Welcome to POLS 202: American Government

Introduction:

The typical American Government course follows a well-worn path. The standard survey course first dissects the subject matter into isolated and discrete pieces – usually by using the Constitution itself as a kind of framework for organizing the course. The standard course then isolates the different institutions which are taught as separate “functions” or "parts" within the government. A chapter on the Congress, a chapter on the Presidency, one on the Supreme Court... Other pieces might include a cursory look at Political and Civil Liberties, the Media, Interest Groups, Elections, Public Policy, Federalism. What is the overall effect or impact of the standard course? Over a traditional 12-week course, one might hope to retain a few details on each of these functions or parts but fail to gain a comprehensive understanding of politics and government as a whole. The result is what Stroup and Garriott (1997) have called a “[piecemeal, incomplete, static and needlessly detailed view of American politics].”

What is unfortunate about the piecemeal organization of the traditional American Government course is that the isolated pieces tend not to promote a holistic and historical understanding of how our government has actually worked (or not worked) over time or in actual historical and cultural circumstances. This promotes several misunderstandings, amongst which are the following:

A failure to understand why government behaved the way it did and what circumstances caused it to behave the way it did.
A failure to recognize that government and the state are both greater than its institutions and also occasionally not as omnipotent as might be supposed.
A tendency to see the Constitution and government (and therefore politics) as static and immovable, rather than seeing them as phenomena that operate in a real, changing, and dynamic world.
A tendency to undermine and under-appreciate the people, issues, conflicts, aspirations, movements, and the technological and cultural changes that have often motivated and sometimes also prevented change.
A tendency to promote the ideas and values of those in power (political and economic elites) rather than those who are marginalized, ostracized or otherwise dominated, and thus a fail to chronicle struggles over time unless that benefits elites and their interests.

The standard approach, to the extent that it under-appreciates such actors and their grievances, undermines the historical lessons students and citizens might learn in order to motivate and enact their own demands via democratic agency. The standard or traditional study of American Government in the United States, with its ubiquitous (and no doubt shiny) corporate-produced textbooks, often does much to weaken ambitions to understand and promote democracy. Corporate capture of publishing and corporate influence in institutions of higher education contributes to the continued problems of white supremacy, patriarchy and an erosion of democratic values and imaginaries. In that respect, the standard textbook, while it might claim to be empirical, or scientific, is far from value-free and can weaken the cultivation of values that democracy requires. If one of the goals of this course is the development of civic-mindedness and citizenship, and I think these are some of the goals, then the traditional approach cannot stand and must be discarded and replaced with a more critical pedagogy.

This course then has the ambition to turn the traditional study of American Government on its head. Rather than survey the main political institutions and demand that you memorize and regurgitate a litany of details you’ll likely forget within a months or two, and which are, frankly, of little use to you unless you plan to specialize in one of those areas or are in a position of power that allows you to avail yourself of those processes, this course will proceed thematically and historically. It will use historical primary source material and primary critical/academic sources which will present key questions, usually reflecting real and significant political conflicts over time, many of which get very short attention, if any in the typical survey course. We will reflect on what government or those in power did or failed to do in those circumstances and why.

Of course, the very question regarding what "counts" as "a real and significant" conflict is itself a political question. The answer to that question is itself a matter of power. Who controls the agenda which either recognizes or does not recognize conflict as legitimate? The course takes the problem of power as central to any understanding of politics, and we should recognize that very often, what doesn’t happen or what is blocked from happening is just as important, or even more important, than what does actually happen. Why don't we have better health care? Why don't we have stronger policies on climate change? Why don't we have better citizen oversight over policing? Why do we have policing at all? So often, history and textbooks only report on what does happen as a consequence of those in power and then excuse the rest as part of the “ongoing project of democracy.” This kind of treatment is inexcusable.

Politics is a living concern, not some already dead field where all the “answers” are already given or are only available to experts or specialists. The hope is that a course organized around an historical and thematic approach will be much more engaging and meaningful for you. It will encourage you not to learn a bunch of so-called “facts” but teach you how to think critically about important political questions within the American context of politics and see how those questions have developed over time. Hopefully, it will help you see yourself and your concerns as a part of all that.

Finally, the orientation of the course is meant to encourage a critical and questioning attitude toward government, authority, and power in general - that's not just a good philosophical approach, it’s an approach that is consistent with the best of democratic aspirations. Without the skills, attitudes and dispositions of historical interpretation and critical thinking, democracy is hardly a possibility even in the most economically and technologically advanced societies. With these skills, attitudes and dispositions, perhaps democracy has some hope.

A Radical Perspective?

