91096

PS 104   International Relations

Michelle Murray

. T . Th .

1:30 -2:50 pm

Olin 201

SSCI

Cross-listed: GIS,  Human Rights   This course will focus on the major theories and concepts in international relations.  We will start the semester looking at the major schools of international relations theory:  realism, liberalism, and constructivism.  What are the implications of these theories for foreign policy decision making (and for the future of the world!)?  The course will also look at international organizations, including the UN and WTO, and how foreign policy is carried out.  We will end the semester by looking at some of the “hot” issues in the world today including: terrorism, preventive war, the rise of China, and the spread of democracy. The goal of the class is to see how (or if) theories of international relations can explain how organizations function and how foreign policy is made and to see what answers theory can provide for how to deal with the problems of a “post 9/11 world.”  Authors to be read include: Thucydides, Morgenthau, Russett, Huntington, and Mearsheimer, among many others.   

 

91092

PS 105   Comparative Politics

Omar Encarnacion

M . W . .

11:50 -1:10 pm

Olin 202

SSCI

(PS core course)   Cross-listed:  GIS   The basic intellectual premise of comparative politics is that we can better understand the politics of any country by placing it within a broader, global context.  This comparative “method” allows us to address some of the most fundamental questions in the study of politics, such as what makes democracy possible, how is political representation organized around the world, and why some nations are more successful than others at generating wealth and prosperity, while contributing to the building of theories about the nature and evolution of states, interest groups, civil society, and the dynamics of political processes such as revolution, modernization, and democratization.  Class lectures and discussions will cover developed and developing states, as well as democratic and non-democratic ones.

 

91524

PS 109   Political Economy

Sanjib Baruah

. T . Th .

10:10 - 11:30 am

Olin 201

SSCI

(PS core course)   Cross-listed:  GIS   The term Political Economy refers to the interrelationship between politics and economics. However, political scientists and economists do not always use the term in the same sense. Even within these two disciplines the term has multiple meanings. The course will review the ideas of a few major thinkers such as Adam Smith, Karl Marx, Karl Polanyi, Thorstein Veblen, John Maynard Keynes, and John Kenneth Galbraith, and will introduce students to two subfields in particular: international political economy and the political economy of development. Among the questions we would ask are: Why are some countries rich and others poor? What is development? What are the prime movers of globalization? Is the US an empire given its influence and power in the global economy? How can development be redefined to tackle the challenge of climate change? Among issues that we will look at closely is the role of organizations such as the International Monetary Fund, the World Bank, and the World Trade Organization in managing the global economy and the current debates about reforming these institutions. 

 

91102

PS 115   Intro to Political Thinking

David Kettler

. . . Th .

10:10 -12:30 pm

Olin 301

SSCI

(PS core course)   From Plato to Hannah Arendt, great thinkers in the Western tradition have asked about the nature and practice of political action.   Thinking about politics is, knowingly or not, conducted against the background of this shared tradition. This is no less true of political thought that aims to break away from “the classics” than of political thought that finds in them a constant resource for both critical and constructive thinking. This course explores fundamental questions of politics through a core body of readings by thinkers including Plato, More, Machiavelli, Rousseau, Marx, and Arendt.   Looking comparatively at texts from ancient to recent times, we will compare more “utopian” with more cynical or “realist” approaches to political thinking while reflecting upon key political concepts such as justice, democracy, and “the individual”. We will also explore such enduring questions as the relationship between the state and the individual; the conditions for peaceful political order; and the connection between morality and politics.

 

91523

PS 122   American Politics: Issues & Institutions

Verity Smith

M . W . .

3:10 – 4:30 pm

Olin 203

SSCI

Cross-listed: American Studies, Social Policy   This course introduces students to the basic institutions and processes of American government. The class is meant to provide students with a grasp of the fundamental dynamics of American politics and the skills to be an effective participant in and critic of the political process. During the semester, we will examine how the government works, interpret current political developments and debates, and consider how to influence the government at various levels.       

