justice. Based in particular on the work of L. Boltanski and L. Thévenot, the course seeks to identify the issues around the question of social justice in contemporary societies. By looking at empirical work, it aims on the one hand to provide an insight into the way in which contemporary societies treat problems of justice, recognition, solidarity, etc. and on the other hand, to analyse how situations of injustice where social actors, be they individual or collective, consider themselves to be offended, discredited, humiliated etc. We will also seek to understand how these actors establish agreements and build compromises to be able to act together

Learning outcomes of the course :

To give a large basic overview of the social justice problems ans enable students to reason in a rigorous way on the basis of given criteria.

Prerequisites and co-requisites/ Recommended optional programme components :

No prerequisites

Planned learning activities and teaching methods :

Mode of delivery (face-to-face ; distance-learning) :

Interactive teaching. Oral presentation accompanied by discussions on the subject of concrete problems of justice. Students will be asked to collect examples of injustice taken from daily life and situations of compromise in order to analyse them from a pragmatic sociological perspective. Based on these analyses, students should submit a piece of written work to the lecturer.