Class schedule for psci 120 - Social Sciences



PSCI 120

America and the World

After September 11

Professor McAllister

G20 Stetson Hall

Office Phone: 2572

Home Phone: 458-9624

Office Hours by appointment

Course Description

The terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001 led to a very brief period in which America was united and much of the world was sympathetic to our misfortune. Needless to say, three years after the attacks Americans are very divided over the course of our foreign policy and much of the world is very hostile to our current strategy. This course will examine the critical issues and debates surrounding American foreign policy before and after 9/11. This course is designed to examine issues and debates rather than to resolve them. While we will certainly not reach a consensus by the end of the semester, I hope we will at least be in a better position to understand and respect differences of opinion over the nature of contemporary American foreign policy.

Course Requirements

There will be a variety of assignments in this course. While this class is listed as a 100 level course, there should be no misunderstanding about the level of work (heavy) expected of each and every student.

Five Short Response Papers/Class Participation. These papers are designed to enhance your ability to grapple with the arguments put forward in the assigned reading. They must be no longer than 2-3 pages. The format will be explained on a separate handout. 20%

Two Papers of 6-7 pages in length. 50% (25% each)

Final exam: 30%

Course Reading

All of the reading for this course will be available in course reading packets that will be distributed in class. Please note that the instructor reserves the right, and will use that right, to change readings if necessary to improve understanding of certain topics.

Teaching Assistants

Lucy Cox-Chapman

Ben Cronin

Ian Schulte

Sept 9: Introduction

Sept 13: How Did it Happen? Making Sense of 9/11

The 9/11 Commission Report, “What to Do? A Global Strategy,” pp.361-398.

Robert Jervis, “An Interim Assessment of September 11: What Has Changed and What Has Not,” Political Science Quarterly (Spring 2002), pp.37-54.

John Mueller, “Harbinger or Aberration? A 9/11 Provocation,” The National Interest (Fall 2002), pp.45-50.

ER: Daniel Byman, “Scoring the War on Terrorism,” The National Interest (Summer 2003), pp.75-84.

Sept 16: Neoconservatives and American Foreign Policy (1)

Norman Podhoretz, “World War IV: How it Started, What it Means, and Why We have to Win,” Commentary (September 2004), pp.1-55.

Max Boot, “Neocons: Think Again,” Foreign Policy (Jan-Feb 2004), pp.20-28.

ER: Joshua Muravchik, “The Neoconservative Cabal,” Commentary (September 2003), pp.26-33.

Sept 20: Neoconservatives and American Foreign Policy (2)

Charles Krauthammer, “Democratic Realism: An American Foreign Policy for a Unipolar World,” February 2004, Irving Kristol Lecture.

Max Boot, “What Next? The Bush Foreign Policy Agenda Beyond Iraq,” The Weekly Standard, May 5, 2003, pp.27-33.

Francis Fukuyama, “The Neoconservative Moment,” The National Interest (Summer 2004), pp.57-68.

John Ikenberry, “The End of the Neoconservative Moment,” Survival, Spring 2004, pp.7-22.

David Kirkpatrick, “War Heats Up in the Neoconservative Fold,” The New York Times, August 22, 2004.

ER: Zachary Selden, “Neoconservatives and the American Mainstream,” Policy Review (April 2004), pp.29-39.

Sept 23: The Bush Doctrine and American National Security

President Bush, “The National Security Strategy of the United States,” September 20, 2002.

Joshua Muravchik, “The Bush Manifesto,” Commentary (December 2002), pp.23-30.

Michael Glennon, “Preempting Terrorism: The Case for Anticipatory Self Defense,” Weekly Standard, January 28, 2002.

Robert Jervis, “Understanding the Bush Doctrine,” Political Science Quarterly (Winter 2003), pp.365-388.

ER: Melvyn Leffler, “9/11 and the Past and Present of American Foreign Policy,” International Affairs (Spring 2003), pp.1045-1063.

Sept 27: Power and Hegemony: Realist and Liberal Perspectives

Stephen M. Walt, “American Primacy: Its Prospects and Pitfalls,” Naval War College Review (Spring 2002), pp.9-28.

John Ikenberry, “America’s Imperial Ambition,” Foreign Affairs (Sept/Oct 2002), pp.44-60.

