UNDERSTANDING JOHN STUART MILL: The Smart Student's Guide to Utilitarianism and On Liberty (Philosophy Study Guides)

Understanding John Stuart Mill, like the previous books in the philosophical classics series, is a guide for new philosophy and political science students. Previous guides have been Plato's Socratic Dialogues and the Republic, and John Locke's Second Treatise of Government. These are guides for smart students who are reading the classic philosophical works for the first time. I use the words "smart students" not to designate high IQ, but to refer to students who want to understand Mill's central ideas, and learn how to think critically about issues in ethics and political philosophy.
John Stuart Mill is generally regarded as a genius, and this is displayed in his nineteenth-century prose. But my 50+ years of experience teaching Mill and other great philosophers made me aware early in my career that new students need a guide to help them through Mill's Utilitarianism and On Liberty.
In these guides I break down the book into short sections and explain, in clear twenty-first-century English, the progress of Mill's argument. This approach has worked in my classrooms and I am certain it will work for you and all those who want to understand John Stuart Mill's Utilitarianism and On Liberty.