Political philosophy relates to how society should be organised to maximise human happiness, avoid needless suffering and uphold human values such as freedom, equality and justice.

Political economy and political philosophy are different fields. The former is about economics in the context of politics, government, and nation states. In today’s terms it’s a social science, a combination of political science and economics. Political philosophy is a branch of philosophy, and as such it asks fundamental questions about government, the state, etc. It’s not a social science doing empirical investigation.

I haven’t read the Bataille. Looks weirdly interesting.

Political economy and political philosophy are different fields. — Jamal

Are they? In academics, maybe. In life, not so much. In political life, economy is central: it frames so many issues, influences so many decisions, determines so many policies. Is it really possible to keep them in separate arenas?

But i'm premature in my study so what really defines political philosophy?. — LancelotFreeman

Read John Locke and JS Mill.

Is it really possible to keep them in separate arenas? — Vera Mont

Absolutely.

The economy is science and politics aren't. The latter is full-filled by theories of what "should" a society works correctly. Furthermore, I guess that theorists of politics are always debating each other about the classic fight of "social classes". It is true that politics are influenced by Economics, but this is the one that goes separated and cannot be influenced by politics.

For example: inflation or bankruptcy. These concepts that are more common that we used to think, can be fixed or analysed thanks to economists, experts of market and money fluctuations. A politician cannot make anything here. Maybe spreading some lies to collect votes, but his/her discourse will be empty. The markets work themselves, without political theories.

Unemployment is one of the main examples too. The increase or decrease in the rate of working people depends on a lot of factors. Most of them come from economics. But, however, politicians tend to think it is due to their "political theories" when this is a terrible mistake. If your economy depends on tourism and we are in a scenario like a pandemic where all airports are locked down, your unemployment rate will experience a high ratio because of the lack of tourists. Politics has nothing to do with these facts.

Political economy and political philosophy are different fields. — Jamal

Are they? In academics, maybe. In life, not so much. In political life, economy is central: it frames so many issues, influences so many decisions, determines so many policies. Is it really possible to keep them in separate arenas? — Vera Mont

Well, political economy and political philosophy, which the OP asked about, are just the names of academic disciplines, so that's really what I was talking about. And anyway, the separation I described is not between economics and politics but between a social science that combines both on one side (political economy), and a branch of philosophy on the other (political philosophy).

But I'm all for an interdisciplinary approach and I'm all for applying these things in everyday life. One of the things I like about Marx and critical theory (at least early critical theory) is their resistance to a specialization that leads to the splitting of knowledge into smaller and smaller discrete chunks.

:up: