American Government: Foundations

The Honors Course

Abel

Office: 107 LA North

Hours:

Phone: 2145

E-mail: CFABEL@sfasu.edu

On the front of the McKeldin Library at the University of Maryland is carved, "You shall know the truth and the truth shall set you free." Unfortunately, these words are on the outside of the building and the students inside can't see them. They pursue information, grades and one another avidly. They truly believe that the truth is relative; and perhaps it is the case, as the poet says, that:

On the other hand, perhaps the truth (and the extent of its relativity) has something to do with human nature. You rarely hear it said, for example that some being is "relatively human." Rather, it seems, at some point a change in degree becomes a change in kind. As diverse as all beings might be, each is either human or not.

Consequently, human nature seems a fruitful place to start in deciding what is the right and good thing to do politically. In fact, some understanding of "human nature" is at the heart of the most important accomplishments, failures and disputes in politics. Claims about "human nature" figure prominently in the work of most political philosophers and regime creators, including the founders and subsequent shapers of our "American regieme." The founders read extnesively of Hobbes, Locke, Aristotle and Rousseau. All begin with some view of the essential qualities that define all of us as human. Madison, Hamilton, Jefferson, and Paine, as we shall see, hotly debated human nature and ontology, embodying their conclusions in the Constitution and the institutions that it creates. Many theorists hinge the possibility of progress on the possibility for human development. Defenses of democracy depend on assumptions of the capacity for rationality and justice in the people. On the other hand, defenses of authoritarian and totalitarian regimes center on the capacity for enlightened leadership among the chosen, the few, and on the incapacity for decision-making by the people, the many. Which views of human nature are plausible and can be corroborated by empirical evidence? Which are implausible and rejected by empirical evidence? Clearly many of our presumptions about human nature demand careful examination.

"Introduction to American Government: the Honors Course, " is a critical exploration of the foundational concepts, theories and dynamics undergirding American government, politics and democracy. In the process of this exploration it stresses an investigation of human nature and its expression through political institutions and ideologies. Classes blend conventional lectures with controversial films, critical thinking exercises, games, scientific investigations, student participation, and creative projects. Each session fuses philosophy and science into a coherent paradigm through interactive, thoughtful, open-minded and irreverent polemic, discussion and debate. Students explicate the meaning and implications of fundamental concepts such as "democracy," "power," "justice," "government," "politics," "authority," "legitimacy" and "political socialization," given human nature and context. They question and inquire into the evidence warranting and confirming the values, structures, goals and processes of American government in light of human nature. They argue and evaluate the system's success in meaningfully establishing an effective democracy that genuinely embodies, secures and promotes democratic values; and they investigate not only the national level but the state and local levels by inquiring into the Texas state counterparts to federal structures, process, values and goals

There are three principal disciplinary approaches to study "human nature." The first approach is psychoanalytic and is based on the work of Sigmund Freud and Carl Jung. The second approach is that of social psychology. Much of the work in social psychology is based a Lockean view, i. e., social learning. Human beings learn their most human, and humane, qualities through development and nurturing in a beneficent social context. The third is neuroscience, which studies brain structure and function, as well as neurochemistry, of both humans and animals. This last approach takes an evolutionary approach to human nature. We will discuss all three, but concentrate on the psychoanalytical and socio-psychological approaches.

Objectives

• To describe, explain and help the student comprehend the foundations, structure, meaning, values and purposes of American politics, government and democracy
• To introduce students to certain tools essential to analyzing and evaluating the extent to which the American governmental system embodies, pursues and secures democratic values, processes and goals
• To foster the development of purpose, discipline, and direction in students so that they may experience meaningful lives as productive, informed citizens capable of reasoning (thinking analytically, critically and creatively).
• To enhance the student's ability to communicate clearly, to make responsible decisions, to take responsibility for their decisions and to be accountable for their actions.

Participation, Class Notes and the Student's Responsibilities

The course is founded upon discussion and analytical exercise. Consequently, it puts a premium upon discussion and cooperative learning; much of the important material will be missed should you fail to attend and participate.

