Overview

Description

CALENDAR DESCRIPTION:

From peasant uprisings and student protests to armed insurrections, this course explores the range of African social movements and assesses their role in shaping Africa's future. Key themes include the role of ethnicity and religion, the impact of urbanization, economic inequality, gender politics, and trends in international solidarity and engagement. Students who have taken IS 319 with this topic may not take this course for further credit.

COURSE DETAILS:

Over the past thirty years, the African continent has undergone a dramatic political and economic transformation. Dozens of countries became nominal democracies, and their economies were liberalized, even as Africa became increasingly integrated into the international economic system. Despite these developments, however, the broad swath of the population has relatively little influence over the narrow elites that have ruled since independence, and the privatization of the state has further entrenched existing inequalities. This course will examine how citizens across the continent have reacted to these changes through social movements and other forms of political contestation. We will study the ideology, social networks, and strategies of these movements, which range from non-violent student protests to NGO activism and armed mobilization.

COURSE-LEVEL EDUCATIONAL GOALS:

Students will finish the course with the following knowledge and skills:

• A broad understanding of major political and social trends in African politics since the 1960
• A basic familiarity with major paradigms, concepts, and theories in the social scientific study of social movements
• The ability to critically evaluate competing theories of and methodological approaches to popular mobilization

Grading

Materials

REQUIRED READING:

REQUIRED READING NOTES: