Theories of Power and Resistance

3 Credits.

How does power operate in contemporary societies? How is power reproduced, how is it resisted and under what conditions does resistance produce social change? This course will examine how social theorists have advanced novel answers to these questions as they grappled with the historical events and social concerns of the 20th and 21st centuries, including the failure of communist movements in the West, the rise and fall of fascism and Nazism, the consolidation of capitalist democracies, the emergence of anti-colonial movements in the "Third World," and the mutations and intersections of race, gender and sexuality as forms of domination. In addition to understanding and comparing theories, we will assess their usefulness for understanding our present conjuncture.