One could certainly call this a “radical” approach to United States Government and Politics. You might be thinking, "radical"?! That sounds scary!" But what does it mean to be radical? Of course, there are common, everyday understandings of what this term means and for some the idea of being a ‘radical’ is full of ideological connotations. Certainly, it is commonplace to call those on the left of the political spectrum, radical, or Marxist, but what does this term actually mean? At its root the term comes from the Latin radix (genitive radicis) or "root" (from PIE root *wrād- "branch, root") meaning "going to the origin, or the essential". You might like to think about it this way: what would it mean to take the problem of power seriously, or the ideals of democracy seriously? In both cases, one might want to press to understand as clearly as possible, the consequences of those terms and how they manifest (or not) in the world. If coercive power lurks in that world, a radical wants to know where it lurks. If democracy is truly a value we view as important, we ought to strive to deepen it’s potential. I don’t see ‘radical’ as pejorative in either of these two instances, but rather as the necessary attitude and disposition of any critcally-minded human being.

I believe the job of anyone who wants to inquire into politics or the human condition ought to aim (best he or she or they can) to get to the root of things - to gain some fundamental and essential understanding about the way the world works and not to shy away from things because they may be distasteful or because they fail to align with one's previous understandings, beliefs or assumptions. Your education is not something to take lightly or view as superficial. Therefore, in a radical spirit, and unapologetically, the course is organized around some large problems that have plagued not just our country, but most countries and where I believe there is work to be done to get to the root of them:

The nature of and legitimacy of the state and concerns about state power and its extent
The legacy and continued existence of slavery, racism and violence either perpetrated by the state itself or within states through proxies
The history of dramatic inequality across and throughout U.S. History
The culture/ideology of radical individualism and how it influences and erodes our politics
Corporate and private power and how they stifle democracy
Military power, policing, and the national security state and how they imperil democracy and social justice - here and abroad
The looming threat of climate change and the destruction of ecological diversity and ecosystems as well as our general disposition toward the natural world

The approach here supposes that these problems and the questions that surround them matter to people and so consequently, it might be worth looking into how people have written about and responded to such concerns over time. Focusing on and inquiring into these questions seems essential if we hope to be able to go on as a country and as a human civilization.

We will begin our inquiry this term with the question of the state (as in the ‘nation-state’). What are states, how did states come about and how should we think about them? Why does this question matter to us as people, as citizens of states, as human beings? One way to think about this question is to ask why it matters that states exist. What is different given their existence and, how have people’s lives been affected given the existence of governments and the state. If we take seriously the idea that states wield enormous power, then we might also take seriously the idea that the power they wield leaves behind an impression on those lives and the land that it comes into contact with. The French political philosopher, Michel Foucault said that power works on and shapes human bodies and one suspects that it works on and shapes psychologies as well. Moreover, I suspect that power works on topographies and geologies (think about the notion of the Anthropocene) - the land, the air, the sea, other species and the environment as a whole. States and their power make impressions in the world - for better or for worse.

We might even think of that impression as a kind of shadow, and here I have in mind the kind of shadow that is both real and metaphorical – that tells the history and legacy of that impression. This might provide us one way of studying American Government – not from the perspective of institutions, their rules, and their inhabitants (the powerful), but rather, from the effect all of that has had on all the other entities that exist in the world, and recognizing that fundamentally, the study of American Government is only a piece of the study of American politics and that in order to really gain some understanding of politics, that study cannot be limited only to the functions of government, but must also make some attempt to understand the context and the history in which government functions and must work to make some sense of people's experiences living under those orders and regimes. The aim of this course then is to try to understand something of the impression made by the fact of the American state. I hope that this course will make an impression on you.

Hiroshima shadow

The nuclear shadow of a Hiroshima man eerily scorched onto the stone steps of a local bank.

Outcomes

By the end of this course, you will...

Gain an understanding of the key political and legal institutions as well as the organization and principles of American government
Gain an understanding of and appreciation for the democratic and liberal ideals that serve to inform the American political tradition and contemporary political culture.
Use those democratic and liberal ideals to critique the institutions, processes and principles of American government
Via discussions with classmates, work to discern some of the central social/political ideas/ideals of American political culture.
Survey some of the competing theories of power in the United States, asking the question, “Who Rules”?
Survey some of the most recent empirical scholarly work on class and inequality in the United States and the government’s seeming inability to address it.
Use the critical evaluatory tools of the course to increase your knowledge of one area of American government.

Getting Started Checklist

To get started with this course, complete the following tasks:

Read the Course Syllabus
Meet Your Instructor
Read Module 1 Overview: Module Title Here

IMPORTANT: For technical training and assistance with Canvas, and/or support with online learning in general, please consult the following resources.

Tips for Success

To help in the completion of this course, you should…

Read through all the resources the first couple of week and familiarize yourself with course content, navigation and course flow.
Schedule out at least two hours a day for reading course learning materials and completing weekly assignments.

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