The Politics of Belonging: Democracy, Identity and Power in the 21st Century

Democracies everywhere are undergoing transformation and redefinition in response to particular contemporary phenomena. These phenomena include the rise of global capitalism and the subsequent globalization of many aspects of culture; large-scale migration or immigration; identity politics; the development of new, powerful supranational entities like the European Union; neo-liberal policy; and, in the case of Central and Eastern European countries, the dismantling of state socialism. This process of transformation demands sustained analysis of its impact on different groups within society and of its consequences for the utopia promise of democracy. This course specifically considers how these processes shape political and social belonging in democracies today in various ways. It will address how governing and power operate through particular social processes, (like the global political economy; media representation, fashion, or consumption), in addition to the formal operations of governments.

Contemporary social and feminist theory has a great deal to contribute to the investigation of how power relations, social identity, and rights are being renegotiated at this historical moment. Thus, the course will draw on interdisciplinary scholarly literature to explain how social categories such as gender, race, sexuality, religion, European-ness, and nationality might delineate identity and belonging in a polity. It draws on theoretical and philosophical writing, policy, visual theory, feminist studies, critical race theory, and post-state socialist studies in considering these issues. In its analysis of the politics of belonging, the course will pay special consideration to the way the axis of East/West, and 1st/3rd world are reproduced in several social locations and are significant in legitimating inequality within democracies. We will consider the particularly ambiguous positionality of Central and Eastern Europeans in contemporary redefinitions of "Europe" as an imagined political community and as a landscape of uneven economic privilege. The central themes of the course will be investigated through a discussion of borders as material and imagined boundary markers of inclusion; globalization; policy; consumption; citizenship; intimacy; and the public sphere.

Finally, the course will devote time and attention to the logic and process of methodology. The faculty members involved pursue several different methods in their work, ranging from policy analysis to visual culture analysis. Thus, several seminar meetings and one "workshop" will be devoted to questions about epistemology, methods, and individual student projects. These meetings will center on a detailed discussion of some of the following research practices: discourse analysis, policy analysis, visual culture research, ethnographic methods, interviewing, and the identification of a research population. These discussions will also address the relationship of theory to empirical research, the potential role of political commitment to feminist research, and ethical approaches to research.