Introduction to Comparative Politics

Course Overview

Anchored in and informed by history, this course will analyze the foundation of modern politics. It will offer an analytic overview of such key concepts as the state; modern governing mechanisms such as legislatures and executives; and spend a considerable time looking at that quintessentially modern political structure called “party”. Moreover, the course will offer an understanding as to how collective identities express themselves politically. Thus, particular emphasis will be given to conflict (as well as consensus) surrounding such collectives as class, ethnicity, religion, gender and, above all, that of nation. We will analyze all these topics in the framework of the three major modes of political development that informed the 20th century and that continue to play central roles in our contemporary lives albeit under different names and labels: liberal democracy; fascism and socialism/communism. While we will harness evidence from many countries and the course casts its empirical net very widely, we will concentrate in particular on a few representative “case studies” not so much to learn current details about them, but to have them serve as examples for our larger conceptual points that form the core of this course. Thus, we will look at GREAT BRITAIN and FRANCE as prototypes for the liberal democratic route to modernity. And since we live in the United States and since this country could arguably be labelled the very first liberal democracy, and since it has so many special features within the genre of this specific political construct called “liberal democracy”, we will also look at the UNITED STATES as a prototype of a liberal democracy and look at the similarities and differences that it features compared to GREAT BRITAIN and FRANCE. Subsequently, we will concentrate on GERMANY and JAPAN to analyze the fascist route to modernity; and then have the SOVIET UNION/RUSSIA and CHINA be our prime examples for a presentation of the socialist/communist mode. We will end the course with a discussion of INDIA and BRAZIL, two very important and huge (in population and territory) liberal democracies of the non-European world, thus rounding out an analysis of the so-called BRIC countries (Brazil, Russia, India and China).