RA I

Culture
History
Literature
Sociology
Political Science

American Conceptions of Democracy between Canonization and Crisis

Key Topics:

• Contemporary discourses on the crisis of democracy
• “Democracy” as self-description in North American politics, culture and society
• Democracy and democratization as elements of U.S. and Canadian foreign policy
• The United States and Canada as democracies ‘in the world’
• Democracy as a discursive construct, communicative practice, and literary imagination: metaphor, narration, dramaturgy
• Analytical frameworks: cyclical systemic crises or fundamental change?
• “We the People”: Immigration and Citizenship

RA II

Literature
Culture
History
Sociology
Political
Science
Economics

Race, Gender and Class as Competing Elements of North American Ideals of Democratization

Key Topics:

• “Identity politics” and/as/vs. “lifestyle politics”
• Indigenous activism in international perspective
• The literary public sphere as a national and transnational field of cultural democratization
• The Mexican-American borderlands as a transnational space
• Indigeneity in a post-colonial age
• Urban racial politics in the United States and Canada
• Racism and the topos of “a culture of poverty” in North American discourses on democracy
• Concepts and techniques of multicultural mediation, representation, and participation
• Multiculturalism and religious freedom

RA III

Political Science
Economics
History
Sociology
Culture

Multi-Polarization of American Politics

Key Topics:

• Multiple polarizations and alliances: market radicalism (left-wing and right-wing neoliberalism), nationalism, ‘classical’ liberalism, progressivism, and American socialism
• The role of religion and faith-based communities across the American political spectrum
• Shortcomings in democratic governance; tendencies of de-democratization in the United States and Canada
• Democracy and representation in the “multi-level” systems of Canada and the United States
• Structural origins of dysfunctionalities of the U.S. political system
• Tensions between public and private accountability in North American democracies
• Alt-right and the neo-fascist International

RA IV

Literature
Culture
Sociology
History

Aesthetics of Democracy

Key Topics:

• Competing concepts and practices of democratic art throughout American history
• Crises of representation as democratic crises?
• Democratized aesthetics and quotidian digital media
• Competing practices of democratic aesthetics in American literature after postmodern avant-gardism
• Academization of popular culture vs. popularization of ‘high’-cultural sectors
• The media ecology of North American democracies
• The politics of language and issues of multilingualism in the United States and Canada
• Aestheticization of politics

RA V

Sociology
Culture
Literature
Political
Science
History
Economics

Publics and Counterpublics

Key Topics:

• Developments after the repeal of the Fairness Doctrine
• Literature, film and television as subsets of the public sphere
• Changes in the literary field in reaction to the ‘attention economy’ and digital communication
• News cultures: medial and political dynamics of ‘the news’ in North America
• Social media and the new structural transformation of the public sphere (in the fields of print media, post-cinema, and digital-age television)
• Public and Cultural Diplomacy and its domestic repercussions
• (New) political cultures of affect
• Social articulation and political mobilization in times of #BlackLivesMatter and #MeToo

RA VI

Economics
History
Political
Science
Sociology

Economic and Financial Crises

Key Topics:

• Financial crises in historical perspective
• North American trade in international perspective
• Political and social dimensions of the financial crisis
• The significance of global disequilibrium
• Financialization of the North American economy
• Financialization of North American politics
• Economics and democratic theory
• Modernization and international cooperation

RA VII

Economics
Political
Science
Sociology
History

Democracy and Inequality

Key Topics:

• Socioeconomic inequality and political reform throughout American history
• Societal effects of inequality
• The evolution of functional income distribution in the digital age
• Tax-transfer-spending battle lines in the fiscal future
• The decline of the middle class and the crisis of democracy
• The financial system and the political economy of ‘rent-seeking’
• Democracy and the future of work
• Mechanisms of inclusion and exclusion

RA VIII

Political Science
History
Culture
Literature

Globalization, Democracy and (the End of?) American Hegemony

Key Topics:

• “America First”? Challenges to US-American hegemony
• Transnational networks and human rights
• The ‘foreign policy’ of American culture
• North American nation branding and nation building
• Multilateralism and global governance
• Sovereignty as an (endangered) ideal of state action
• Imaginary and political meanings of borders and border security
• Contemporary societal dynamics of migration
• Populism as a (global) challenge