POLS 589: POLICING THE STATE

Spring 2002, Wednesdays 6:00-8:30 p.m.
Professor Stephen Engelmann (sengelma@uic.edu)


Before September 11 many social scientists remarked on the demise of the state and public policy, threatened from within and without by globalization and privatization. Now security--and the state's special role in guaranteeing it--has been forced to the top of public and private sector agendas. But what is security and what is policy, and why do we assume they are in tension with globalization and privatization? How, indeed, should we think about the conceptual and spatial borders within and among states, economies, and societies? In this graduate seminar we will ask these basic questions in the course of investigating the theoretical origins of and interactions between the modern state and modern policy, also known as "police." Following an introductory section of twentieth-century readings on governance and the state we will immerse ourselves in early-modern European and American political theory, looking not just at some of the usual suspects--Niccolo Machiavelli, Thomas Hobbes, Adam Smith, James Madison--but at more obscure followers and critics. Some of our concerns will be historical, but we'll keep an eye on contemporary distinctions and developments, and on how our understanding of these might be revised in light of the course materials. Our approach throughout will be to loosen the grip that contemporary categories and oppositions (e.g. "the government" vs. "the economy") have on us as policymakers, analysts, and citizens, and to think more in terms of the meanings and consequences of attending to different spheres and modes of governance.
This class should be of interest to students in political science, economics, sociology, anthropology, history, philosophy, communications, and criminal justice. Prerequisite: graduate standing or permission of instructor.