In their book, Why Nations Fail, Acemoglu and Robinson argue that nation-states will only be sustainably prosperous when they have functioning inclusive political and economic institutions. I would suggest that inclusivity – valuing, respecting, and accepting all people regardless of disabilities, ethnic origin, gender, gender identity, race, religion, sexual orientation, or socioeconomic status – has been historically rare and that exclusion has been a tool for power creation by those that understand politics and economics as zero-sum games. If Acemoglu and Robinson are correct, this implies that inclusion allows for the best people to do the best work – i.e. that the market will determine prosperity as a function of merit. To determine where your nation-state is suffering from limited inclusion, we will look at who in your nation-state is being disenfranchised, marginalized, or outright oppressed. I.e. we will look at who is not being treated as a full citizen with all attendant rights. We will then want to see what reasons are given for this treatment. The assumption here is that most of these reasons point to a cultural logic that informs identity: who am I/who are we is a definition of contrast to who those other people are. ACTION STEPS: 1) Find one disenfranchised, marginalized, or oppressed group in your chosen nation-state 2) Research the history behind this with a specific focus on reasons given for why this treatment might be somehow “acceptable” in the cultural logic of the hegemony. Do the reasons speak to issues of race, religion, gender or some other identity marker? 3) Write a short summary (up to 275 words) of your findings and submit by the due date. Cite your sources parenthetically.