TOPICS IN AREA STUDIES: Democracy in Theory and Practice (In-Person Course)

Democracy remains the most legitimate form of government worldwide. At the same time, there is widespread dissatisfaction with democracy even in places where it has long been established. In this course we will learn how democracy is supposed to work, why it usually does not work that way in practice, and various proposals for overcoming the problems. We consider everything from modest tweaks to the status quo to non-democratic alternatives through close examination of an eclectic array of scholarly and non-scholarly materials.

Subfield: Comparative Politics