questions about how we understand, organise and change society have never been more urgent. these questions surface in a range of contemporary phenomena. the many faces of inequality, fake news and the climate crisis. war, displacement and shifting relationships between the global north and south. child exploitation and care scandals. black lives matter, trans activism, and the #metoo campaign against sexual harassment. rising islamophobia, anti-semitism and resurgent nationalism and settler-colonialism. this course welcomes students from across the world to the heart of london to provide them with an internationally and practically oriented understanding of the ways in which core debates within the social sciences can shape our responses to pressing social and policy questions. the course has a particular focus on issues of inequality and social justice, informed by the close reading of social theory and policy literatures.