Bachelor of Arts (BASS)

BASS Philosophy and Criminology

Debate the causes and consequences of crime from a moral perspective.
  • Duration: 3 or 4 years
  • Year of entry: 2025
  • UCAS course code: VL53 / Institution code: M20
  • Key features:
  • Study abroad
  • Industrial experience

Full entry requirementsHow to apply

Fees and funding

Fees

Tuition fees for home students commencing their studies in September 2025 will be £9,535 per annum (subject to Parliamentary approval). Tuition fees for international students will be £26,500 per annum. For general information please see the undergraduate finance pages.

Policy on additional costs

All students should normally be able to complete their programme of study without incurring additional study costs over and above the tuition fee for that programme. Any unavoidable additional compulsory costs totalling more than 1% of the annual home undergraduate fee per annum, regardless of whether the programme in question is undergraduate or postgraduate taught, will be made clear to you at the point of application. Further information can be found in the University's Policy on additional costs incurred by students on undergraduate and postgraduate taught programmes (PDF document, 91KB).

Scholarships/sponsorships

Scholarships and bursaries, including the Manchester Bursary , are available to eligible home/EU students.

Some undergraduate UK students will receive bursaries of up to £2,000 per year, in addition to the government package of maintenance grants.

You can get information and advice on student finance to help you manage your money.

Course unit details:
Environment and Society

Course unit fact file
Unit code SOCY10202
Credit rating 20
Unit level Level 1
Teaching period(s) Semester 2
Available as a free choice unit? Yes

Overview

This course introduces students to critical sociological thinking about the natural environment as a social issue. It presents a range of sociological approaches to the environment and equips students with the intellectual tools to critically engage with key contemporary debates concerning the intersecting ecological and climate crises affecting global society. At the core of the module is an introduction to sociological thinking on the natural environment and the causes, implications and potential solutions of socio-environmental problems, with a particular emphasis on climate change, biodiversity, and sustainability. This is situated and understood in the broader context of interdisciplinary debates on environmental justice and politics, intersectional socio-environmental inequalities, and decolonial, de-growth and post-anthropocentric currents in green social thought. Such ideas are explored and assessed through critical discussion and debate of a wide range of examples of substantive socio-environmental issues and controversies, encompassing not just climate change but ecosystems and biodiversity, pollution, food systems and sustainability, animals and mass extinction, technologies and environmental health. The module is co-taught in a way that reflects the research strengths of the contributing staff in sociology at Manchester.

Aims

The course draws on cutting edge scholarship on environmental-societal relationships which foregrounds issues of inequalities, colonialism, anthropocentrism and economism as central drivers of our current ecological crisis. These issues are explored through substantive topics, which introduce students to areas which are addressed in-depth by level 2 and 3 undergraduate as well as postgraduate taught courses within the School of Social Sciences.

Indicative list of topics covered (these may vary):  

  1. Sociological approaches to the environment, climate change and sustainability  
  2. Environmental justice, climate justice: environmental (in)justices and global social inequalities  
  3. Mass extinction: sociological approaches to biodiversity loss 
  4. Sustainable consumption, everyday life and social practices 
  5. Modernity and the nature crisis: cultural and relational perspectives 
  6. Energy, empire and environment: postcolonial perspectives 
  7. Eating the planet: food, farming systems and sustainability 
  8. Toxic exposures: bodies, health and environmental justice 
  9. Can there be a green capitalism? green growth or degrowth?  
  10. Climate change: anthropogenic or sociogenic?  

Learning outcomes

By the end of the course, students will:  

  • Be able to bring sociological thinking to bear on environmental issues.  
  • Be able to outline and evaluate key currents in contemporary environmental discourse.  
  • Be able to critically engage in current environmental debates and controversies.  
  • Be able to critically assess debates on the explanations for, and potential solutions to, environmental problems through the application of core sociological concepts.

Teaching and learning methods

Weekly two-hour lecture, followed by a separate one-hour tutorial

Assessment methods

Non-assessed assignments (formative):

Case study/report (1250 words). Students will be asked to apply critical sociological thinking to a social-environmental issue, debate or controversy of their choice.

Assessments (summative):

Two-hour exam (100%). Students will be required to write two 1000-1500 word essays in answer to questions chosen from the weekly topics.  

Feedback methods

All sociology courses include both formative feedback - which lets students know how they are getting on and what they could do to improve - and summative feedback - which provides a mark for assessed work.  

Recommended reading

  • Baker, S. (2015) Sustainable Development. 2nd edition. London: Routledge  
  • Benjaminsen, A. and Svarstad, H. (2021) ‘Political Ecology on Pandora’ in Benjaminsen, A. and Svarstad, H. Political Ecology: A Critical Engagement with Global Environmental Issues, Pages 1-28. Palgrave-McMillan  
  • Besek, J. F. and York, R. (2019) ‘Toward a Sociology of Biodiversity Loss’, Social Currents, 6 (3): 239-254.  
  • Dhillon, J. (2018) ‘Indigenous Resurgence, Decolonisation, and Movements for Environmental Justice’, Environment and Society, 9 (1): 1-5.  
  • Fuchs, et al. (2021) Consumption Corridors: Living a Good Life within Sustainable Limits. London and New York: Routledge  
  • Gunderson, R. (2011) ‘The Metabolic Rifts of Livestock Agribusiness’, Organization and Environment, 24 (4): 404-422.  
  • Harvey, M. (2021) Climate Emergency: How Societies Create the Crisis. Emerald Publishing Limited.  
  • Lockie, S. (2015) ‘What Is Environmental Sociology?’, Environmental Sociology 1 (3): 139-142  
  • Middlemiss, L. (2018) Sustainable Consumption: Key Issues. London and New York: Routledge  
  • Patel, R. and Moore, J. (2018) A History of the World in Seven Cheap Things: A Guide to Capitalism, Nature, and the Future of the Planet. Berkeley: University of California Press  
  • Robbins, P., Moore, S.A., Hintz, J. (2014) Environment and Society: A Critical Introduction. 2nd Edition. Cheltenham: Wiley  
  • Schroeder, P., Anantharaman, M., Anggraeni, K. and Foxon, T. ‘Which pathways lead towards an inclusive circular economy?’ in Schroeder, P., Anantharaman, M., Anggraeni, K. and Foxon, T (eds.) The Circular Economy and the Global South: Sustainable Lifestyles and Green Industrial Development. London and New York: Routledge  
  • Walker, G. (2012) Environmental Justice: Concepts, Evidence and Politics. Abingdon, Oxon; New York: Routledge  

Study hours

Scheduled activity hours
Assessment written exam 2
Lectures 20
Seminars 10
Independent study hours
Independent study 168

Teaching staff

Staff member Role
Richie Nimmo Unit coordinator

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