221 - 230 of 315 results for: POLISCI

This seminar offers an in-depth exploration of the political and social theory of Hannah Arendt, one of the most influential and provocative thinkers of the twentieth century. Through close readings of major works - including The Human Condition, The Origins of Totalitarianism, On Revolution, Between Past and Future, and The Life of the Mind - as well as selected essays and lectures, students will engage with Arendt's reflections on power, politics, action, judgment, and the cultivation of a humane, human world. We will endeavor to follow Arendt's imperative "to think what we are doing," both in our understanding of her work and its relevance to the challenges of our own time. The course is designed for graduate students in political theory, political philosophy, and related fields in the humanities and social sciences. Advanced undergraduates with prior coursework in political or social theory may be admitted with permission of the instructor.

Once attributed to the wrath of the gods, disasters are now understood as punishments that man would inflict on himself: in the Anthropocene era, even Nature has ceased to be independent of human action. We know today that there are two ways, intimately related, for humankind to annihilate itself: the direct way, through unlimited violence, weapons of mass destruction, internecine war at the planetary level; the indirect way, through the destruction of the conditions that are necessary for the survival of the species. This seminar will explore the following menaces: nuclear war, climate change, gene editing, synthetic biology, advanced artificial intelligence. Among the philosophemes that will be summoned: the post-Heideggerian critique of technoscience (Hannah Arendt and Günther Anders), Hans Jonas' Ethics of the Future, the notion of existential risk and the instructor's concept of "Enlightened Doomsaying." Appeal to literary works and films will be integral part of the program. By and large, this research seminar will strive to exemplify what the humanities in the broader sense of the word can bring to the discussion of the existential threats that stand in the way of humankind's progression. Too often, this discussion is limited to the technological dimension of the problems at hand. The humanities are not and shouldn't be the enemy of technology. However, the conversation between them remains a challenge that this course will strive to take up.

Over the past three decades, a relational egalitarian conception of equality has emerged in political philosophy. Proponents of the view argue that the point of equality is to establish communities whose members are able to stand and relate as equals. This entails building societies free from a variety of modes of relating that are thought to be detrimental to our status as moral equals. The list of those inegalitarian relationships is long: oppression, domination, exploitation, marginalization, objectification, demonization, infantilization, stigmatization, etc. The graduate seminar will introduce students to the rich literature on equality in contemporary political philosophy, with a special focus on identifying and scrutinizing unequal relationships. Each week will be centered on a specific unequal relationship, trying to understand how it operates, what social function it serves, and what makes it specifically harmful or wrongful to groups and individuals. Advanced undergraduate students will be considered and should email the PI to communicate their interest. 2 unit option only for Phil PhDs beyond the second year.

Conceptions of evil and its nature and source, distinctions between natural and moral evil, and what belongs to God versus to the human race have undergone transformations reflected in literature and film. Sources include Rousseau's response to the 1755 Lisbon earthquake; Hannah Arendt's interpretation of Auschwitz; Günther Anders' reading of Hiroshima; and current reflections on looming climatic and nuclear disasters. Readings from Rousseau, Kant, Dostoevsky, Arendt, Anders, Jonas, Camus, Ricoeur, Houellebeck, Girard. Films by Lang, Bergman, Losey, Hitchcock.

For PhD students. Directed reading in Political Science with a focus on political theory. May be repeated for credit.

Welcome to the Political Economy of China! Over the course of the semester, you'll gain a rigorous, historically informed understanding of the long-term trajectory of policy and economic change in China from antiquity to the present day. By taking a long-term approach, we'll examine the extent to which contemporary Chinese political economy is the result of modern innovations, historical contingency, and/or path-dependent trends with their roots deep in the imperial past. To take an example very much in the news today, the mainstream media routinely describes Xi Jinping as a new emperor, a recrudescence of Mao, or a sui generis product of China's current social and political conditions. These descriptions are evocative; but are they accurate? Only by taking a closer look at the historical record can we isolate the evolution of its economic institutions and practices. For many students, this course will also be directly useful to your professional career. In the business, NGO, and policy worlds, analysts often make predictions based on historical precedent, but do so with only a hazy understanding of the Chinese past. A more robust grasp of the history will give you a competitive advantage whether you are researching state-owned enterprise reform, geopolitical competition, or market demand for new products and services.

Mass political mobilization occurs in both democracies and autocracies. Sometimes political protests, demonstrations, and acts of nonviolence civic resistance undermine autocracies, produce democratic breakthroughs, or generate democratic reforms. Other times, they do not. This course explores why, first examining the original causes of mobilization, and then understanding why some movements succeed and others fail. The first sessions of the course will review theories of revolution, social movements, and democratization. The remainder of the course will do deep dives into case studies, sometime with guest lecturers and participants from these historical moments. Cases to be discussed will include Chile, South Africa, Eastern Europe and the USSR (1989-1991), Russia (2011), Serbia and other color revolutions (2000, 2003, 2004), Tunisia, Egypt, and the Arab Spring (2011), China and Hong Kong (1989, 2016), and recent mobilizations (Belarus in 2020, Burma and the U.S. in 2021). The deadline to apply for this course is December 3rd.

Brexit, Donald Trump, the collapse of party systems in established democracies like France and Italy - these striking developments have a common thread: the disruption of politics as usual by insurgent "populist" movements and/or parties. The seminar will focus on Europe and the U.S. Students will have access to surveys of western democracies conducted by YouGov. Undergraduates interested in this course will need to request permission from the instructor to enroll.

How did colonial empires, revolutionary movements, and military regimes shape modern Southeast Asia? This course approaches the region as a place where global ideas of capitalism, nationalism, and governance were continually negotiated through local struggles. Spanning from the late nineteenth century to the end of the Cold War, students will engage with key debates in Southeast Asian historiography - on plural societies, moral economies, and developmentalism - as well as questions central to political science: state formation, authoritarian legitimacy, and civil-military relations. The readings combine archival depth with analytical range, introducing students to how historians craft interpretations of power, development, and violence.