 

91301

PS 167   Foundations of the Law

Roger Berkowitz

. . W . F

1:30 -2:50 pm

Olin 101

SSCI

Cross-listed:  Human Rights   Corporate executives hire high-priced lawyers to flout the law with impunity. Indigent defendants are falsely convicted, and even executed for crimes they did not commit. We say that law is the institutional embodiment of justice. And yet, it is equally true that law, as it is practiced, seems to have little connection to justice. As the novelist William Gaddis writes: “Justice? You get justice in the next world. In this world, you have the law.” This course explores the apparent disconnect between law and justice. Can contemporary legal systems offer justice? Can we, today, still speak of a duty to obey the law? Is it possible for law to do justice?  Through readings of legal cases as well as political, literary, and philosophical texts, we seek to understand the problem of administering justice as it emerges in the context of contemporary legal institutions. Texts will include Immanuel Kant, Groundwork of a Metaphysic of Morals,  Herman Melville, Billy Budd, and selections from Dostoevsky, Twain, Melville, Plato, Blackstone, Holmes, Milton, Kant, and others.

 

91093

PS 214   US-Latin American Relations

Omar Encarnacion

M . W . .

3:10 -4:30 pm

Olin 202

SSCI

Cross-listed: GIS, LAIS  Despite common origins as off springs of European colonialism and close economic and political ties during their respective period of independence and state-building, conflict rests at the heart of the relationship between the United States and the nations of Latin America.  This course unpacks the historical and ideological roots of that conflict, how it has developed over the course of the years, and what possibilities exist for its resolution in the future.  The course is divided into three main sections.  The first one covers the years between the Spanish-American War of 1898 and the events leading to World War II.  It emphasizes U.S. attempts at creating a "sphere of influence" over Latin America, highlighted by numerous military interventions in places like Mexico, Central America, and the Caribbean, as well as Latin American responses to what they perceived to be an American project of imperialism.  The second section focuses on the dynamics of the Cold War as played out throughout Latin America.  It emphasizes the real and perceived fears by U.S. policy-makers about the advent of Marxist-inspired revolutions in Latin America, which led to interventions in Cuba, Chile, and Guatemala, among other nations, and the high toll that the Cold War exacted upon the peoples of Latin America.  The third and final section looks at the most salient issues in contemporary U.S-L.A. relations: economic integration, the illicit drug trade, and Latin American migration to the United States.   

 

91120

PS 239   United Nations and Model UN

Jonathan Becker

. . . . F

1:30 -2:50 pm

Olin 202

SSCI

Cross-listed: GIS, Human Rights   1 credit*  The course will be divided into two parts. The first part will explore the history of the United Nations and will introduce students to its structure and principal aims. It will also focus on the role of specialized agencies and the ways in which alliances impact on the UN’s day-to-day operations. The second part of the course will focus on an assigned country (for each Model UN, each college is assigned a country to represent. It will entail a study of the country’s history, politics and economics and will conclude with the writing of ‘position papers’ that reflect that country’s approach to issues confronting the UN. In addition, there will be a public speaking component. Students taking the course will have the opportunity to participate in a Model United Nations. Students wishing to participate should e-mail [email protected] with 1-2 paragraphs indicating why they would like to participate. *One credit per semester, two-credit course. Students must take both halves to obtain credit.

 

91514

PS 247   American Foreign Policy

Traditions I

Walter Russell Mead

. . W . F

11:50 – 1:10pm

RKC 102

HIST

Cross-listed: GIS, Human Rights  This course will be an introduction to the history of American foreign policy and to the connections between foreign policy and domestic policy that developed from the founding of America through the Spanish-American War. Students will be introduced to the principal geopolitical, economic and ideological pillars that have shaped American strategic thought. Particular attention will be devoted to how popular religious, cultural and political movements have attempted to influence American foreign policy, including anti-war movements: What, for example, are the similarities between today’s anti-war movements and those that have existed since the country's founding? In the context of the course, students will be asked to read key documents that have defined American foreign policy. In the Spring Semester there will be an opportunity to continue this study in a related course that focuses on the history of American foreign policy from the Spanish-American war to the present. 

 

91094

PS 248   East Asian Politics & Society

Kenneth Haig

. T . Th .

