Summer 2021

   Women make up around 49.5% of the global population, yet they are strikingly underrepresented when it comes to political office. Looking at the global average, women only hold 24% of seats at the parliamentary level. The percent of women in office varies drastically between countries. For example, quota-based countries like Rwanda have 60% women in parliament, whereas countries with unique electoral systems like Lebanon only have 4.7%. This course looks to explain this variation, and further understand the consequences of it. We will focus on questions such as: How do electoral systems affect women’s access to elected office?  What, if any, are the negative effects of imposing gender quotas? If elected, do women promote greater substantive representation? We will look into the potential for gender-based discrimination among socialized gender roles, voters, political parties, campaign policies, and the media. Please be advised that this is not a course on feminist theory, but rather an investigation of the barriers to women’s representation and political participation.

Instructor: Melanie Phillips

   For more than sixty years, the European Union has represented the world’s most advanced experiment in governance beyond the nation-state. More recently, however, this experiment has become mired in financial turbulence and growing social protest, and for the first time faces the withdrawal of a member. This course takes a broad view of the promise as well as the challenges of European integration. It looks at the EU’s institutional components, the events leading to the single currency in the 1990s, enlargement eastward into the post-socialist world, and the major crises that have been challenging Europe since 2008: the financial crisis, the rise of populism, and Brexit. These topics allow us to assess Europe’s ability to craft adequate responses to the challenges posed by economic transformation, terrorism, multiculturalism, and worldwide financial interdependence, and to come to a better understanding of the EU’s current and future role on the world stage.

Instructor: Matthew Stenberg

   Many scholars agree that groups and group identities are central to politics. But what constitutes a group? Why are some groups more salient than others? What is identity? And how do certain identities become central to political conflicts? This class combines theoretical and empirical approaches to these questions and emphasizes the complexity of group identity. We focus on racial and ethnic politics in the United States. Additionally, this class considers psychological theories of identity, comparative perspectives on immigration and racial identity, and the relationship between ethnic and non-ethnic identities including gender, class, and geography. We discuss foundational scholarship on Black politics and also emerging scholarship on White identity. We adopt a developmental and comparative perspective for the analysis of Latino and Asian-American panethnic identification. We also consider mechanisms of change in group identities. 

  The course is structured around a series of debates. What do we mean by “identity politics”? Does in-group bias arise from conflicting group interests and, if not, where does it come from? Can descriptive representation be a useful means for furthering group interests? How are group interests defined, and how do they change over time? Is it coherent to speak of group interests at all, or will the interests of groups always be contested? Finally, what effects (if any) can we expect demographic change to have on American politics? For each of these issues, this course aims to provide students with conceptual and empirical tools necessary to develop informed understandings of these debates.

Instructor: Joseph Warren

This course provides an overview of the U.S. political system from the nation's founding to the present. In addition to examining the core structures of our federal system, we will also explore a number of special topics, such as the evolution of civil rights and the causes of partisan gridlock. The course will pay particular attention to the role institutions play in shaping political conflict and, ultimately,in determining who wins and who loses.

Instructor: Thomas Kent

The overwhelming majority of governments throughout history have been dictatorial. Even the recent spread of democracy has not extirpated authoritarian rule: as of 2012 roughly one quarter of all countries are considered full-blown autocracies. Whatever the benefits of democracy, it seems dictatorship is here to stay. This course explores the characteristics and dynamics of non-democratic regimes: how and why they come about, what sustains them, why some people resist them and others do not, and how and why they decline and fall. We will explore a variety of examples from Africa, Asia, Europe, and Latin America. Using films and novels in addition to political science literature, we will investigate how dictators maintain their power, how ordinary people react to repression, and the links between dictatorship and security and economic development.

Subfield: Comparative Politics

Note: Course description is from Summer 2014

What can psychology tell us about why believe what they believe about current events, vote the way they do, or even perpetrate atrocities? This class explores the sources of public opinion and political behavior through the application of psychological theories about personality, cognition, social influence, and identity. The course focuses on both underlying psychological theories and concepts and their political implications. This class will largely focus on applications in United States politics and society, but I will include examples from other countries as well.

Political science deals with the behavior of individuals in settings of collective or group choice. The best course of action for any individual to take in such settings generally depends on the course of action taken by others with whom they interact. For instance, the best strategy by a candidate in an election campaign might depend on the strategy adopted by other candidates. The best approach for achieving gains in a peace settlement for one nation-state depends on how other nation-states will
react. Game theory is the analysis of decision making in situations where one individual's best action depends on the actions taken by other individuals. This course provides a relatively non-technical introduction to game theory and its application in social science, especially political science and also economics.

Course runs during Session C (June 21- August 13)

Please note you will NOT be able to take Political Science W135, if you are enrolled or have completed Political Science C135/ECON C110. This is an on-line variation of the course.

In addition, PS W135 is an advanced METHODS course. The course can NOT be used as a substitute for PS 3.  It also does NOT count towards the Political Theory distribution requirement.

Note: This description is from Summer 2015

This class, which focuses mostly on the domestic politics of India, has multiple aims.   In addition to providing an overview of political developments in India since independence, this online course assesses the nature of democratic participation and representation in contemporary India-the world's largest democracy. Course is scheduled to run  Session C (June 21 - August 13).

Please note you will NOT be able to take Political Science W145A, if you are enrolled or have completed Political Science 145A. This is an on-line variation of the course.

Note: Course description is from Summer 2013

This course provides an overview of some of the methods employed in political science research. Its purpose is to familiarize you with the scientific study of politics, and to teach you how to pose and answer empirical research questions using appropriate evidence and arguments. Along the way we will learn about how to formulate and evaluate theories, how to design research to discover whether a particular theory holds up empirically, and some basic research strategies. By the end of the course you should have the tools to critically evaluate the kinds of social science arguments found in everyday life and be able to conduct your own independent research.

Course runs during Session C (June 21- August 13)

Civil conflicts—civil wars and terrorist campaigns—are among the major threats to peace in the current system. This course addresses explores why, and to what end, civil conflicts fought. It then focuses in on the question of when, why, and how international actors intervene in civil conflicts—especially to end them. Students will have the opportunity to better understand what we know about civil conflict termination and international intervention in that process. These questions also produce answers about the processes by which peace agreements are signed; why peace sometimes lasts and what can be done to make peace more durable; as well as the longer-term prospects for rebuilding after war. This course draws on different theoretical and empirical approaches to actively ask and answer these questions. It is designed to help you: (1) actively engage with the existing research to begin to understand the causes, strategies, and consequences of civil conflict and international intervention, (2) broaden your theoretical framework in international relations generally, (3) develop your critical thinking and writing on these topics through in-class exercises, assignments, and discussion in sections.

Recommended:   Familiarity with social science methodology at the level of PS 3 is needed for this course.