Madeline Albright, “Bridges, Bombs, or Bluster?” Foreign Affairs (September/October 2003), pp.2-19.

Stanley Hoffman, “America Goes Backward,” The New York Review of Books, June 12, 2003.

ER: Benjamin Schwarz and Christopher Layne, “A New Grand Strategy,” The Atlantic Monthly (January 2002), pp.36-42.

Sept 30: The American Left and 9/11

Noam Chomsky, “On the Bombings,” ZNET, September 13, 2001.

Noam Chomsky, 9-11 (2001), pp.59-70.

Arundhati Roy, “The Algebra of Infinite Justice,” The Guardian, September 29, 2001.

Robert Jensen, “September 11,” ZNET.

Katha Pollitt, “Put Out No Flags,” The Nation, September 19, 2001, pp.150-153.

David Barsamian, “Edward Said: The Progressive Interview,” The Progressive (November 2001), pp.41-44.

Charlotte Raven, “A Bully with a Bloody Nose is Still a Bully,” The Guardian, September 18, 2001.

Jeremy Scahill, “John Kerry as the Warchurian Candidate,” Common Dreams, August 27, 2004.

Paul Hollander, “The Resilience of the Adversary Culture,” The National Interest (Summer 2002), pp.101-112.

ER: Larissa MacFarquhar, “Noam Chomsky: The Devil’s Accountant,” The New Yorker (March 31, 2003), pp.64-79.

October 4: Debates Within the American Left Since 9/11

Christopher Hitchens, “Against Rationalization,” “Of Sin, the Left & Islamic Fascism,” and “Blaming Bin Laden First,” September-October 2001, in Katrina Van Den Huevel, ed., A Just Response: The Nation on Terrorism, Democracy, and September 11, 2001 (2002), pp.147-150, 156-164.

Salman Rushdie, “Anti-Americanism Has Taken the World By Storm,” Guardian, February 6, 2002.

Michael Walzer, “Can There Be a Decent Left,” Dissent (Spring 2002), p.19-23.

Jeffrey C. Isaac, “Ends, Means, and Politics,” Dissent (Spring 2002), pp.32-37.

Adam Shatz, “The Left and 9/11,” The Nation, Sept 23, 2002.

ER: Christopher Hitchens, “Unfahrenheit 9/11: The Lies of Michael Moore,” Slate, June 21, 2004.

Oct 7: Dinesh D’Souza Class Visit

Dinesh D’Souza, What’s So Great About America, pp.1-99.

**In addition to appearing in our class, Dinesh will be giving an additional lecture on October 6, “In Defense of American Empire,” at 7:30pm (Griffin 3 or 6). Your attendance is required.

Oct 11: Reading Day

Oct 14: The Origins of Osama Bin Laden and Al-Qaeda (1)

The 9/11 Commission Report, “The Foundation of the New Terrorism,” pp.47-70.

Peter Bergen, Holy War, Inc: Inside the Secret War of Osama Bin Laden (2001), pp.24-75.

Bernard Lewis, “License to Kill,” Foreign Affairs (Nov/Dec 1998), p.14-19.

ER: Michael Doran, “The Pragmatic Fanaticism of Al-Quaeda,” PSQ (2002), pp.177-190.

**Former Governor Tom Kean, Chair of the 9/11 Commission, will be speaking in Chapin Hall on October 13. Attendance is not required, but it would be very foolish to miss this event.

Oct18: The Origins of Osama Bin Laden and Al-Qaeda (2)

Sayyid Qutb, Milestones (1964), pp.7-19, 241-263.

Sayyid Qutb, “The America I Have Seen: In the Scale of Human Values,” in Kamal Abdel-Malek, ed., Images of America in Arabic Travel Literature (2000), pp.11-27.

Lawrence Wright, “The Man Behind Bin Laden,” The New Yorker, September 16, 2002, pp.56-86.

ER: Jason Burke, “Al Qaeda: Think Again,” Foreign Policy (May/June 2004), pp.18-26.

Oct 21: The West and Islam: A Clash of Civilizations? (1)

Bernard Lewis, “The Roots of Muslim Rage,” The Atlantic (September 1990), pp.47-60.

