A Revival of Ideologies 2. Polarization and Democracy

Political polarization has become an unavoidable issue in European societies, to the point that half of the articles that have been written in all places and times on this topic were published in the last five years. There is a veritable avalanche of paper underway. But this is not only an emerging topic in political science, in the discipline that deals with the analysis of politics as an activity, but it is overwhelmingly present in sociology, anthropology, social psychology and the media. And this is perhaps the most important thing, there is an emotional polarization of the population, of hatred towards those who are not from one's own tribe, a diffuse feeling of anger and displeasure in people's daily lives, that deteriorates the relationships with others. As has been pointed out “we have become polarized” and we do not know how it happened. That is, polarization is not only an issue that affects European societies from an academic perspective, but it also signals a social and cultural change that makes diversity problematic.

In this CIVIS Blended Mobility course we want to illuminate this issue from the perspective of what we identify as a"Revival of ideological politics", that is, of politics aimed not at reaching a consensus to establish harmony in society,but that seeks a friend/foe confrontation understood as the political. In order to analyse this issue, we scheduled a series of multidisciplinary sessions where the revival of ideologies is addressed from a historical perspective, showing how the post-war consensus and the liberal consensus of the final decade of the 20th century have been followed by an unexpected extremism in European societies. This outcome threatens European integration due to exceptional conditions of diversity and accelerated social change. The assessment of this contemporary predicament will be deepened by using the approaches of sociology, political science, philosophy, anthropology and gender and religious studies. 

Main topics addressed

• Traditional and new ideologies
• Ideological politics versus political consensus.
• Classical ideologies and Populism
• Demagogues and political polarization
• Communicating ideology
• Political opinions
• Intellectuals, experts, and think tanks

-The students will have the opportunity to visit political institutions in Madrid; meet politicians of different ideologies; and visit think tanks that work creating ideas for Spanish political parties. In addition to this, teaching will take place as a conversation in between students and teachers in order to avoid the passive learning of lectures.

-The seminar will provide students with a full understanding of what ideologies are.

-The students will acquire a clear understanding of what polarization is in connection with the revival of ideologies.

-The students will become familiar with an inter-disciplinary view on the challenges that polarization and the revival of ideological politics have for European integration.

-The students will realize how ideological politics can be connected with social change and diversity.

-The course will provided a variety of methodological up-to-date approaches from different disciplines in order to study ideologies and social polarization.

-The course will foster students critical thinking on European social issues.

-The course will improve students abilities to foster their Master or PhD work.

Learning outcomes

The course will provide:

-An inter-disciplinary picture of the challenges that polarization and ideological politics pose to European societies.

-An up-to-day inter-disciplinary methodological approach on the topics of polarization and ideological politics in European society, focusing on diversity, social change, inequality, the rule of law and democratic institutions.

-Improved capacities to present complex topics in public and to write successfully academic essays.

-Foster the students critical thinking on polarization and ideological politics by discussing with students and teachers coming from different political and social contexts.

-Help to improve their master or PhD dissertations by presenting them to an audience interested in the same topics and with time and motivation to discuss at large.