To help focus discussion, debate and analysis, and to stress what is most important in class, a series of class notes is available on the department's web page. You should make copies of each set, bring them to class, add to them, and elaborate upon them as the class progresses. The notes are short hand reminders of points, themes and important information. They are rather barren and at some points incomprehensible, without both the readings and the classroom discussions, polemics and debates.

Upon matriculating at a university, you accept certain responsibilities. Most importantly, you accept responsibility for you own intellectual, moral and spiritual development. This means that you are the person primarily responsible for learning and for contributing to an optimal learning environment. This responsibility includes the responsibility to participate actively, attentively and positively in learning situations; the responsibility to demonstrate a sincere interest in learning and growing personally and intellectually; and the responsibility to seek and respond willingly to constructive feedback. Similarly, only you can insure the timely reading of assigned materials, the regular attending of classes, the taking of good notes and the development of good study habits.

SFASU provides a number of resources to assist you in your quest for an education. These include a wide variety of courses, an equally wide variety of professors, a modest library, a counseling center, tutors, a campus network with access to information sources throughout the world, laboratories, and an array of extracurricular cultural and intellectual activities. Ultimately, however, the responsibility for employing these resources to attain an education rests with you.

I have tried to develop as many mechanisms as I can within the framework of the course to assist you in your education. I have tried to select interesting and unique readings that should stimulate you to look at the American political system from different perspectives. I have chosen some supplementary readings that address fundamental issues of current concern. You will be doing some data analysis and hypothesis testing, and you will conduct an empirical investigation and an artistic endeavor. To stimulate curiosity, creativity and comprehension, I will employ a variety of video materials, games, class activities, extracurricular events, musical compositions and visual arts. Class periods are structured to provide opportunities for active participation, research and analysis; and they encourage you to read required materials on time, to clear up any misconceptions and to insure that you thoroughly understand the material. But, a professor can do only so much. You are responsible for developing effective study habits and for attending class prepared to discuss and challenge the materials.

Requirements and Grading:

Your overall grade will be based upon:

1. An Exam On Some of the Concepts And Theories in American Government and Political Psychology (20%)
2. A Midterm Exam (20%) On:
1. Some More Of The Concepts And Theories in American Government and Political Psychology
2. The Foundations of American Democracy (Institutional and Psychological)
3. The Empirical Tools Employed to study American Government and political psychology, and
4. The Empirical Findings So Far Produced
3. An Original Creative Project (15%)
4. An Empirical Investigation (15%)
5. A Cumulative Final Exam (Some More Theory, Concepts And Empiricism) (30%)
6. The Professor's Professional Judgement (X%)
7. Extra Credit (X%)

All exams require a thorough explication of certain theories at the core of American Government and certain key terms employed in political discourse. They also require some discussion of principal issues, themes, arguments and ideas discussed and analyzed in the lectures, discussions and readings. In addition, the midterm and final include some objective questions on the empirical tools employed by the discipline and the discipline's empirical findings. The midterm will be conducted on two separate days; the concepts and theory bit on a Friday and the empirical bit on the following Monday. A review sheet will be provided one week prior to each exam, and the class immediately prior to the exam will be given over to review.

Blue books will be used for taking each exam. Each student will submit at least two blue books for each exam no later than Friday of the first whole week of classes. Books will be redistributed just prior to each exam. Students failing to hand in the books by the required day, may not take the exams.

The creative project requires students to design and execute an independent project that examines some aspect of American politics. The project must be original and is limited to films, artistic performances (e.g., songs, music, dances, plays), sets of original political cartoons, portfolios of original photographs or pieces of creative writing relevant to the themes covered in the course. Before beginning, speak with me about exactly what you want to do, why (how it "fits" the course material), and how it should be evaluated. I must approve all projects. Students must turn in a project proposal by the end of the second week, a report on the current status at midterm, and the completed work no later than Monday of "dead week. " Projects must be retrieved no later than Monday of exam week. Unclaimed projects will be trashed.

