Eight courses are required for completion of the Ethics Certificate Program (ECP)*:

1. ETHICS 100D Introductory Course: The Challenges of Living an Ethical Life

2. One course in Philosophical Ethics from a list of approved courses

3. One course in Practical Ethics from a list of approved courses

4. One course in Religious Ethics from a list of approved courses

5. One course in Ethics in Historical and Cultural Context from a list of approved courses

6. Two additional courses with an Ethical Inquiry (EI) designation (approval required)

7. ETHICS 200 Capstone Course: Research Seminar in Ethics

ETHICS 100D INTRODUCTORY COURSE: The Challenges of Living an Ethical Life
This course, specially designed for the Ethics Certificate Program and taught by Professor Peter Euben, is framed by a number of familiar but fundamental ethical questions: What is a good, worthy, or just life (or lives)? How is it to be lived, among whom, by engaging in what sorts of activities, toward what ends? The course examines the origins of the concepts of ethics and morality, and how and why they became distinct realms of discourse and life. Specific issues include: public and private morality, morality and moralism, the possibility of ethical knowledge and the relationship of that knowledge to ethical action, purity and compromise, sin and redemption, political freedom and freedom of the will, just war and the justifications of violence, professional ethics and the professionalization of ethics, the politics of morality and the morality of politics, and the particular circumstances of ethics in a democratic polity.

Ancient and modern texts in a variety of genres provide a springboard for reflection on these issues. Students read dramas and philosophical analyses, parables and autobiographies, polemics and meditations, novels and political commentaries, case studies and historical examples. Together, these works provide different ways of approaching fundamental ethical questions and offer ways of resolving them.

PHILOSOPHICAL ETHICS
ECP students must take one course that provides an overview of systematic approaches to moral philosophy.

PRACTICAL ETHICS
ECP students must take one course for its relevance either to applied ethics in the professions or to contemporary public policy issues.

RELIGIOUS ETHICS
ECP students must take one course that familiarizes them with the religious foundations of ethical thought.

ETHICS IN HISTORICAL AND CULTURAL CONTEXT
ECP students must take one course that explores how ethical ideas, visions, and practices change over time and across cultures.

ELECTIVE
ECP students must take at least two additional courses with an Ethical Inquiry (EI) designation (approval required).

ETHICS 200 CAPSTONE COURSE: Research Seminar in Ethics
This advanced seminar is restricted to senior-year students enrolled in the Ethics Certificate Program. Each year the course will focus on a broad theme (such as equality and class, power and morality, ethical theory and ethical practice, justice and corruption, democracy and moral development) that will enable students who have developed distinct approaches to and special competence in questions of ethics to engage in a dialogue with one another across their specializations. Course discussions will be informed by the specific ethical problems and academic disciplines that have defined students’ work since they entered the program.

All students will complete a substantial research paper that integrates their special concerns into the broader issues of living an ethical life. Where appropriate, students’ projects in the seminar will link with departmental honors projects. All ECP students will be required to give an oral presentation on their research in a mini-conference or other forum as the culmination of their work in the program.