Readings:
- Alexander, The New Jim Crow, Introduction (187-203)
- Walker, Drugs in the Western Hemisphere, Pt. 6 Intro and Ch. 46 (195-7; 229-249)
Reading Questions:
1. According to Michelle Alexander, how has the War on Drugs served to create a new racialized caste system in the United States? What role does the U.S. criminal justice system play in upholding this system?
2. According to William Walker, how did narco-diplomacy promote U.S. hegemony over the Andean nations of Bolivia, Peru, and Colombia in the 1980s? What domestic challenges led the leaders of the Andean nations to accept U.S. aid and intervention? What strategies did they pursue in the 1990s to break free from U.S. hegemony?
Note: “Hegemony” is basically a fancy academic word for “power.” However, in contrast to the term “domination,” hegemony operates by garnering consent among those over whom power is wielded. In other words, hegemony requires the participation of the subordinate group (in this case leading members of Andean nation states) in their own subordination, even if that participation is half-hearted or resentful. Hegemony is often maintained either by ideology (adherence to the moral authority of the hegemonic power) or by affording certain compensating advantages (recognition on the part of the subordinate group that rejecting the authority of the dominant group would entail greater pains than accepting it).
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