Theories of Justice and Social Change

FALL 2008

NEIU JUST-310

INSTRUCTOR: Dr. June Terpstra

COURSE DESCRIPTION

The course explores general theories of social change and the relationship between social change and the pursuit of justice. The starting point is unjust social structures and processes, leading into analysis of how social change occurs, especially through social movements. Prereq: JUST 101, and JUST 202 or consent of Instructor. 

COURSE OBJECTIVES 

1. Identify your theories of justice, ideologies and religious systems of beliefs.

2.  Identify the manner in which theory influences practice and who benefits from the manner in which theories have been implemented in societies.

3. Understand critical cultural and economic historical analyses about patterns of conflict, collaboration and cooperation globally.

4. Develop critical political analyses for social change and social justice movements past and present.

5. Identify theories that positively and negatively influence future possibilities for honoring people's rights to self-determination across the globe while also honoring the health of the planet. 

COURSE REQUIREMENTS 

1. Class Attendance and Participation--200 PTS 

2. Reflexive writing on the weekly readings 300 pts 

3.  Midterm research presentations on an ideology or theory of justice, political or religious.  You will present its main principles and teachings and theorists.  At least five research sources are required.  250 pts 

4. Final research presentations on reform, resistance, or revolutionary groups or individuals who incorporated the beliefs of the ideology or religion you presented in the midterm.  At least five research sources are required.  250 pts 

TEXTS:  All URLs for essays and articles assigned are below in the syllabus.

TENTATIVE SYLLABUS

Week #1  8/26/08 Ideological and Religious Theories

READ AND RESPOND

1.  Oppression and Revolution - Part I by Jeanne Curran and Susan R. Takata
http://www.habermas.org/opprev01.htm#critdist

1. Three Theories of Justice at http://lilt.ilstu.edu/pefranc/3-Ts%20of%20Justice.htm

2.  Human Rights at http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/rights-human/

3.   A Vindication of the Rights of Woman.  1792, Mary Wollstonecraft. Chapters 1-4

http://www.bartleby.com/144/1.html

Week 2 Political and Moral Philosophy

READ AND RESPOND 

1. Law and Ideology at http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/law-ideology/

2. Distributive Justice at http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/justice-distributive/

3. Restorative Justice at http://www.restorativejustice.org/intro

WEEK 3 Colonialism, Imperialism, and Post-Colonialism  

READ AND RESPOND

1. Five Hundred Years of Injustice at http://ili.nativeweb.org/sdrm_art.html

2. The Divine Right to Occupy the Land John Cotton, (London, 1630) at http://www.healingtheland.com/resources/discovery/cotton.html

3.  Postcolonial Thought

Week 4 Nationalism and Racism

READ AND RESPOND

1.  Reciprocal Bases of National Culture and the Fight for Freedom by Frantz Fanon at http://www.marxists.org/subject/africa/fanon/national-culture.htm

2.   Frantz Fanon, Black Skin, White Masks New York: Grove Press, 1967.http://www.umass.edu/complit/aclanet/FanonBW.html

3. Moving Onward From Racial Division to Class Unity by Brooke Heagerty and Nelson Peeryhttp://www.speakersforanewamerica.com/Moving%20Onward.php

4.  Roots of Oppression  http://www.american-pictures.com/roots/index.htm

Week 5 Hegemony and Counter-Hegemony

Do your research!

Weeks 6&7 Research Presentations

Week #8 

Revolution and War

READ AND RESPOND:

 1. Terrorism, Theirs and Ours by Eqbal Ahmad http://www.quaker.org/chestnuthill/eahmed.htm

2. Guerrilla Warfare: A Method by Che Guevara at  http://www.thechestore.com/Che-Guevara-Guerrilla-Warfare.php

3.  Peace and the New Corporate Liberation Theology by Arundhati Roy http://www.serendipity.li/iraqwar/arundhati_roy_peace_prize_lecture.htm

Week 9 Epistemology and media

READ AND RESPOND

1. The Corporate Control of Society and Human Life by Stephen Lendman http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article12842.htm

2. Managing Consent --The Art of War, Democracy and Public Relations
By Ramzy Baroud http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article18221.htm

Week #10  Revolutionary and political analyses of justice

READ AND RESPOND

1. Notes for the Study of the Ideology of the Cuban Revolution by Che at http://www.thechestore.com/Che-Guevara-Notes-Ideology.php

2. The Immorality of the State by Mikhail Bakunin at http://dwardmac.pitzer.edu/Anarchist_Archives/bakunin/bakuninimmorality.html

3.  ANARCHISM: WHAT IT REALLY STANDS FOR by Emma Goldman at http://dwardmac.pitzer.edu/Anarchist_Archives/goldman/aando/anarchism.html

Week 11 Anti-globalization

READ AND RESPOND

1.  How does Global Order Harm the Poor at http://ksghome.harvard.edu/~mrisse/Papers/Papers%20-%20Philosophy/UnjustWorldVI.pdf

2. THE ABOLITION OF WORK by Bob Black at http://www.spunk.org/library/writers/black/sp000156.html

Week # 12-14

Final Research Presentations

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