POL 3520 Politics of Poverty

This course views poverty as a socially constructed artifact-an effect of political ideas and decisions-and a source of continuing political controversy. The course explores the ways in which poverty and inequality are defined and measured as well as the extent of poverty and its effects on different population groups. Various theories that attempt to explain the causes of poverty and prescribe solutions are explored in the context of a study of U.S. poverty policy from the Great Depression through the present. U.S. approaches to poverty are also explored in relation to comparable industrial democracies. Prerequisite(s): POL 1100 OR POL 1200
Credits: 3.0