SOCI 803: Institutions and Inequalities

SOCI 803-001: Institutions and Inequalities
(Fall 2022)

04:30 PM to 07:10 PM T

Horizon Hall 3012

Section Information for Fall 2022

“(In)equality” exists in many forms and types. “Class equality,” “status equality,” and “power equality,” for example, are related but distinct. To increase equality may come at the cost of other values, such as liberty. Capitalism is in many ways more “equitable” than feudalism, in other way less so. This paradox—that different types and dimensions of equality may work against each other—provides one major research problem for this course. A paradox about institutions provides another research problem for the course. Institutions mediate the unequal relations of persons to larger structures of society and culture. Institutions are simultaneously facilitative and constrictive. This paradox is related to the dialectical nature of discipline, which is always required to create the level of organization and resource-mobilization necessary for change, and yet is often oppressive in its enforcement of rule and routine. While these related paradoxes apply to all institutions, they also suggest a key axis of variation among types of institutions--from those (such as communes) that are primarily facilitative to those (such as prisons) that are primarily constrictive. The most general questions for the course, then, are as follows: Why are institutions so often dehumanizing, and what are the possibilities for making them more humane? How do institutions reproduce relations of power, domination, and exclusion? How can they be made more open, effective, and equitable? At what cost to the degree of certain forms of inequality are increases in other forms of equality won? And at what cost to other values?

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Course Information from the University Catalog

Credits: 3

Addresses the processes through which institutions reproduce relations of power, domination, and exclusion as well as the similarities and differences across forms of inequality and their connection to institutions. May not be repeated for credit.
Registration Restrictions:

Enrollment is limited to Graduate level students.

Schedule Type: Seminar
Grading:
This course is graded on the Graduate Regular scale.

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