DOC PREVIEW
U of R LDST 309 - Syllabus LDST 309
Pages 5

This preview shows page 1-2 out of 5 pages.

Save
View full document
View full document
Premium Document
Do you want full access? Go Premium and unlock all 5 pages.
Access to all documents
Download any document
Ad free experience
View full document
Premium Document
Do you want full access? Go Premium and unlock all 5 pages.
Access to all documents
Download any document
Ad free experience
Premium Document
Do you want full access? Go Premium and unlock all 5 pages.
Access to all documents
Download any document
Ad free experience

Unformatted text preview:

Leadership and the Common Good LDST 309 Fall 2011 Course Syllabus Instructor: Dr. Douglas A. Hicks Office: Jepson Hall, Room 134 E-mail: [email protected] Phone: 287-6891 (office) Lakeview ―office hour‖: Monday, 4:00 – 5:00 p.m. (and by appointment) Class meeting time: Thursday 3:00 – 5:40 p.m. Class location: Lakeview 112 Purpose This course examines political, economic, moral, and religious approaches to how societies determine and pursue goods in common. The course is structured around the comparative exercise of conceiving, measuring, and achieving goals of a well-functioning society. What is well-being, how do individuals and societies determine it, and how do leaders help communities to achieve it? How do different societies balance, or trade off, individual and collective welfare? How have leaders in various contexts moved citizens to embrace common goals? In talk of ―common good,‖ which interests are prioritized and which are left out? The principal political contexts of comparison are the United States, the Scandinavian countries, and Mediterranean Europe. We will also examine questions of deprivation, development, and global assistance as they relate to other regions of the industrialized and two-thirds world. Finally, some assignment and activities will apply these perspectives on common good and collective well-being to the metropolitan Richmond context and local leadership initiatives. Seen another way, the purpose of this course is to engage a group of fifteen sophomore scholars (and their professor, and their resident advisor) in a shared intellectual and co-curricular adventure that is unlike any other in their undergraduate career. It will be incumbent upon each participant to draw upon their own academic background and intellectual talent and creativity to make their own contributions to this common enterprise. In addition to weekly reading and writing assignments, seminar discussions, and individual research projects and a midterm examination, this course includes occasional talks, discussions, and outside-of-class activities; a group project; and preparation for a weeklong travel seminar, in January 2011, to Madrid, Cordoba, and Granada, Spain. Learning Objectives: - Understand and articulate various conceptions (economic, political, moral, and religious) of individual and collective well-being - Learn how leaders succeed or fail in creating a commonly held vision - Gain an appreciation for how leaders and citizens can frame public goals - Understand cross-cultural differences in conceptions of self-interest and communal goods - Clarify students’ own conceptions of the social goods deserving of common pursuit2 Leadership, Newspapers, and Contemporary Society Students are strongly encouraged to follow current events online, especially in order to follow stories providing concrete examples for the study of leadership and the common good. We will be focusing on issues of local interest and of national application in the U.S., Spanish, and Danish contexts. Thus, websites such as these will be of significant value: www.timesdispatch.com; www.nytimes.com; www.washingtonpost.com; www.bbc.co.uk/news/; www.economist.com; www.elpais.es; www.abc.es; www.elmundo.es; www.jp.dk; www.politiken.dk; www.cphpost.dk. Required Texts (Available for purchase at the UR bookstore) Esping-Andersen, Gøsta, The Incomplete Revolution: Adapting to Women's New Roles (Polity, 2009). ISBN: 0745643167. Gilbert, Daniel. Stumbling on Happiness (Vintage, 2007 [2006]). ISBN: 9781400077427. Hooper, John. The New Spaniards, second ed. (Penguin, 2006). ISBN: 0141016094. Menocal, María Rosa, Ornament of the World: How Muslims, Jews, and Christians Created a Culture of Tolerance in Medieval Spain (Back Bay Books, 2002). ISBN: 9780316168717. Nussbaum, Martha. Creating Capabilities: The Human Development Approach. (Belknap/Harvard, 2011). ISBN: 0674050541. Sen, Amartya. Identity and Violence: The Illusion of Destiny. (W.W. Norton, 2006/07). ISBN 0393329291. Zuckerman, Phil. Society Without God: What the Least Religious Nations Can Tell Us about Contentment (New York University Press, 2010). ISBN: 0814797237. Harvard Business School case study (available for purchase at HBS Web site): Daemmrich, Arthur and Benjamin Kramarz, ―Denmark: Globalization and the Welfare State‖ Course Components and Requirements - Class Contribution (10% of course grade) The first mark of a successful course is the active participation of each member of the class. Students are expected to attend—and arrive promptly for—all class meetings and to engage fully in the discussions and activities. The course also includes two or three required events outside of class time. The key element of class discussion is quality, not quantity, of participation. Each student will be responsible for co-leading at least two discussions during the course of the semester, drawing upon their weekly essays and other preparations. Cell phones, BlackBerrys, etc., must be turned off or to ―all sounds off‖ mode. Students are permitted to use their laptops to take notes, but they are not permitted to use any3 electronic device for texting, sending IM, emailing, Web surfing, etc. It is by now counter-cultural to switch our brains to ―all distractions off‖ mode—but this kind of focus is needed in order to accomplish the goals of our seminar. Students will be penalized by three percentage points from their final grade for each unexcused absence beyond one absence. - Weekly Essays (10% of course grade) By 11 p.m. each Wednesday evening, the student must post, on the course’s Blackboard site, an essay of no more than 500 words on the assigned reading for the following day. The essay should engage directly, critically, and imaginatively with one or more central ideas of the text(s). Of all of the weeks for which an essay is assigned, each student may opt out of two of those weeks’ essays. Although a grade will not be assigned to each paper, students will receive (at mid semester) a grade with comments for the essays of the first half of the term and, at semester’s end, a grade for the remainder of the essays. - Papers (40% of course grade) Paper #1 (15%) Monday, September 26 Measures of Well-being A fuller description of this assignment will be provided with sufficient time prior to


View Full Document

U of R LDST 309 - Syllabus LDST 309

Course: Ldst 309-
Pages: 5
Documents in this Course
Load more
Download Syllabus LDST 309
Our administrator received your request to download this document. We will send you the file to your email shortly.
Loading Unlocking...
Login

Join to view Syllabus LDST 309 and access 3M+ class-specific study document.

or
We will never post anything without your permission.
Don't have an account?
Sign Up

Join to view Syllabus LDST 309 2 2 and access 3M+ class-specific study document.

or

By creating an account you agree to our Privacy Policy and Terms Of Use

Already a member?