A. Lee Hannah

View course descriptions of the classes that I regularly teach. Please reach out [lee.hannah[at]wright.edu] if you have questions about any class or want to see if it can fit with your program and interests.

PLS 2120: American National Government

“A people who mean to be their own governors must arm themselves with the power which knowledge gives.”

- James Madison

This class aims to equip you to be a well-informed citizen who sees the complexity, the flaws, and the promise of the American political system. As James Madison stated, in order for democracy to flourish, we need to be armed with knowledge. Unfortunately, many Americans are ill-informed or uninterested in the political process. To the untrained observer, American government can often seem confusing, frustrating, mean-spirited, and dominated by self-interested elites and corporations. However, politics is a process by its very nature designed to take these preferences and combine them with those of everyone else, enacting policy decisions in a peaceful manner. Given this goal, what expectations should we have of our political system and how well do we believe it represents the will of the public?

The goal of this course is to introduce you to political science as a discipline while teaching you the fundamentals of government and politics in the United States. T Rather, the goal of this class is to teach you how to think critically about politics and to understand how political scientists understand and study politics. At the end of this course, you should understand the systemic forces – the rules, structures, and procedures – that structure politics as practiced in the United States. Moreover, you should have the tools to assess critically the causal claims made by politicians and journalists, to be a conscientious consumer of political information, and to understand how political parties, the media, and interest groups interact with political institutions to affect policy change in the United States.

This course is offered regularly online and in-person.

PLS 4020/6020: Mass Media & Politics

“The basis of our governments being the opinion of the people, the very first object should be to keep that right; and were it left to me to decide whether we should have a government without newspapers, or newspapers without a government, I should not hesitate a moment to prefer the latter. but I should mean that every man should receive those papers & be capable of reading them.”

- Thomas Jefferson

The press is often referred to as the fourth branch of government, in reference to its fundamental role in disseminating information citizens need to make political decisions in our republican system of government and holding leaders accountable for their policies and behavior. However, American media organizations face a number of serious challenges in the 21st Century: a decline in gatekeeping power, increasing public mistrust, economic competition and uncertainty, and hostility from the elites and the masses.

This course will lead students through an in-depth examination of the American press, focusing on political science scholarship but also drawing insights from the fields of communication, psychology, journalism, sociology, and law. We will study how organizational structures, economic incentives, and professional norms shape the production of news content. A secondary focus of this class is human behavior in consuming political information. We will study how we learn from the news, how we decide what information to accept or reject, and how we communicate political information to others.

PLS4350/6350: Political Corruption

“In framing a government which is to be administered by men over men, the great difficulty lies in this: you must first enable the government to control the governed; and in the next place oblige it to control itself.”

- James Madison, Federalist #51

In this course, we will examine the wide-ranging causes and consequences of political corruption. Political corruption, broadly defined as the misuse of public office for private gain, is a fundamental challenge of public administration. Corruption is an economic, political, and human rights problem. Corruption can undermine economic growth and lead to political instability. Furthermore, corruption is unavoidable in an increasingly bureaucratized and globalized world. We will learn about the different types of corruption, the historical origins of corruption, and the consequences of corruption. We will discuss how political theorists, policymakers, and scholars have tried to understand and prevent corruption. Finally, we will look at corruption at the highest levels in the U.S. Presidency focusing on the investigations of U.S. presidential administrations.

PLS 4050/6050: Polarization in American Politics

“Moderation in temper is always a virtue; but moderation in principle is always a vice.”

- Thomas Paine

One of the most common themes in current discussion about American politics is polarization. The term has been loosely used to describe everything from radicalism and extremism to conflicts over norms related to culture, politics, race, and religion. In turn, political polarization has been identified as the main reason for legislative gridlock, political incivility, the rise of extremist groups, and the rise of conspiracy theories. In this course, we will explore polarization as it relates to the increasing division between the masses and the elites on political issues. We will explore the evidence of political polarization that scholars have compiled and investigate the potential causes of polarization. We will also engage with evidence that pushes back on the polarization narrative. Is polarization as bad, or as unprecedented, as pundits make it out to be?

PLS 3220/5220: State Government

While our attention is most often drawn to the political events in Washington, D.C., a great deal of the policymaking that impacts our daily lives occurs in statehouses across the 50 states. Indeed, state governments legislate on issues including welfare, healthcare, social policies, education, criminal law, infrastructure, and many others. Understanding how state institutions and behavior shape policy outcomes is substantively interesting, but the states also provide political scientists with opportunities to examine larger questions about topics such as power, representation, and responsiveness. They do so by providing a comparative context for testing how variation in institutions and political behavior relate to these broader concepts. This course will address both how the states themselves are substantively interesting, as well as how they are used to understand broader issues in political science and governance.

PLS 4030/6030: Campaigns & Elections

This class focuses primarily on campaigns and elections in the United States. In particular, this course emphasizes political parties’ role in governance and elections; the strategic elements of political campaigns; the federalized nature of elections administration; and the determinants of citizens’ electoral behavior. We will learn about the peculiarities of elections and use past elections to provide proper context for the current election cycle. The course is broken into four units: 1) The Design & Purpose of Elections; 2) Understanding the Electorate; 3) The Campaigns and the Candidates; 4) Post-Election: Making Sense of the Results of the Last Election.

PLS 3370/5570 The Legislative Process

Legislatures are instrumental to the function of representative democracy in the United States. At a very basic level, the size of our population and the resulting transaction costs makes direct democracy untenable. Legislative bodies reduce these costs by selecting a few individuals who collectively deliberate and create laws on behalf of society.

Today, Congress and legislatures are met with deep skepticism and concern. While many citizens believe their member of Congress does a good job representing their interests, they also believe the institutions themselves are broken, corrupt, inefficient, and perhaps, unnecessary. What causes people to have such disparate views? How do the institutions of Congress actually function and who has influence over legislation?

This course is about legislatures in the United States and the lawmaking process. We will explore several topics central to legislatures, including how they evolved, the rules that structure their operation, who serves, and what influences legislators’ behavior once in office. We will also examine how legislatures interact with other political actors including parties, interest groups, and other branches of government. This course is designed to move beyond social commentary and take a broader look at the institutions of legislatures and the behavior of its members.

PLS 4240/6240: American Public Policy Analysis

Who is best qualified to make good public policy, elected leaders or trained experts? Is a policy best delivered from the federal, state, or local government? How do we balance personal liberty with the collective good in ensuring public health? What should be taught in public schools and who should decide?

This course introduces students to public policy and the professional practice of policy development and analysis. We discuss the struggle over competing values and ideas in the policy making process. We will explore how the selection and definition of policy goals (i.e., equity, efficiency, welfare, liberty, and security), problem definitions, and solutions shape our evaluation of public policy.

Students will build skills in policy research and writing skills required of policy analysts. Policies include: public health, education, environmental, criminal justice, drugs, poverty, disaster response, and more.

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