01:790:315:80 Politics and Culture
W 6:00-8:40p.m., RVCC
Instructor: Mark Mazureanu
E-mail: mark.mazureanu@rutgers.edu, marcmazureanu@gmail.com
Office hours: TBD
SYLLABUS
Course Outline:
The fall of the Berlin Wall signified for the entire world the end of the Soviet dictatorship
and the supremacy of liberal democracy. It made everyone chant Fukuyama’s vision about the
End of History and the Last Man, which explains why the entire globe would soon converge to a
unique liberal democratic political and economic system. We all lived in this pinky dream until a
series of events started bringing us back to gray reality. The detailed analysis of the Tiananmen
Square Revolution in China showed that the revolution was not that democratic in its essence as
it was previously presented; that the rapid democratic transformations in Russia and its former
socialist counterparts ended up in newly installed forms of authoritarian regimes, and finally, that
the rapid democratization of former Yugoslavia turned into a cruel ethnic conflict that shook the
world with unbelievable genocidal actions. How could all this be possible when the world was
just a step away from the envisioned democratic world? In this class we will analyze how culture
explains the fiasco of the rapid political, social, and economic transformations that took place at
the end of the 20th century and gave hope for a better democratic world.
Learning Objectives:
This course will discuss how various aspects of culture affect social relations and political
decision-making. The course will center around three central questions:
 How is political activity and political behavior shaped by culturally specific symbolic
meanings and social codes?
 How and under what conditions do cultural identities (i.e. ethnicity and religion) become
politicized in different political systems?
 How does the relationship between culture and politics shape our understanding of
different areas of analysis in political science, such as, political economy, state formation,
political participation and social movements?
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Class Requirements:
1. This class requires active learning. Beyond completing course readings and taking notes,
students are expected to actively engage in classroom discussions. During class discussions
students are encouraged to challenge all conceptual formulations and arguments presented in
the course readings, and to develop their own approaches to the problems and issues discussed.
Our meetings will heavily rely on the assigned readings, consequently the students are expected
to attend all classes and come always prepared.
What I am expecting from you is NOT to:

Be late – every three late show ups will equal a missed class;

Miss classes – two unexcused absences will negatively affect your final grade,
resulting in the reduction of a half grade for each unexcused absence;

Use of electronic devises not related to the class work – this kind of misbehavior
does not have a penalty but usually leaves a negative impression about you.

Disrespect academic integrity norms - Students of this class are governed by the rules
of Rutgers University regarding academic misconduct/dishonesty and plagiarism. Please
take this warning seriously and allot yourself several minutes by visiting the Rutgers
official page: http://academicintegrity.rutgers.edu/
Grading:
In-class participation – Class Presentations (40%)
Section evaluation – Part I, II, III, IV (60%)
Important: No make-ups except for medically proven conditions. If you experience a
legitimate emergency, which will prevent you from completing required coursework on time, or
attend examinations, I expect you to communicate with me at the earliest reasonable opportunity,
and also provide medical proof. Please state the nature of the emergency, and when you expect to
turn in the coursework.
Communication:
We will use Sakai as the main platform for readings sharing, paper submission, and general
discussions. You are also free to approach me personally during office hours or just in your free
time. Also feel free to reach me by e-mail (mark.mazureanu@rutgers.edu,
marcmazureanu@gmail.com).
Required Readings:
Required: should be read by all students, the evaluation questions will be taken from the
readings and the in-class presentations. Moreover, the participation and the in-class discussions
depend on these readings.
Recommended readings: will broaden the horizon of your knowledge on a specific topic and
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will help you write better and more compelling final papers.
Books:
You do not have to buy any book. All the assigned readings and those needed for your
presentations will be uploaded to Sakai.
COURSE OUTLINE
1. Jan 22 – INTRODUCTION – Course Overview. Conceptualizing Political Culture
Required Readings:
 David Laitin, Hegemony and Culture: Politics and Religious Change among the Yoruba
(University of Chicago Press, 1986), ch. 1, “The Two Faces of Culture”, 1-20
 Gladwell, Malcolm. 2008. “The Ethnic Theory of Plane Crashes” in Outliers, 177-223.
Recommended Readings:
 Barber, B. Terrorism Challenge to Democracy. in Jihad vs McWorld. 2001. pp. xi-xxxii.
2. Jan 29 – Beyond Political Culture: How to think about the relationship between culture
and politics.
Required Readings:
 Aronoff, Myron and Jan Kubik, Anthropology and Political Science: A Convergent
Approach, 17-49.
Recommended Readings:
 Swidler, Ann. 1986. “Culture in Action: Symbols and Strategies.” American Sociological
Review, 51, 273-286.