You must conduct an investigation focused on how the psychological characteristics of people in (1) the United States and (2) Texas or the southern region of the U.S. (depending on the data set employed), may affect how they think and what they do. You may choose among one of the following kinds of investigation:

• Choice I: A political/psychological content analysis of the writings, speeches, music, web-sites, etc. of a particular political party, subculture (e.g., militia groups), region, religion (e.g., what are the songs they sing in church?) or any other group you might reasonably define (e.g., KKK, libertarians).
• Choice II: Secondary Analysis Of Survey Data. Testing some hypotheses derived from a theory or theories using existing survey data.
• Choice III: A Meta-Analysis of Research Literature. A review of the literature in one of the topic areas listed below. Reviews should contain a summary of the theoretical issues, the body of research findings, a critical assessment of the area of work summarized and, most importantly, an assessment of what this specific literature has to say to us about politics.

Topic Areas For The Empirical Investigations Include:

1. Political Socialization: How, what and when do people learn about politics? Are political attitudes, values and beliefs learned at an early age and maintained or are they likely to change over the course of one’s life?
2. Why People Obey: Are people inclined to obey authority? What are the situational factors that make people susceptible to the dictates of authority figures? Are people capable of resisting the environmental and persuasive factors that lead to obedience? How do organizations and governments get people to obey?
3. Personality and Politics: Does an individual’s personality determine his/her political behavior? For instance, are some personalities more likely than others to obey authority figures? Are some people more likely than others to run for political office and be attracted to positions of political power?
4. Values in Politics: Is the way that the average American thinks about politics influenced by traditional democratic ideals and values (e.g., egalitarianism and freedom)? Do Americans consistently apply these democratic values in concrete situations? What happens when these values contradict each other? How far are Americans willing to go to support these values?
5. Affect and emotion in Politics: Does emotion influence political thinking? How prevalent is emotion in politics? Can people experience mixed emotions? If so, how does mixed emotion get translated into political preference? Does emotion contradict or complement reasoned political thinking? Is there such a thing as reasoned political thinking?
6. Stereotypes in Politics: Do perceptions about groups in society shape political thinking? How might social group perceptions translate into public policy outcomes?
7. Propaganda and persuasion: Are political attitudes easily changed? What are some of the different models of poltical persuasion? What are some of the situational elements that make people either susceptible to or resistant to persuasion?
8. The Media: What is the role of the mass media in influencing political outcomes? Are people affected by media messages? Are media messages capable of changing individual attitudes? Has the media changed the way we elect candidates for office? How do political candidates use media technology to their own (dis)advantage?

If you have an idea for an empirical investigation that does not fall within one of these categories, you may pursue your idea with the permission of the instructor. In any case, as soon as possible, you should review with the instructor your plans for the paper.

• A political/psychological content analysis should contain the following sections:
• Abstract: A 100 word summary of what you did, why you did it, how you did it, and what you found out. You'll probably want to write this last.
• Introduction: You will first define and discuss the particular culture to whom this music belongs. What are the values, beliefs, norms and behaviors that set them apart from the wider culture? Given the values, norms, beliefs and behaviors of this subculture, what do you expect to find as the central themes of their music?
• Methodology: Here you tell what you've done to collect data. You should also explain how you operationalized (or measured) the key concepts (i.e. sexuality, religion, violence, romance, justice, anal retentive, patriotism, rebellion, etc.) in your study.
• The basic methodology for this assignment is:
• Draw a sample of no fewer than ten written or verbal expressions of the group (e.g., songs). They may all be by the same person but need not be. This is likely to be a purposive rather than random sample. We'll talk about what that means in class.
• Examine the content of these expressions by conducting a careful analysis of the major themes expressed. Look for both the manifest and latent content of the expression. You should "operationalize" quantitative and qualitative indicators of the content of this "social artifact."
• For instance if you wanted to measure the level of "democratic imagery" in 1960s rock music you might first want to look at the manifest content by counting the number of times that the words "equal," "liberty," "free," "brotherhood of man," "we all live in a yellow submarine," "everybody must get stoned" and so forth were found in the songs. In addition, though, you want to look at the latent content – what is said is sometimes not what is meant, so read between the lines.
• Results: In this section you'll report what you found. It's best if you are specific and explicit, use examples of the themes you found in the music, give a table that summarizes your results.
• Conclusion: Finally you should say what these findings suggest about the music of this group. What, more broadly, do they say about the group itself? Is there likely to be a connection between this and the thoughts and actions of the members of the group?

