The Politics of Pause: Understanding Police, Transit, and Garbage Strikes, and Government Shutdowns as States of Nature

October 7, 2022 - 10:00am to 11:00am

This Members only event will be held over Zoom.

The Politics of Pause: Understanding Police, Transit, and Garbage Strikes, and Government Shutdowns as States of Nature   

Civil worker strikes are relatively rare things in the United States, though we've experienced nine different government shutdowns since 1980 (when we started describing incidences of lapsed funding--per the 1884 Antideficiency Act--as "shutdowns"). However, moments when essential workers providing public goods cease to do so are fascinating to consider in the broader context of political thought. When police, transit workers, or garbage collectors strike, or when funds don't get provided to do other services, the very core of the Enlightenment ideas that backgrounded the United States experiment are tested and strained. This lecture will discuss some prominent examples in the US and elsewhere and think about how the nature of cessation and pause of services can (and ought) affect our understandings of the entire system of government. 

Andrew Lotz, PhD, serves as an Assistant Dean in Arts and Sciences, as well as a Lecturer and Advisor in the Department of Political Science at the University of Pittsburgh.

(Register online through the Member Registration website.)