This book provides a comprehensive collection of influential essays that present a balanced survey of the major ideas that have come out of this area of study in the last two decades. Each article has been carefully chosen to enable any student of political philosophy to grasp the main debates within the topic.
Clearly divided into two parts, Part One deals with fundamental philosophical issues: the nature of social explanation; distributive justice and liberalism and communitarianism. Part Two contains seminal papers in more specific areas: citizenship and multiculturalism; nationalism; democracy and criminal justice.
Readings from the following thinkers are included: Lukes, Nozick, Rawls, Parekh, Walzer, Elster, Frankfurt, Gutmann, Barry, Duff, Cohen, Parfit, Taylor, Scruton, von Hirsch, Wright, Sandel, Young, MacIntyre.
The readings represent a range of views and demonstrate the richness of the philosophical contribution to political thought. Each section has an introduction by the editors that situates the papers in the ongoing debate and Further Reading sections feature at the end of each chapter.

This textbook reflects the buoyant state of contemporary political philosophy, and the development of the subject in the past two decades. It includes seminal papers on fundamental philosophical issues such as:
the nature of social explanation
distributive justice
liberalism and communitarianism
citizenship and multiculturalism
nationalism
democracy
criminal justice.
A range of views is represented, demonstrating the richness of the philosophical contribution to some of the most contested areas of public policy and political decision making. Each section has an introduction by the editors that situates the papers in the ongoing debate. Further Reading sections feature at the end of each chapter.
Readings from the following thinkers are included:
Steven Lukes, Robert Nozick, John Rawls, Bhikhu Parekh, Antony Duff, G.A. Cohen, Derek Parfit, Roger Scruton, Michael Sandel, Alasdair MacIntrye.
Debates in Contemporary Political Philosophy will be a valuable resource for upper-level students interested in current thinking in this area.