PART I: Theoretical Approaches to Political Culture
3. Feb 5 – Theories of Social Capital and its Critiques
Required Readings:
 Robert Putman, Making Democracy Work: Civic Traditions in Modern Italy, (Princeton
University Press, 1993), ch. 5: “Tracing the Roots of Civic Community”, pp. 121 – 162
 Shari Berman, “Civil Society and the Collapse of the Weimar Republic”, World Politics,
vol. 49 (April 1997), pp. 401 – 29
Recommended Readings:
 Putnam, ch. 6: “Social Capital and Institutional Success”, pp. 163 – 185
 Filippo Sabetti, Village Politics and the Mafia in Sicily (Montreal: McGill-Queen’s
University Press, 2002), “Epilogue: The Past as the Future”, pp. 221 – 240
4. Feb 12 – Culture and economy
Required Readings:
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 Bourdieu, Pierre. 2001 [1983]. “The Forms of Capital.” In The Sociology of Economic
Life. Second Edition. Mark Granovetter and Richard Swedberg, eds. Boluder: Westview,
pp. 96-111.
 Huntington, Samuel. 2000. “Cultures Count.” In Culture Matters. How Values shape
Human Progress. S. Huntington and Lawrence E. Harrison, eds. New York: Basic Books,
pp. xiii-xvi.
 Landes, David. 2000. “Culture makes almost all the difference.” In Culture Matters. How
Values shape Human Progress. S. Huntington and Lawrence E. Harrison, eds. New York:
Basic Books. Pp. 2-13.
Recommended Readings:
 Harrison, Lawrence E. 2000. “Why culture matters.” In Culture Matters. How Values
shape Human Progress. S. Huntington and Lawrence E. Harrison, eds. New York: Basic
Books, pp. xvii-xxxiv.
 Sen, Amartya. 2004. “How Does Culture Matter? in Vijayendra Rao and Michael Walton,
eds. Culture and Public Action. Stanford Social Sciences. An imprint of Stanford
University Press, pp. 37-58.
5. Feb 19 – Theories of Social Character
Required Readings:
 Samuel Huntington, “The Clash of Civilizations?” Foreign Affairs, vol. 72, no. 3 (Summer
1993), pp. 22 – 49
Recommended Readings:
 Lawrence E. Harrison, The Central Liberal Truth: How Politics Can Change a Culture and
Save it From Itself, (Oxford University Press, 2006), ch. 9: “Guidelines for Progressive
Cultural Change”, pp. 206 – 225
6. Feb 26 – Political Symbolism as a Dynamic Variable of Culture
Required Readings:
 Nicolai Petro, Crafting Democracy: How Novgorod Has Coped with Rapid Social Change,
(Cornell University Press, 2004), ch. 4 “Three Keys to Understanding Rapid Social
Change”, pp. 95 – 125
Recommended Readings:
 TBA
PART II: HOW TO USE THE PAST TO DOMINATE THE FUTURE – NOSTALGIC
POLITICS
7. Mar 5 – Theories of Collective Memory
Required Readings:
 Eric Hobsbawm, “The Social Formation of the Past: Some Questions” Past and Present,
no. 55 (May, 1972), pp. 3 – 17
 Benedict Anderson, Imagined Communities: Reflections on the Origin and Spread of
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Nationalism (New York: Verso Press, 1991), ch. 5: “Old Languages, New Models”, pp.
67 – 82
Recommended Readings:
 TBA
8. Mar 19 – How Nations Remember their History
Required Readings:
 Barry Schwartz, “Social Change and Collective Memory: The Democratization of George
Washington”, American Sociological Review, vol. 56, no. 2 (April, 1991), pp. 221 – 236
 Hugh Trevor-Roper, “The Invention of Tradition: The Highland Tradition of Scotland”, in
The Invention of Tradition, Eric Hobsbawm and Terence Rangers, eds. (Cambridge
University Press, 1983), pp. 15 – 41
Recommended Readings:
 Paschalis M. Kitromilides, “On the Intellectual Content of Greek Nationalism:
Paparrigopoulos, Byzantium and the Great Idea”, in Byzantium and the Modern Greek
Identity, David Ricks and Paul Magdalino, eds., (Aldershot, UK: Ashgate Publishing
Limited, 1998), pp. 25 – 34
 Thomas A. Emmert, “Kosovo: Development and Impact of a National Ethic”, in Nation
and Ideology: Essays in Honor of Wayne S. Vucinich, Ivo Banac, John G. Ackerman, and
Roman Szporluk, eds. (Columbia University Press, 1981), pp. 61 – 86
 Myron Aronoff, Israeli Visions and Divisions: Cultural Change and Political Conflict
(New Brunswick, NJ: Transaction Publishers, 1995), ch. 3. “The Manipulation of
Political Culture under the Likud”, pp. 43 – 67
PART III: Culture as a Tool of Democracy and Authoritarianism
9. Mar 26 – How Culture (Ab)Uses the Past to Legitimize the Present
Required Readings:
 Boym, S. The Future of Nostalgia. Basic books, 2001. pp. xiii-xix, 3-18, 41-55.
 Murphy, A. Longing, Nostalgia, and Golden Age Politics: The American Jeremiad and
the Power of the Past. 2009. pp. 125-136.
 Murphy, A. Prodigal Nation. Oxford, 2009. pp. 125-141.
 Sedikides, C.; Wildschut, T.; Arndt, J. and Routledge, C. Nostalgia - Past, Present, and
Future. pp. 304-307.
