Civil Society and American Citizenship

fakultatywne
proseminaria

This course is a research seminar in American Political Thought. as well as the intellectual history of American political ideas--with a focus on the concepts of Civil Society and Citizenship. The course will vary on the various authors that are taken up for examination each time the course will be offered. This course will focus on some current and established scholarship on both civil society and citizenship and how these concepts emerged and operate in the lived political world. The course teaches students to tackle the key texts and address the scope of the secondary scholarship on those texts.

This course is a research seminar in American Political Thought. as well as the intellectual history of American political ideas--with a focus on the concepts of Civil Society and Citizenship. The course will vary on the various authors that are taken up for examination each time the course will be offered. This course will focus on some current and established scholarship on both civil society and citizenship and how these concepts emerged and operate in the lived political world. The course teaches students to tackle the key texts and address the scope of the secondary scholarship on those texts.

The week to week reading and expectations will follow the direction the course will take in examining the particular theme(s), author(s), and/or texts in American political thought/American political ideas chosen for the specific term. Students will get a more flushed-out syllabus with the schedule of the week to week reading assignments and other tasks.

Foley, Michael W., and Bob Edwards. "Beyond Tocqueville: civil society and social capital in comparative perspective: editors' introduction." American Behavioral Scientist 42, no. 1 (1998): 5-20.

Fukuyama, Francis. "Social capital, civil society and development." Third world quarterly 22, no. 1 (2001): 7-20.

Gellner, Ernest. Conditions of Liberty: Civil Society and Its Rivals. (Penguin, 1994).

Hanson, Victor Davis. The Dying Citizen: How Progressive Elites, Tribalism, and Globalization Are Destroying the Idea of America (Basic Books, 2021).

Maitland, Frederic William. Maitland: state, trust and corporation. (Cambridge University Press, 2003).

Newton, Kenneth. "Trust, social capital, civil society, and democracy." International political science review 22, no. 2 (2001): 201-214.

Pipes, Richard. Property and Freedom. (Vintage, 2007).

Putnam, Robert D. "E pluribus unum: Diversity and community in the twenty‐first century the 2006 Johan Skytte Prize Lecture." Scandinavian political studies 30, no. 2 (2007): 137-174.

On the completion of the course, the students will be able to:

1. Apply the various methods and interpretative approaches that are common in the study of American political thought, as well as for the history of political ideas.

2. Compare and contrast the various secondary scholarship addressing the selected authors and learn how to assess the relative value and usefulness of those scholar contributions to understanding the various text or issue under investigation

3. Design and execute a research project.

4. Come to realize the proper approaches to craft research and how to effectively present it to a variety of audiences.

1: Short Assignments and quizzes 20% of the overall grade for the course

2: Literature Review 30% of the overall grade for the course. 8-10 page review of the secondary literature on the topic, author, or work taken up for the main research paper for the course.

3: Semester Research paper 40% of the overall grade for the course. 15-20 pages (excluding cover page and References).

4: Presentation of Research 10% of the overall grade for the course A 10-15 minute presentation of the student's research paper.