Overview

Description

CALENDAR DESCRIPTION:

Examines the impact of identity politics on the dynamics and organization of political systems. Topics include the impact of ethnic, racial and/or religious diversity on modes of political representation, the formation of public policy, and the quest for political stability and national identity. Student with credit for POL 481 may not take this course for further credit.

COURSE DETAILS:

Identity politics is a doubly-contested concept.  There is debate about whether political actors should engage in identity politics at all or whether it is unnecessarily divisive and hence damaging to political order.  Second, there is debate about the very meaning of the term.  What is identity politics?  Which identities are the most salient?  What would a politics that didn’t take identity into consideration even look like?

Disagreement about these questions results in a variety of competing stories being told about identity politics.  Some speak of identity politics as focusing on what separates us – race, orientation, gender, etc. – rather than on what unites us as citizens; some speak of it as being necessary in order to shed light on structural injustice that other perspectives are prone to miss; still others speak of it as the recognition that all political thinking hinges on identity whether we realize it or not.  This course will be a study of some of these stories.  In the course of thinking about the meaning of identity politics, we will necessarily pay attention to the question of its desirability as well.  Finally, we will end by applying some of our theoretical insights to some political/policy issues in which identity is particularly salient.

There will be one 4-hour seminar each week.

Grading

Materials

REQUIRED READING: