Browse Hierarchy ULC335: Contemporary Theory II: Crisis

Marxists have long argued that capitalism tends towards 'crisis' but since the 2008 Financial Crash this vocabulary has become more widespread in relation to a range of issues such as climate change, migration and the rise of neofascist politics. Taking a step back and considering the term's analytical qualities, this module asks how crisis helps illuminate the unprecedented challenges of 21st century politics and examines different critical-theoretical approaches to manifestations of contemporary crisis. Crises occur when social formations can no longer be reproduced on the basis of pre-existing governing strategies and systems of social relations. Any given crisis means there is a systemic instability that can only be addressed through radical measures from various actors. This means that as well as studying authoritarian turns within liberal states, including emerging and ongoing forms of policing and racialisation, we will also look at the less familiar, sometimes improvisatory, forms of resistance pursued by subaltern peoples and social movements in turbulent times. The series of case studies in crisis on this module are intended to further develop students ' engagement with contemporary critical theory studied in semester 1. How have critical theorists made sense of these turbulent times? Sessions will include 'Urban militarization and the globalization of zero tolerance', 'Carceral Geographies and Surplus Populations', 'Infrastructures of Crisis: The Rise of Logistics', 'Circulation Struggles I: Gilets jaunes, gilets noirs', 'Circulation Struggles II: Indigeneous activism and anticolonial counterlogistics'