Spring 2020

This course examines public opinion in American Politics and how to measure it.  The course considers the nature of public opinion, survey methods, the role of polling in opinion expression, opinion formation, citizen knowledge, the role of media in shaping opinion, the effect of opinion on policy, and political polarization.

Course themes:

1. What is public opinion and in what ways is it expressed?

2. How do surveys perform as measures of public opinion and what is their role in our democracy? Are they accurate? What do they measure?

3. What are the implications of the changes in technology for surveys?

4. Are citizens knowledgeable? Are they rational or self-interested?

5. Is the public polarized?

6. How does the media influence public opinion?

7. What role does opinion play in shaping policy?

NOTE: This description is from Spring 2015

This course examines the politics and policy of contemporary Japan, applying a range of theoretical perspectives to analyze both recent history and current events. After a brief historical review, we survey the core political institutions of the postwar era, examine patterns of political interaction, and investigate current debates over policy issues. We focus particularly on political change since 1993, including the new electoral system and party realignment. Specific topics include social issues, the economic crisis, political and economic reform, U.S.-Japan relations, defense and foreign policy.

Subfield:   Comparative Politics

Please note that this course description is from Fall 2013

 This course is designed primarily for students interested in exploring in depth the relationship between U.S. foreign policy and developments in East Asia. Although geographically quite distant from the Asian mainland, the United States has been deeply involved militarily, diplomatically and economically with that region since the 19^th Century. Since the defeat of Japan in the Pacific component of World War II, the United States has maintained a strong military presence throughout the Asia-Pacific and has fought costly wars in Korea and Viet-Nam, all as integral components of the Cold War. More recently, the rise of China; the cross-Straits problem surrounding Taiwan; the economic torpor of Japan; the continued division of the Korean peninsula and the nuclear program of North Korea; along with the potential for Muslim terrorism in Southeast Asia are but a few of the problems that animate the foreign policy interactions between East Asia and the United States. This course will explore the historical and contemporary foreign policies of the United States toward Asia with an eye toward analyzing the ways in which Asia has been shaped by American, and in turn American policies have been shaped by events in Asia.

Students who took PS 191 "Junior Seminar: American Foreign Policy in East Asia" with Professor Pempel cannot take this course due to the substantial similarity in course content.

Note: The description is from Spring 2014

Over half of the world’s population is now urban.   As urban populations swell, metropolitan areas in both the developed and the developing world struggle to provide basic services and address the negative externalities associated with rapid growth.   Sanitation, transportation, pollution, energy services, and public safety typically fall to sub-national governments.   Yet local sub-national institutions face difficulties as they tackle these challenges because development tends to spill over political boundaries and resources are limited.   Such difficulties are particularly acute in the developing world due to tighter resource constraints, weak institutions, and the comparative severity of the underlying problems.   Moreover, democratization and decentralization suggest that urban governance and service delivery may have become more democratic, but present challenges with respect to priority setting, coordination, and corruption.

This course will consider the political and institutional environment in which efforts to address metropolitan problems are developed, the financial and institutional vehicles used to provide services of different types, and the role of political parties and other forms of political organization in the development and allocation of services. Topics will include urban and sub-national institutions and political regime types, decentralization and multi-level governance, the rule of law and urban violence, civil society and popular mobilization, political party organization and mobilization strategies, public policy formulation, urban bureaucracies, corruption, the politics of urbanization, and the metropolitan political economy. Readings will be drawn primarily from Political Science, Sociology, Geography, and Economics.

Subfield:   Comparative Politics

This course is an introduction to theories and issues in international political economy. Our emphasis will be on understanding bargaining between rich and poor countries. In particular, we will examine the political and economic conditions conducive to the development of cooperative international economic behavior among countries. The first part of the course will consider three analytical approaches to interpret economic interaction among countries - liberalism, dependency, and mercantilism. This part of the course also will consider theories used to explain the evolution of international arrangements - regimes - in the international system. The second part of the course will focus on four issue areas of key significance for North-South relations: trade, money, multinationals, and commodities. Our emphasis will be on the post-World War II transformation of rules and behavior in these issue-areas. The third and concluding part of the course will review the theoretical ideas and examine the prospects of the less-developed countries in the international system and the future of international economic cooperation. PS 126A is a prerequisite for PS 126B, which examines foreign economic policy.

Subfield: International Relations

Please note the description is from Spring 2013

Should nations intervene in other countries to prevent human rights abuses or famine? On what principles should immigration be based? Should wealthy states aid poorer states, and if so, how much? Is it ever right to go to war? And if so, when, and with what means? We will examine different traditions in moral thought and use these tools to make reasoned judgments about these and similar difficult moral problems such as these in world politics.

This course falls within the International Relations subfield.

Please note the description is from Spring 2013

The Middle East seems plagued by endless strife:  wars, civil wars, insurgencies, terrorism.  Is that perception true?  If so, why is this region so conflict-prone?   What factors motivate, constrain, and shape these conflicts?  How can policy makers influence war in the Middle East?  This undergraduate lecture class takes on these and other thorny questions.  It is a sequel to PS124A (“War!”) and builds on insights from that class to explore war in a particular part of the world.

This is not a class on Middle East politics.  It is an IR class focused less on the politics of particular states and more on relations between states, especially violent relations.  This is not a class on the Arab-Israeli conflict or on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.  Both are important cases of war in the Middle East and will be explored alongside other significant conflicts in the region. 

Most importantly:  This is not a class designed to defend a specific claim or theory about conflict in the Middle East.  On the contrary, this is a social science class:   My goal is to teach the importance of exploring pressing policy questions by testing the strengths and weaknesses of competing and often contradictory theories in an even-handed manner.  At the same time, students will be expected to reach their own conclusions and produce pragmatic recommendations in the form of policy memoranda.

This class begins, like its counterpart, with a historical overview of war in the region.  The second part of the class introduces theories that complement and elaborate on theories from PS124A:  arguments about the relationship between war and resources, religion, authoritarianism, civil-military relations, territorial disputes, sovereignty, and power.  In the third part of the course, we will explore current policy concerns related to conflict in the region:  Nuclear proliferation, terrorism, the civil war in Syria, the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, drone warfare, and the U.S. role in the region.

Are human rights women's rights? Are women's rights human rights? This course examines the international human rights system (treaties, conventions, institutions and case law) through the lens of gender, exploring the ways in which they are organized around gendered assumptions that shape and limit their ability to reach and remedy the reality of women's lives. The course also considers the tension between international human rights law and local gender justice as well as how international human rights have evolved in response to the rise of global feminisms. The course explores these issues through a series of case studies examining such issues as sexual violence, human trafficking, religious freedom and women's access to education, health care and employment.

Subfield: International Relations

Note: This description is from Fall 2013

Billions of dollars have been given to developing countries over the past fifty years, yet critics argue that aid is ineffectual and, worse yet, harmful to recipients. In this course, we will examine the politics surrounding the delivery of international aid, exploring who decides the aid agenda, which countries receive what aid and, once delivered, how aid interacts with the political dynamics of recipient communities. The course begins with a brief history of ‘development’ as a concept, tracing the international aid regime’s evolution over the last century, before turning to current debates over international assistance, highlighting throughout how politics pervades even the most ‘technical’ of aid interventions.

The course combines a traditional lecture format with the Harvard Business School case method. The case method asks students to collectively make a decision on a real-world case involving international aid. The case method highlights to students the strategic and ethical complexities of aid work, encouraging students to develop their ability to articulate clear, persuasive arguments and to engage in complex negotiations with their classmates. Active participation in case discussions is therefore central to the course grading structure.