{"id":1,"date":"2020-06-02T10:28:23","date_gmt":"2020-06-02T10:28:23","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/sites.nd.edu\/world-politics-fall-2020\/?p=1"},"modified":"2020-08-06T16:06:58","modified_gmt":"2020-08-06T20:06:58","slug":"welcome-to-the-revolution","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sites.nd.edu\/world-politics-fall-2020\/2020\/06\/02\/welcome-to-the-revolution\/","title":{"rendered":"Welcome to World Politics!"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Congratulations!<\/p>\n

You have arrived at Notre Dame at a critical juncture<\/span> in modern history.\u00a0 I don’t make this statement lightly.\u00a0 Nor am I simply referring to the Corona virus.\u00a0 I mean that you and I are living at a time in which many of the defining features of our existence–our institutions, values, global ideals, relationship with our earthly home, and even our acceptance of scientific truth–are in flux.<\/p>\n

You are also lucky!<\/p>\n

In normal times, it’s hard to see the world as it really is. But, in times of abrupt change and psychological stress, we are literally forced to ask hard questions about what matters most in our lives and what the future holds for us.<\/p>\n

For anyone who is concerned about the state of American politics today, as I am, this is also an excellent, if painful, time to ask difficult questions about who we are as a people, how we relate to each other and to billions of other human beings beyond our national borders, and where all of us humans are going.\u00a0 For example, read the links on the right side of this page under “America’s Problem with Race.”<\/p>\n

In this course, I will provide you with one way of responding to these questions by encouraging you to “think big” about politics and society. Where we are today is not the result of some virtuous action or rational choice.\u00a0 Rather, it is the result of countless, converging forces–decisions, ideas, movements, accidents, natural and self-inflicted disasters–that have come before us.\u00a0 It would be impossible for me to talk about all of these factors.\u00a0 Instead, I will introduce you to a single theme that illuminates much of our current plight:\u00a0 the ongoing and necessarily conflictual evolution of a novel form of political organization known as the Modern Nation-state<\/em>.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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By Modernity<\/em>, I mean a revolution in epistemology, human identity, organization, and political reality that has come to fruition over (roughly) the past four centuries.\u00a0 By Nation-state,<\/em> I mean a \u201csymbolic community to which people voluntarily devote their primary political loyalties despite the many particularistic loyalties\u2013religious, cultural, ethnic, political, social, economic, gender, and athletic\u2013that otherwise divide them.\u201d Modernity and the\u00a0Nation-state<\/em> are abstract terms.\u00a0 But they are useful tools. Like the best tools, they help us make sense of our particular juncture in the long history of humanity.\u00a0 They also alert us to the fragility of our world and the possibility that we may be the cause of its ruin.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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My story\u00a0 is divided into five interlocking chapters. First, in the segment called\u00a0Modern Politics,<\/em>\u00a0I introduce you to some basic concepts about modernity and the\u00a0Modern nation-state<\/em>.\u00a0 Second, we travel down the road the West\u00a0has taken toward a particular form of the nation-state:\u00a0Liberalism.<\/em>\u00a0Third, we consider an initially credible but ultimately failed path:\u00a0Leninism.<\/em>\u00a0Fourth, we confront the pathos and anger of people living in the fractured\u00a0Postcolonial<\/em>\u00a0world of weak nation-states. \u00a0Finally, we return to our starting point to examine the ecstasy and agony of the nation-state in an age of\u00a0Global vulnerability<\/em>.<\/p>\n

Throughout our course, I shall also refer to several themes that I consider particularly troubling.\u00a0 Among them, I include:<\/p>\n

1) the politicization of\u00a0facts\u2013and fact-seeking\u2013<\/em>in democratic politics. If we can\u2019t agree on facts, there can be no democracy.\u00a0 There is no such thing as an \u201calternative fact\u201d!<\/p>\n

Here are some interesting facts<\/span> about different countries’ response to the Corona virus, including our own<\/a><\/p>\n

2) the threat to\u00a0Liberal democracy<\/em> represented by populist politics. Populism<\/em>\u00a0is not another form of politics.\u00a0 It is anti-politics. In an extreme <\/em>form, it can kill democracy.<\/p>\n

My pedagogical goals extend far beyond introducing you to the field we call \u201cpolitical science.\u201d\u00a0 I aspire to:<\/p>\n