For Those Interested In Choice II:

The Data:

You may choose the data you will be using from among:

1. Any of the files provided on the CD accompanying your text (American Government: an Introduction Using Explorit). All of this data is "high quality," taken from larger, sophisticate data sets. The included General Social Survey (GSS) subset, for example, is taken from a survey conducted nearly every year since 1972 (skipping a few here and there) by teams of researchers from the University of Chicago, the University of Michigan and others. It asks literally hundreds of questions of thousands of people (the sample size ranges from around 1,500 nearly 3,000). The random sampling techniques employed allow a sample of just over 1,000 to provide an accurate representation of the adult population of the United States. Your data consists of a small subset of this data that is provided in the "Student ExplorIt" data base

As a simple example, imagine you choose to conduct an analysis testing the relationship among four variables in the GSS subset. You should select some relationship:

1. That you can develop a "theory" about (e.g., Psychoanalysis is an effective mental health tool)
2. From which you might derive an "hypothesis" (e.g., the more shrinks in a given area the fewer the suicides)
3. Which you can test with the data (e.g., use the "States" data file, and the "Shrinks" and "Suicide" variables):

  **Note: the isolated dot represents Texas

You will then interpret and write up these results. For example, this data indicates that as the number of shrinks goes up, the number of suicides goes down. That is, the minus sign in front of the correlation coefficient (r) indicates an "inverse" correlation--the relation between the two variable is such that as the independent one goes up, the dependent one goes down. The two stars next to the numerical value of "r" indicates that the relationship is probably not due to chance (i.e., it is "significant"), and the numerical value indicates that 46% of the time the inverse relationship holds in the sample. So the relationship is not only not due to chance but fairly "strong". The data also suggests that for every four shrinks we add to a state (especially Texas, as it is so close to the regression line) one life is saved; and that for every four we remove (say, by not providing insurance for mental health problems), one life is lost.

You may ask about anything for which there is data. This is backwards from what we should do, but we’ll have to live with it. Begin by taking a look over the "variables" listed in the available data files . What looks like an interesting survey question to you? Do you want to explain why people might be for or against abortion? Do you want to see how attitudes toward abortion changed historically? Do you want to know who might think racial differences are due to discrimination? Effort? Ability? This is how you’ll choose a dependent variable. Next use the same list for three variables (independent variables) that might help explain your chosen dependant variable.

Analyzing the Data:

Once you’ve selected your variables you’ll run a univariate and bivariate analysis of them. The way you’ll do this is explained in your text (American Government: an Introduction Using Explorit). The univariate analysis allows you to see how many people in the sample respond which way to the questions about your independent and dependent variables. So if my dependent variable were abortion attitudes I’d want to start by knowing how many people favored and opposed abortion. Then if my independent variable were sex I’d want to know how many men and women there were in the sample. Finally I’d want to know how many men favored abortion, how many women favored abortion, how many men opposed abortion and how many women opposed abortion. If all men oppose abortion and all women favor it then I can say that attitudes about abortion depend upon sex. That’s unlikely. What is more likely is that some group may favor or oppose it more frequently than the other. Then I might say that men are more likely than women to oppose abortion – attitudes about abortion depend to some extent on sex.

Writing it Up:

Your paper should have the following sections, each offset and organized under headings and subheadings (I’ve attached an example):

Title: Your title should reflect what’s examined in your study – it should catch a reader’s attention and tell her or him what to expect the paper to be about. Accurate is critical, catchy is nice.

Abstract: A brief summary (150 words or less) in which you say what you did, how you did it, and what you found. (Remember this goes right after the title).

Introduction: Here you’ll set up the research question. Why should a reader be interested – why is this a socially and/or sociologically significant question? What do political scientists know about this already (use data from ExplorIt)? What are the ideas you propose to test (i.e. the theory)? What do you expect the relationship between the two variables to look like (i.e., what is your hypothesis)?

