Tip:
Highlight text to annotate it
X
Today the disciplines of Politics, Economics and Philosophy are often treated as separate from each other.
Yet intellectual giants like Adam Smith, John Stuart Mill and Karl Marx:
they didn't make such distinctions.
We sometimes jokingly say that a PEP graduate is someone who can read the newspapers and see what is really going on.
They can evaluate and analyse the arguments and methods being used by people in public life.
They can recognise ideas, their origins and their consequences:
enough that they can separate the good from the bad in among all that noise.
No other university brings the three disciplines together in the way York does.
You will study specially designed, integrated modules.
One of the main things I really enjoy about my degree is political philosophy:
equality, justice and what those mean, what's wrong and what's right.
And it's that area of the degree that I enjoy so much.
It's one of the reasons I chose York over other universities.
Because we have those specific modules which do straddle the disciplines.
You will be taught by economists, political scientists and philosophers
who are distinguished in their fields.
The students particularly enjoy the differing, and sometimes conflicting perspectives,
that the teachers in Politics, Economics and Philosophy bring to such topics
as rationality, justice and democracy.
The public sphere is informed by the study of all three subjects.
For example the recent crisis in Europe clearly indicates that economic measures alone
are unlikely to meet the challenges facing the eurozone if there's a lack of political will.
My own research falls at the intersection of Economics and Philosophy: on topics such
as well being which is very hard for economists to make significant headway without grappling
with philosophical questions about the good life.
Take the idea of national interest, and think about what this might mean in the context
of the UK current economic policy. A key characteristic has been to keep interest rates very low.
While this clearly advantages people who owe debt, but it clearly disadvantages who are
trying to live off the income from their savings. So how do we weigh the interests of one group
against those of another when deciding what's in the national interest?
So what I find fascinating is comparing cost-benefit analysis economics to utilitarianism and philosophy.
By comparing the two I can use utilitarianism to maximise total happiness in a cost-benefit
analysis situation. But then of course that depends on how we define hapiness.
The interdisciplinary study of Politics, Philosophy and Economics enables a graduate to engage
constructively and positively in urgent questions.
They will enjoy careers as thinkers and leaders, equipped to address the challenges of the
coming decades.