Philosophy, politics and economics, or politics, philosophy and economics (PPE), is an academic degree that combines study from three subjects. The first institution to offer degrees in PPE was the University of Oxford in the 1920s. The Oxford PPE course has produced many notable graduates, including numerous British politicians and leaders of other countries.[1][2] PPE degrees began to be offered at other universities in the 1980s and are now offered at many colleges and universities around the world.

History

Philosophy, politics and economics was established as a degree course at the University of Oxford in the 1920s,[3] as a modern alternative to classics (known as "literae humaniores" or "greats" at Oxford) for those entering the civil service. It was thus initially known as "modern greats".[2][4] The first PPE students commenced their course in the autumn of 1921.[1] Initially it was compulsory to study all three subjects for all three years of the course, but in 1970 this requirement was relaxed, and since then students have been able to drop one subject after the first year – most do this, but a minority continue with all three.[1]

The philosopher Roy Bhaskar, who studied PPE at Oxford in the 1960s, subsequently described the course content at that time as follows:

Course material

The programme is rooted in the view that to understand social phenomena one must approach them from several complementary disciplinary directions and analytical frameworks. In this regard, the study of philosophy is considered important because it both equips students with meta-tools such as the ability to reason rigorously and logically, and facilitates ethical reflection. The study of politics is considered necessary because it acquaints students with the institutions that govern society and help solve collective action problems. Finally, studying economics is seen as vital in the modern world because political decisions often concern economic matters, and government decisions are often influenced by economic events. The vast majority of students at Oxford drop one of the three subjects for the second and third years of their course. Oxford now has more than 600 undergraduates studying the subject, admitting over 200 each year.

Reception

Oxford PPE graduate Nick Cohen and former tutor Iain McLean consider the course's breadth important to its appeal, especially "because British society values generalists over specialists". Academic and Labour peer Maurice Glasman noted that "PPE combines the status of an elite university degree – PPE is the ultimate form of being good at school – with the stamp of a vocational course. It is perfect training for cabinet membership, and it gives you a view of life". However, he also noted that it had an orientation towards consensus politics and technocracy.[1] According to Bhaskar, the course "was designed to turn you into a top-class civil servant, able to turn your hand to any brief or service the empire in a variety of roles".[5]

Geoffrey Evans, an Oxford fellow in politics and a senior tutor, critiques that the Oxford course's success and consequent over-demand is a self-perpetuating feature of those in front of and behind the scenes in national administration, in stating "all in all, it's how the class system works". In the current economic system, he bemoans the unavoidable inequalities besetting admissions and thereby enviable recruitment prospects of successful graduates. The argument itself intended as a paternalistic ethical reflection on how governments and peoples can perpetuate social stratification.[2]

Stewart Wood, a former adviser to Ed Miliband who studied PPE at Oxford in the 1980s and taught politics there in the 1990s and 2000s, acknowledged that the programme has been slow to catch up with contemporary political developments, saying that "it does still feel like a course for people who are going to run the Raj in 1936... In the politics part of PPE, you can go three years without discussing a single contemporary public policy issue". He also stated that the structure of the course gave it a centrist bias, due to the range of material covered: "...most students think, mistakenly, that the only way to do it justice is to take a centre position".[1]

See also

References

  1. 1 2 3 4 5 6 Andy Beckett (23 February 2017). "PPE: the Oxford degree that runs Britain". The Guardian.
  2. 1 2 3 4 Kelly, Jon (1 September 2010). "Why does PPE rule Britain?". BBC News Magazine. BBC News.
  3. ↑ Archived 2009-08-30 at the Wayback Machine "Balliol was the birthplace of the modern degree of PPE in the 1920s. A. D. Lindsay, who subsequently became the master of the college, played a key role in the establishment of the degree and Balliol has long remained a major college for the study of PPE, and PPE has long been a major subject within Balliol."
  4. ↑ "History of Philosophy at Oxford – Faculty of Philosophy". Philosophy.ox.ac.uk. 19 November 2009. Archived from the original on 26 December 2016. Retrieved 2 June 2010.
  5. 1 2 3 Bhaskar, Roy (2010). The Formation of Critical Realism: A personal perspective. Interviewed by Hartwig, Mervyn. Abingdon: Routledge. pp. 24–28. ISBN 978-0-203-87808-8. Retrieved 2 May 2025.
  6. ↑ Pateman, Trevor (1968). The Poverty of PPE. Archived from the original on 29 June 2022. Retrieved 3 May 2024.
  7. ↑ Christopher Stray, Classics Transformed: Schools, Universities, and Society in England, 1830–1960. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1998. Pp. xiv, 336. ISBN 0-19-815013-X.
  8. ↑ Dario Castiglione and Iain Hampsher-Monk, The History of Political Thought in National Context. Cambridge University Press, 2001, ISBN 0-521-78234-1
  9. ↑ "Frequently asked questions". University of York. What is distinctive about PPE at York?. Retrieved 3 February 2026. York was one of the first universities after Oxford to offer PPE, starting in 1986
  10. ↑ Bethany White; Samuel Wainwright; Lilly Schreiter (2020). One hundred years of PPE 1920 – 2020 (Report). University of Oxford.

Further reading

allikas: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Philosophy,_politics,_and_economics