Methodology:

Here you record how you did what you did. This should include sections on:

1. Data: What are the data? Where do they come from? How were they collected? (See description above).
2. Measures: What are the measures of the concepts you’re using? How were the questions asked?
3. Procedures: What will you do to test the hypothesis you put forth – i.e. univariate and bivariate analysis.

Your results section should begin with a univariate analysis of your dependent and independent variable. You should have a table for each showing the number and percentage of persons who fall in each category. The table is not enough. You also need to describe the distribution of cases across the attributes of the variable in words.

The second part of your results section will be a bivariate analysis. You should also have a table here that shows the percentage of persons from each of the categories of the independent variable who fall in each of the categories of the dependent variable. In your description of this table, you should focus on the strength of the relationship between the dependent and independent variable. To what extent does the dependent variable differ across categories of the independent variable? Remember the basic rules of table construction – a table should stand on its own, having a consecutive number, descriptive title, descriptive row and column labels, and clarifying notes. Be sure your tables indicate the total number of cases involved in the analysis.

Discussion and Conclusion: Here you answer the question of what you found means. Was your hypothesis supported or not? What are the implications of these findings for the "theory" you proposed? What further questions are raised? What is the social and political significance of this relationship?

There are intangibles to learning that cannot always be captured objectively, even through the scope of devices employed in this course. Professional Political Scientists and Educators, given their education and experience, come to recognize that individual students may understand more or less than "objective criteria" reveal. This is a general problem with objective criteria and is one reason that good quantitative studies (e.g., surveys) are often supplemented by qualitative studies (e.g., focus groups). In this course, you will never receive an evaluation less than the objective criteria indicate. However, your grade may improve by up to one half a grade if, for example, extra credit projects, informal talks outside class or perceptive questions and creative answers during class, indicate a greater understanding of the material than objectively demonstrated.

Extra credit will be given freely for:

• Additional original songs, poems, videos, artistic performances (e.g., dances, plays), sets of original political cartoons, brief satires, scientific investigations (e.g., polls), portfolios of photographs or short pieces of creative writing, relevant to the themes covered in the course. Before beginning, speak with me about exactly what you want to do, why (how it "fits" the course material), and how it should be evaluated.

Rules of the Game

All written materials done outside of a classroom testing situation, must be submitted on a disc properly formatted for IBM and IBM compatible machines.

Blue books will be used for taking each exam. Each student will submit at least two blue books for each exam no later than Friday of the first whole week of classes. Books will be redistributed just prior to each exam. Students failing to hand in the books by the required day, may not take the exams.

All creative projects must be retrieved during "dead week." Unretrieved projects will be discarded.

Do not contact me concerning your final grade prior to its publication by the University. I will not respond.

An "incomplete" will not be given for other than medical emergency or personal tragedy. Documentary evidence is required and is subject to check. Academic hardship does not qualify as an excuse.

Generally, there will be no make-up examinations absent a properly documented medical emergency or personal tragedy. Some leeway will be granted for properly documented "Acts of God." Should the student claim, for example, that "my car broke down," an appropriately dated repair bill will suffice.

Subject to the same proviso, papers will not be accepted after the due date absent a properly documented, valid excuse.

All forms of Dishonesty (e.g., cheating, and plagiarism) will be prosecuted to the fullest extent. Please refer to the Disciplinary Procedures and Student Code of Conduct.

If in the professor's opinion, students are not enthusiastically participating in class, or should the professor conclude that assignments have not been read, a "Pop Quiz" may be given at the teacher's discretion. Each quiz will be worth 5% of the final grade, proportionally reducing the weight of the final exam.

Any missed exam or quiz for which no valid, documented excuse is provided counts as a Zero (0) and not as a Failure (F).

No consideration will be given to extra credit projects other than those mentioned above.

The schedule provided is a general guide. Coverage of the material may be accelerated, decelerated, rearranged, augmented or otherwise modified when in the professor's opinion the class will benefit. Changes will not be kept a secret.