Recommended Readings:
 Russel Shorto, “How Christian Were the Founders?”, The New York Times Magazine,
February 11, 2010.
 Hourani, A. A History of the Arab People. Harward University Press. pp. 434-458.
 Mernissi, F. Islam and Democracy. Perseus Books. pp. 114-129.
 Zerubaverl, Y. Recovered Roots. University of Chicago Press. pp. 3-36.
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10. Apr 2 – Cultures of Resistance Against Authoritarianism
Required Readings:
 James Scott. 1990. Domination and the Arts of Resistance: Hidden Transcripts. New
Haven: Yale University Press (1-28).
 Roger D. Petersen. 2001. Resistance and Rebellion. Lessons from Eastern Europe. New
York: Cambridge University Press (1-133).
Recommended Readings:
 Ian Kershaw, The ‘Hitler Myth’: Image and Reality in the Third Reich (Oxford
University Press, 1987), ch. 3: “’Symbol of the Nation’: The Propaganda Profile of
Hitler, 1933 – 1936”, pp. 48 – 82
 Jan Kubik, The Power of Symbols Against the Symbols of Power: The Rise of Solidarity
and the Fall of State Socialism in Poland (Pennsylvania State University Press, 1994), ch.
8: “The Role of Symbols in the Construction and Deconstruction of the Polish People’s
Republic”, pp. 239 – 269
 Bonnell, Victoria. 1997. “Introduction.” Iconography of Power. Soviet Political Poster
under Lenin and Stalin. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1-19.
 Jeffrey Kopstein. 1996. “Chipping Away at the State. Workers’ Resistance and the
Demise of East Germany.” World Politics 48, pp. 391-423.
 Elena Zdravomyslova. 1996. “Opportunities and framing in the transition to democracy:
The case of Russia. In Doug McAdam, John D. McCarthy, Mayer N. Zald, eds.,
Comparative Perspectives on Social Movements, pp.122-137.
 Scammell, Michael. 1995. “Art as politics and politics in art.” In From Gulag to
Glasnost. Nonconformist Art from the Soviet Union. Alla Rosenfeld and Norton T.
Dodge, eds. Thames and Hudson with the Jane Voorhees Zimmerli Museum, Rutgers,
49-63.
11. Apr 9 – Civic Culture a Basic Element to Have the Democracy Going
Required Readings:
 Inglehart, R. Modernization and Postmodernization. ch.6. Economic Development,
Political Culture, and Democracy: Bringing the People Back In. Princeton University
Press. 1997. pp. 160-215.
 Almond, Gabriel A. 1989 (1980). “The Intellectual History of the Civic Culture Concept.”
In Almond, Gabriel A. and Sidney Verba, eds. The Civic Culture Revisited. Newbury
Park: Sage, 1-36.
Recommended Readings:
 Inglehart, Ronald. 1988. “The Renaissance of Political Culture.” American Political
Science Review 82(4), (December), 1204–30.
 Inglehart, Ronald. 2000. “Modernization, Cultural Change and the Persistence of
Traditional Values.” American Sociological Review. Vol. 65 (February), 19-51.
 Ronald Inglehart and Christian Welzel. 2009. “Development and Democracy: What We
Know about Modernization Today.” Foreign Affairs, March.
12. Apr 16 – How Culture can (Re)Construct a Democracy: A Way Forward?
Required Readings:
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 Nicolai Petro, Crafting Democracy: How Novgorod Has Coped with Rapid Social Change,
(Cornell University Press, 2004), ch 6 “Symbols at Work”, pp. 146 – 180
Recommended Readings:
 Michael Rossi, “In Search of a Democratic Cultural ‘Alternative’: Serbia’s European
Heritage from Dositej Obradović to OTPOR”, Nationalities Papers vol. 40, no. 6
(November), pp. 853 – 878.
PART VI: Pop Culture, Global Culture and Consumerism
13. Apr 23 – Consumerism as Patriotism and Patriotism as Consumerism
Required Readings:
 Lizabeth Cohen, A Consumer’s Republic: The Politics of Mass Consumption in Postwar
America, (New York: Vintage Books, 2003), ch. 6: ”Commerce: Reconfiguring
Community Marketplaces”, pp. 257 – 289
Recommended Readings:
 Lizabeth Cohen, A Consumer’s Republic: The Politics of Mass Consumption in Postwar
America, (New York: Vintage Books, 2003), ch. 3: ”The Emergence of the Consumers’
Republic”, pp. 166 – 192.
14. Apr 30 – Culture, Politics and Globalization
Required Readings:
 Crane, D. et al. Media, Arts, Policy and Globalization. Routledge 2002. pp. 1-19.
 Barber, B. Who Owns McWorld? The Media Merger Frency. in Jihad vs McWorld. 2001.
Pp. 137-154.
 Barber, B. Jihad and McWorld in the New World Disorder. in Jihad vs McWorld. 2001.
pp. 219-235.
 Huntington, S. The West Civilization and the Civilizations. In The Clash of Civilizations.
pp. 301-319.
 Lule, J. Globalization and Media. Ch 7. Media and Cultural Globalization. pp. 121-140.
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