3:10 -4:30 pm

Olin 303

SSCI

Cross-listed:  Asian Studies, GIS   This course offers an introduction to the comparative politics of Japan, Korea, and greater China.  We will focus on a few of the “big questions” that comparativists have posed about the politics of the region, rather than attempt a comprehensive survey.  The first part of the course focuses on the question of economic development: how can industrialization and sustained economic growth be achieved?  After examining how the economies of East Asia were surpassed by the European industrial revolution, we will turn to the “miracle” of their resurgence in the 20th century, even as many other countries in the world tried and failed to industrialize.  In the second part of the course, we will turn to the question of revolution: what are the causes underlying social revolutions?  Why did China and Korea undergo radical revolutions, when both countries seemed to lack all the necessary ingredients for one?  How did Japan avoid a revolution in its rapid transformation from a closed, agricultural society to an industrialized, imperial power?  Finally, we will address the question of democracy in a region with a long history of authoritarian rule.  In addition to examining democratization in Japan, South Korea, and Taiwan, we will explore different cultural conceptions of democracy and their impact on political reform.

 

91099

PS 253   Latin American Politics

Monique Segarra

M . W . .

6:00 -7:20 pm

ASP 302

SSCI/DIFF

Cross-listed: LAIS (core course), GIS, History    This course is an introduction to the politics of Latin America.  We will focus on the political regimes, social actors, and historical processes that have characterized and structured the political life of Latin America.   The course is divided in two complementary parts.   The first focuses on the widely different political regimes that have marked the continent in the 20th century up to today, and on the reasons for the transition from one type of regime to another. It thus provides a broad and comprehensive picture of the very distinct political phases and regimes that have characterized Latin American societies.  Students will become familiar with: “oligarchical liberalism”, “neo-patrimonialism”, “populism”, revolutionary socialism (through guerrilla warfare), “bureaucratic-authoritarianism”, and liberal democracy.  Since the return to electoral democracy in the 1980s, the region has undergone major sociopolitical shifts, first to the neoliberal right in the 1990s and then, this decade, to the left. We will pay attention to issues of inequality, class, race (or color), and representation, with the unifying theme of the “incorporation of the popular sectors.”    The second part of the course examines the political history of some of the most representative countries of Latin America, from the most developed countries to the poorest ones. We will cover Mexico, Brazil, Argentina, Chile (Allende/ Pinochet), Peru, Nicaragua or Cuba, and Venezuela (here, especially under Chavez). The course will either provide an overview of the broad political history of such countries during the 20th century or focus on one key political event or process that has contributed to make some of those countries well-known politically.

 

91097

PS 254   Security & International Politics

Michelle Murray

M . W . .

10:10 - 11:30 am

Olin 202

SSCI

Cross-listed: GIS, Human Rights    Security is one of the foundational concepts in the study of international politics.  As the principle rationale for war, the quest for security influences both states’ behavior in the international system as well as the structure of state and society relations in domestic politics.  Too often, however, the meaning of security is taken for granted in the study of world politics, with individuals, societies and states homogenized into one coherent model.  This course will interrogate the concept of security in an attempt to denaturalize the taken-for-grantedness of the traditional understanding of security.  Some of the broad theoretical themes covered include challenges to the mainstream approach to security, the construction of dominant discourses of security and its representation in international politics, critical and discursive approaches to security and the politics of threat construction.  The aim is to assess the validity of these alternative approaches and highlight their value-added to security studies.  We will then (re)consider some contemporary security problems in light of these alternative conceptualizations of security:  migration, the environment, health, development, the war on terror, and the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction, among others.  The course ends with a discussion of the ethics of national security by looking at the politics of torture, human rights and the suspension of civil liberties in the state of exception.

 

91105

PS 256   Politics and News Media

Jonathan Becker

M . W . .

11:50 -1:10 pm

Olin 205

SSCI

Related interest: GIS, Human Rights,  Social Policy, PIE core course   This course examines broad questions about the relationship between the news media and politics. It addresses the interaction between government and news media, concentrating on the characteristics of different national media systems, legal regulation of the media, the impact of corporate ownership and globalization, and the role of new media technologies. Particular attention will be devoted to the role of media in elections and restrictions related to national security concerns. A little more than half of the course will be devoted to media and the system of political communication in the United States. The rest of the course will involve thematic comparisons of media in a number countries, including Russia, Hungary, Sweden, Italy, Germany, the United Kingdom, South Africa, and Zimbabwe.