Bernard Lewis, “The Revolt of Islam,” The New Yorker, November 19, 2001, pp.50-63.

Samuel Huntington, The Clash of Civilizations and the Remaking of World Order (1996), pp.209-218.

Abdel Rahman al-Rashed, “Innocent Religion is Now a Message of Hate,” The Daily Telegraph, September 7, 2004.

The Wall Street Journal, “The Children of Beslan,” September 7, 2004.

ER: Ian Buruma, “Lost in Translation: The Two Minds of Bernard Lewis,” The New Yorker, June 14, 2004, pp.184-191.

Oct 25: The West and Islam: A Clash of Civilizations (2)

John Esposito, The Islamic Threat: Myth or Reality (1995), pp.212-222.

Edward Said, “The Clash of Ignorance,” The Nation, October 22, 2001.

Fareed Zakaria, “Why Do They Hate US?” Newsweek, October 15, 2001.

Anonymous, Imperial Hubris: Why the West is Losing the War on Terror (2004), pp.1-19.

ER: President Bush, “Address to a Joint Session of Congress,” September 20, 2001.

Oct 28: Islam and Democracy (1)

Ali Mazrui, “Islamic and Western Values,” Foreign Affairs (Sept 1997), pp.119-132.

Noah Feldman, After Jihad: America and the Struggle for Islamic Democracy (2003), pp.3-16, 51-74, 189-234.

ER: Bernard Lewis, “Islam and Liberal Democracy,” The Atlantic Monthly (Feb 1993), pp.1-10.

Nov 1: John Kerry and a Democratic Foreign Policy

Philip Gourevitch, “Damage Control,” The New Yorker, July 26, 2004, pp.50-63.

Joshua Marshall, “Kerry Faces the World,” The Atlantic Monthly (July/Aug 2004), pp.108-114.

Samuel Berger, “Foreign Policy for a Democratic President,” Foreign Affairs (May/June 2004), pp.47-63.

Chuck Hagel, “A Republican Foreign Policy,” Foreign Affairs (July/Aug 2004), pp.64-76.

ER: To be assigned.

Note this is a slightly revised syllabus from the one on your syllabus. Please follow this one rather than the old one. It contains all the readings up to Thanksgiving break.

Nov 4: Islam and Democracy (II)

Fareed Zakaria, “Islam, Democracy, and Constitutional Liberalism,” Political Science Quarterly (2004), pp.1-20.

Ray Takeyh, “Arab Democracy and U.S. Interests,” The National Interest (Spring 2004), pp.1-7.

David Remnick, “The Experiment: Will Turkey be the Model for Islamic Democracy,” The New Yorker (November 2002), pp.50-55.

David Phillips, “Turkey’s Dreams of Accession,” Foreign Affairs (Sept 2004), pp.86-97.

David Remnick, “Going Nowhere: Letter from Cairo,” The New Yorker, July 12, 2004, pp.74-83.

ER: President Bush, “Remarks by the President at the 20th Anniversary of the National Endowment for Democracy,” November 6, 2003.

*Note the Takeyh article substitutes for the Garfinkle article that is listed on the syllabus.

Nov 8: Saudi Arabia: Friend or Foe?

Michael Scott Doran, “The Saudi Paradox,” Foreign Affairs (Jan/Feb 2004), pp.35-51.

Robert Baer, “The Fall of the House of Saud,” The Atlantic Monthly (May 2003), pp.53-62.

Adam Garfinkle, “The Weak Vicissitudes of Saudi Bashing,” National Interest (Spring 2002), pp.144-150.

Martin Sieff, “Sand in our Eyes: U.S.-Saudi Relations After Iraq,” The National Interest (Summer 2004), pp.93-100.

*Note the Hanson article on the syllabus has been dropped and the Sieff article is mandatory rather than required. There is no ER reading for this class.

November 11: Iran: Reform, Revolution, and Nuclear Proliferation

Ray Takeyh, “Iran: From Reform to Revolution?” Survival (Spring 2004), pp.131-144.

Geoffrey Kemp, “How to Stop the Iranian Bomb,” The National Interest (Summer 2003), pp.48-58.

Ray Takeyh, “Iran’s Nuclear Calculations,” World Policy Journal (Summer 2003), pp.21-28.

