COLL 350 Courses in Government

Faculty Name

Course Name

Course Number 

Howard

Building the American Welfare State

GOVT 360

Nemacheck

American Legal Process

GOVT  372

Israel-Trummel

Minority Political Behavior

GOVT 391

Israel-Trummel

Representation & American Democracy

GOVT 391

McKinney

Politics of Reproduction

GOVT 392

Faculty Name

Course Name

Course Number 

Difference, Equity, Justice Content

Sasser

Race, Law, and Memory

GOVT 150

This seminar examines how our attenuated relationship with American law and history undermines contemporary debates about policing, criminal justice, and mass incarceration. Our sources include Supreme Court opinions, novels, memoirs, films, television, and scholarship from a range of disciplines.

Holmes

Introduction to International Politics

GOVT 204

This course is an introduction to the theory and practice of international politics. Topics include the central role of race in the development of the modern state system, history and lasting effects of colonization and imperialism, critical race and feminist theories of world politics, and consideration of performative effects of “Western” IR theory on policy-making.

McGlennon

Political Parties

GOVT 306

GOVT 306 focuses on political parties and elections in the United States, with some comparison to party systems comparatively.  The course gives significant emphasis to the impact of majoritarian electoral systems on minority representation.  Significant attention is devoted to restrictions and expansion of voting rights to women, Blacks, young people and others, with particular attention to the systematic exclusion of African-American voting rights during slavery, post-Reconstruction and in contemporary politics.  One of core readings is “America’s Unequal Democracy” (Hajnal), who demonstrates disproportionate impact of electoral rules in depressing participation in urban areas, where racial minorities constitute have more potential to influence policy outcomes.

Israel-Trummel

Political Polling/Analysis

GOVT 307

This course focuses on training students to conduct survey research. Students will survey voters and write papers focused on understanding how voters make their decisions. There will be the option of examining topics such as racism and participation in protests against policing, within the context of the 2020 election.

Pickering

Politics of Eastern Europe

GOVT 335

This course focuses on the political transformation of East European since the fall of one-party communist rule.  One section examines the policies in the 1990s that peacefully included into politics ethnic minorities, those that discriminated against minorities, and violence against minorities. It also considers anti-immigrant policies and the impact of international intervention after violence that was designed to build ethnically inclusive political systems & transitional justice mechanisms.

Sasser

Civil Rights & Civil Liberties

GOVT 373

This Supreme Court-opinion-driven course considers how legal and political forces have shaped individual rights under the U.S. Constitution. Protections springing from the Bill of Rights and the Reconstruction Amendments--due process, equal protection, voting rights--drive the course.

Harish

Politics of Inequality

GOVT 391

This course is centered around inequality, as it exists between countries (hence with some overlap with International Relations) and within countries (hence with some overlap with Comparative Politics). Topics include the study of racial inequality (especially in the U.S. context), redistribution and link to finding democratic solutions to these issues

Nemacheck

US Supreme Court & Criminal Justice Reform

GOVT 401

This course centers on constitutional guarantees of criminal suspects’ rights and equal protection guarantees. The majority of the course focuses on glaring inequities in the protections of these rights based on race, sex, and income.