 

91211

PS 280   Nations, States, and Nationalism

Sanjib Baruah

. T . Th .

1:30 -2:50 pm

Olin 310

SSCI

Cross-listed: GIS; Human Rights, MES  The twentieth century was the century of nationalism.  The national conflicts that followed the collapse of the Soviet Union in the territory of the former USSR and in the rest of Eastern and Central Europe were only the most recent evidence of the power of nationalism.  But even though we talk of national identities as if they are natural, terms such as nations, nationalities and nationalism are difficult to define.  The competition faced by official nationalisms from other comparable solidarities ? those that are larger than official nations, e.g. pan-Arabism, or pan-Islamicism, or smaller than official nations, e.g. Quebec, Basque, Kashmiri or Sri Lankan Tamil national identities   -- is often underestimated or misunderstood because we tend to take the national order of things as given.  We will examine the history of the idea of nations and the "nation state" and will read a number of key theoretical texts.

 

91100

PS 311   Immigration & Citizenship

Kenneth Haig

M . . . .

4:40 -7:00 pm

Olin 303

SSCI/DIFF

Cross-listed:  GIS, Human Rights, Social Policy;  Related interest:  French Studies, German Studies   This course examines the ways that responses to immigration have affected existing policies and practices of citizenship. The course will focus primarily on the post-World War II experience of developed countries and the practical and theoretical issues it has raised. One of the challenges that migration to these countries has presented has been that of politically integrating culturally and religiously diverse new social groups of immigrant origin. The course will explore the often contrasting ways in which different countries have confronted this task and the historical, social, and intellectual roots of variations in their approaches, and levels of enthusiasm. Topics addressed include multiculturalism, minority rights, visions of state and nationhood, nationality law, alien voting rights, migration-related social movements, and citizenship of the EU.   

 

91098

PS 326   Nuclear Proliferation Seminar

Michelle Murray

. . W . .

1:30 -3:50 pm

Olin 301

SSCI

Cross-listed: GIS; related interest:  STS   This advanced seminar examines the origins of nuclear weapons proliferation and its impact on the United States’ national and international security.  To do this, we will consider the central academic debates about why states want nuclear weapons and evaluate these ideas against the major cases of nuclear acquisition and restraint in the twentieth and early twenty-first centuries.  The objective of the course is to think analytically and critically about the causes and consequences of nuclear proliferation and to develop theoretically informed policy responses for how the United States can stop and/or manage the spread of nuclear weapons in the years to come.

 

91516

PS 365   God’s Country? Foreign Policy

and Religion in the United States

Walter Russell Mead

. . . Th .

1:30 – 3:50 pm

Olin 308

SSCI/DIFF

Cross-listed: GIS; Human Rights  The United States is an intensely religious country profoundly affected by an individualistic form of Christianity with roots in the British isles and the Protestant Reformation.  Both religious and non-religious people today have been shaped by this heritage, and America’s engagement with the world continues to reflect the ideas and values of that past.  This course will examine the ideological, cultural and social consequences of that influence on American foreign policy. 

 

91091

PS 420   Hannah Arendt Seminar

Roger Berkowitz

. T . . .

4:40 -7:00 pm

Dubois

HUM

Cross-listed:  Human Rights   This course is dedicated to reading some of Hannah Arendt's seminal works with a particular focus on her thinking about science and art as these two human activities relate to the human condition. In addition to close readings of some of Arendt’s most important books and essays, we will also explore the challenge that scientific rationality and artificial intelligence pose to the humanity of humans. In conjunction with the 2010 Arendt Center Conference on “Human Being in an Inhuman Age,” we will ask how Arendt’s work helps us to think about the ways that automation, artificial intelligence, and rational machines are transforming the very nature of what it means to be human. In addition to Bard undergraduates, the participants will include visiting fellows from the Hannah Arendt Center for Ethical and Political Thinking. The course is also open to select students from the Center for Curatorial Studies (CCS). Beyond scheduled class meetings, students are expected to attend lectures and other events sponsored by the Arendt Center and CCS.