Reuel Marc Gerecht, “Regime Change in Iran,” The Weekly Standard, August 5, 2002, pp.30-33.

Joe Klein, “Shadow Land: Who’s Winning the Fight for Iran’s Future?” The New Yorker, Feb 18, 2002, pp.66-76.

ER: Giles Kepel, Jihad: The Trail of Political Islam (2002), pp.106-135.

*This section is exactly the same as the syllabus.

Nov 15: The Arab-Israeli Conflict (1)

Benny Morris, “The Rejection,” The New Republic, April 2003, pp.1-14.

Rashid Khalidi, “A Universal Jubilee? Palestinians 50 Years After 1948,” Tikkun (1998), pp.53-56.

Jerome Slater, “What Went Wrong: The Collapse of the Israeli-Palestinian Peace Process,” Political Science Quarterly (2001), pp.171-199.

Norman Podhoretz, “Oslo: The Peacemongers Return,” Commentary (October 2001), pp.21-33.

Dennis B. Ross, “Yasir Arafat,” Foreign Policy (July/Aug 2002), pp.18-26.

ER: Jeffrey Goldberg, “Among the Settlers,” The New Yorker, May 31, 2004, pp.47-69. Please note that this is the ER reading for the next class as well. It is a very disturbing article and worth a read.

*Note the ER reading on Hamas has been dropped from original syllabus.

November 18: The Arab-Israeli Conflict (2)

David Makovsky, “How to Build a Fence,” Foreign Affairs (March/April 2004), pp.50-64.

Tony Judt, “Israel: The Alternative,” The New York Review of Books, October 23, 2003.

Leon Wieseltier, “Israel, Palestine, and the Return of the Binational Fantasy,” The New Republic, October 18, 2003.

Hillel Halkin, “Beyond the Geneva Accord,” Commentary (January 2004), pp.21-28.

Martin Indyk, “A Trusteeship For Palestine?” Foreign Affairs (May/June 2003), pp.51-66.

Fiamma Nirenstein, “How Suicide Bombers Are Made,” Commentary (Sept 2001), pp.53-55.

ER: Finish up the Goldberg reading

Nov 22-No class

Nov 29: Iraq: The War and the Aftermath (I)

Lawrence Freedman, “War in Iraq: Selling the Threat,” Survival, Summer 2004, pp.7-50.

Efraim Karsh, “Making Iraq Safe for Democracy,” Commentary (April 2003), pp.22-28.

Kenneth Pollack, “Next Step Baghdad,” Foreign Affairs (Mar/April 2002), pp.32-47.

ER: Kenneth Pollack, “Spies, Lies, and Weapons: What Went Wrong,” The Atlantic Monthly (Jan-Feb 2004), pp.78-92.

Dec 2: Iraq: The War and the Aftermath (2)

Larry Diamond, “What Went Wrong in Iraq,” Foreign Affairs (Sept/Oct 2004), pp.34-56.

George Packer, “Caught in the Crossfire: Will Moderate Iraqis Embrace Democracy,” The New Yorker, May 17, 2004, pp.63-73.

Victor Davis Hanson, “Iraq’s Future and Ours,” Commentary (January 2004), pp.15-20.

Nir Rosen, “Home Rule: Letter from Fallujah,” The New Yorker, July 5, 2004, pp.48-53.

Nancy Birdsall, “Saving Iraq From Its Oil,” Foreign Affairs (July/Aug 2004), pp.77-89.

ER: To be assigned

Dec 5: America and Europe: The Troubled Alliance

Robert Kagan, “America’s Crisis of Legitimacy,” Foreign Affairs (March/April 2004), pp.65-87.

Ivo Daalder, “The End of Atlanticism,” Survival (Summer 2003), pp.147-166.

Christopher Caldwell, “How Do I Hate Thee: The Global Anti-American Left,” The Weekly Standard, November 25, 2002, pp.25-30.

Adam Gopnik, “The Anti-Anti-Americans,” The New Yorker, September 1, 2003, pp.30-36.

ER: Takis Michas, “America the Despised,” The National Interest (Spring 2002), pp.94-102.

Dec 9-Open class

Readings to be determined.

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