Construct and Defend a Plan for Social Change Copy

A. Institutionalized Inequalities Persists

Sociology reveals that we live in a stratified society. An individual person’s access to social resources and opportunities varies markedly depending on numerous factors, including those associated with their social location at the always intersecting systems of institutionalized inequalities. Class, race, ethnicity, gender, nationality, religion, and sexual orientation are important predictors of patterned outcomes at the social group level, across institutions. Examining these arenas at a macro level allows sociologists to achieve a more sophisticated grasp of their workings and the larger social structural dynamics at play. This higher level thinking is also necessary to the creation of well-informed strategies designed to create new forms of justice. Half measures are arguably problematic. As Malcom X once said, “If you stick a knife in my back nine inches and pull it out six inches, there’s no progress. If you pull it all the way out that’s not progress. Progress is healing the wound that the blow made” (1964, but as relevant as ever today).

B. People Make History

Sociology also reveals that people make history. We are historical agents who help (re)produce and (potentially) transform institutions and culture moment-to-moment throughout our days perpetually. As historical agents, we have the capacity to contribute to positive change in our daily lives. A more just and sustainable world is possible and looming. “Another world is not only possible, she is on her way. On a quiet day, I can hear her breathing.” (Arundhati Roy)

C. Social Policy is an Excellent Avenue for Concrete and Critically Informed Social Change.
Social policy is an excellent avenue for achieving social justice because it moves human and economic resources and facilitates enacting concrete actions for concrete change. Importantly, it allocates our combined social wealth (tax dollars, human energy). We can continue to invest policy dollars and energy into war, policing, punishment, and corporate welfare–deepening the existing social relationships and macro patterns of unequal power. Another route, already underway, is to shift our resources toward policy efforts that address social inequities at their roots, and nourish healthy communities. Your readings in the final section of the class include policy platforms that you may consider models for this paper (though your proposal will necessarily be much smaller in scope, given word count limits).
Other strategies for social change include but are not limited to legislation (lawmaking by representative government or other governmental bodies), litigation (using the courts), research (the work of think tanks, universities, organizations, activists), community organizing (movement building; awareness-building; mobilization; protest; cultural, solidarity, mutual aid work; art and music (immensely important in social movements and social change), and educating ourselves and others on histories and contemporary realities of racism from a critical race perspective (note: education, even critical education, is not enough, but it is an essential ingredient to transforming institutions). Any of above strategies can be driven by social policy. Social change is created and facilitated by people; we are the ones who can build a more just and peaceful future.
The selections in weeks 7 and 8 provide critically informed and carefully conceived and articulated policy proposals for social change. As Angela Y. Davis boldly said, “You have act as if it were possible to radically transform the world. And you have to do it all the time.” The Latin root of the word radical is “rad”—for “root.” Radical change, for Davis and many theorists of change, means addressing social problems at their deepest roots. Mass incarceration is an example of why we need to deepen and shift our thinking and responding to social problems from treating symptoms to long-term prevention and institutional transformation. We can see that broken windows policing and mass incarceration are bandages for many of our most deeply entrenched injustices of race and class, bandages that often (re)entrench racial injustices. Official responses to criminalized behaviors make members of certain racialized or otherwise historically marginalized groups vulnerable to devastating patterns of overpolicing and overincarceration, yet our governments continue to use them as a frontline response to vast arenas of conduct that have been criminalized in specifically racialized, gendered, and classed forms. To eliminate injustice, we will need to develop long-term, multigenerational strategies that address racial and other inequities in our institutions at their roots. With a critical understanding of the issues and the vision it creates, we could imagine policies and other community efforts that fulfill human needs and promote healing, justice, and flourishing communities long-term. For the purposes of this paper, I recommend that you put aside concerns of what would easily pass through electorates, legislatures, and courts and imagine and document policy ideas you think might actually help move us toward a more just future.
II. INSTRUCTIONS and MINIMUM REQUIREMENTS
Be up to date on the course readings from Section II of the course (See the Course Schedule in the printable syllabus): Your essay requires you to select a minimum of 4 reading selections that substantiate your proposal for change.

Read this entire document to frame and direct your essay writing. Come back to it often as you write to ensure your essay meets expectations.

Choose a social justice issue currently affecting members of a social group or groups in your community or beyond.

It can be any social issue or case of injustice or discrimination based on social group membership.

Write: Construct and defend a hypothetical social policy effort in response.

Here is where the major writing and thinking comes in! Your proposed social change effort should:

Introduce your topic and establish its importance (your Intro)

Clearly articulate each aspect of your policy plan. Plan features will depend on your vision and the type of effort but should include a problem or vision statement (brief!) and concrete steps your plan will involve. The plan should be narrow enough in scope to allow you to describe and discuss it in the few pages allotted for the assignment. Be specific. Use our policy readings from Mijente, the Movement for Black Lives, and the Women’s March as examples to inform your selection and presentation of policy changes.

Defend the choices in the plan throughout the essay, using evidence from course content—especially readings, but also discussions comments, films, and instructor comments. Dig deeply into course sources to substantiate your choices throughout the essay. If your proposal is inconsistent with arguments by other authors in Section II of the class, your proposal should engage with or counter those authors explicitly.

Ground your plan in long-term vision and a critical grasp and the institutionalized and historical nature of social problems. Remember that service provision is important but will not necessarily address social problems at their roots and may in fact perpetuate them.

Analyze at the institutional level To understand social problems sociologically, we need to assess them in historical and institutional contexts—especially macro-level relationships of power. Be sure to maintain a critical focus on large-scale social forces like institutionalized racism, class inequality, cis-hetero-sexism, or other major axes of power, as you devise and justify your plan.

UPLOAD YOUR ESSAY In the following format:

800-1000 words in length, minimum.
edited and revised for clarity, conciseness, organization, and rigor in responding directly to the prompt.
written and edited to avoid plagiarism: Click here for very important guidelines on academic integrity
deeply engaged with the texts and other course sources. The essay must engage with and cite:
at least four separate required course sources from the Section II of the course (two of which must be policy platforms from weeks 7 & 8, the other two may be any selection assigned in part II of the course [Modules 5-8])
at least one Peer Comment, Film selection, or Lecture—cite one or more peer or instructor comments, or films, from the Section II of the course [Modules 5-8]
This assignment is geared toward assessing the degree to which you have mastered course sources. I highly recommend focusing on in-class sources. No need to use outside sources here. Your references to these sources should involve in-depth engagement and show a comprehensive grasp of them. Try to go beyond in-passing mentions that do not delve beneath the surface, and instead dig deeply into sources
Please BOLD *and* NUMBER all citations to make them easy for your instructor to find while reviewing hundreds of papers this finals week (R1 through R4+ (for readings–in no particular order]), C+ (for peer comments), F1+ (for film), L (for lecture).