Political Science

Wilfred M. McClay, Blankenship Chair in the History of Liberty, University of Oklahoma - Professor McClay is a prize-winning scholar of American intellectual and cultural history. He served for eleven years on the National Council on the Humanities and is a Senior Scholar at the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars. A prolific essayist, he is author of Why Place Matters: Geography, Identity, and Civic Life in Modern America; and The Masterless: Self and Society in Modern America.

Lecture by Professor Joshua Rubongoya, Roanoke College, “The Politics of Homophobia in Africa: Lessons from Uganda”

Lecture by Ambassador Richard LeBaron, Atlantic Council. Ambassador LeBaron is a career diplomat with over thirty years experience abroad and in Washington. His most recent overseas posting was as deputy chief of mission at the US embassy in London from August 2007 to August 2010. Ambassador LeBaron served as ahargé d’affaires in London from February to August 2009. Previous to his assignment to London, Ambassador LeBaron served as the US ambassador to Kuwait (2004 to 2007).

Is Civility Dead? Many Americans believe the 2016 presidential election has been unusually vicious. But concerns about civility are hardly limited to political campaigns or to the current day. Given the long history of rudeness in the United States, is civility even possible? And even if it’s possible, is civility desirable? Why not just celebrate free speech and tell people they need to develop a thicker skin? Join us for a discussion of how and why we should all get along. Keith J. Bybee the Paul E. and the Hon. Joanne F.

“Ill fares the land, to hastening ills a prey, Where wealth accumulates, and men decay” —Oliver Goldsmith, “The Deserted Village” (1770) Inequality is on the rise in the contemporary global economy, both within prosperous economies and between developed and developing countries. Can democracy sustain itself while acquiescing in a growing gap between the world’s haves and have-nots? Does the American dream depend on a foundation of shared prosperity that is increasingly a historical artifact?

This will be an informal lunch with faculty to build awareness about programs at the Middlebury Institute of international studies in Monterey. Maren Gauldin, assistant director of global recruiting at MIIS, and Orion Lewis, professor of political science and faculty advisor for accelerated degrees, will provide brief audiovisual remarks briefing attendees on the structure of the recently announced accelerated degree offerings.

“Ecologies of Freedom: Global Political Thinking in the Age of Socrates” A lecture by Joel Alden Schlosser, Department of Political Science, Bryn Mawr College Drawing on the ancient historian Herodotus as well as ancient Greek poetic and scientific texts, this talk will consider an underappreciated strand of political thinking in the classical world, one deeply concerned with the complexity and interdependency of geography, culture, and political structure among diverse groups of people.

Commencement reception for Polical Science Seniors and their families.

Commencement reception for Polical Science Seniors and their families.

Mary Gallagher is an Associate Professor of Political Science at the University of Michigan, where she is also the Director of the Center for Chinese Studies, and a faculty associate at the Center for Comparative Political Studies at the Institute for Social Research. The underlying question that drives her research in all of these areas is whether the development of markets is linked to the sequential development of democratic politics and legal rationality. Put simply, she is interested in the relationships between capitalism, law and democracy.