Comparative Politics II
Code: 101080 ECTS Credits: 6| Degree | Type | Year | Semester |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2500259 Political Science and Public Management | OB | 3 | 2 |
| 2503778 International Relations | OB | 3 | 2 |
Errata
English is the main working language and there is no group entirely in Catalan. Group 51 is bilingual Catalan / Spanish, depending on instructors availability.
Contact
- Name:
- Francesc Xavier Ballart i Hernāndez
- Email:
- xavier.ballart@uab.cat
Use of Languages
- Principal working language:
- english (eng)
- Some groups entirely in English:
- Yes
- Some groups entirely in Catalan:
- Yes
- Some groups entirely in Spanish:
- No
Other comments on languages
Readings mostly in EnglishTeachers
- Eva Ostergaard-Nielsen
Prerequisites
Comparative Politics I
Objectives and Contextualisation
The main objective of this course is to deepen in the study of Comparative Politics on the basis of the theme of world democratization, expanding the object of study to the non-European countries of Latin America and Caribbean, Africa and Asia.
From the perspective of the students, the main objective is to apply the knowledge to the analysis of a country that exceeds the mere description, based on the application of the topics presented during the course and the bibliographic search in indexed quality journals.
The main issues have to do with democratization in the world, trends in institutional arrangements for and against democracy: presidentialism, populism, corruption, electoral but not real democracy, federalism and regionalism, consensual democracy and other alternatives for complex societies including failed states.
Competences
- Political Science and Public Management
- Applying the knowledge of the structure and operations of political institutions to problems and practical, real or simulated cases.
- Arguing from different theoretical perspectives.
- Connecting the different components that shape the structure and operations of political systems and the environment where they interact.
- Demonstrating good writing skills in different contexts.
- Demonstrating knowledge about the structure and working of the European Union and its main institutions, as well as identifying the main political actors and recognising the main means of integration.
- Demonstrating the comprehension of the structure and functioning of political systems in the internal and international arena, both in the analytic area and in the elaboration of intervention proposals or public policies.
- Demonstrating the understanding of the structure and operations of political institutions.
- Identifying sources of data and conducting bibliographic and documentary searches.
- Interpreting and applying English texts in an academic way.
- Managing the available time in order to accomplish the established objectives and fulfil the intended task.
- Managing the main theoretical formulations about political institutions and connecting them with the global structure of political systems, both in the internal and international arenas.
- Synthesizing and critically analysing information.
- Working autonomously.
- Working in teams and networking, particularly in interdisciplinary conditions.
- International Relations
- Analyse cases and phenomena in the international sphere and interpret different political texts using contemporary political theories.
- Identify data sources and carry out rigorous bibliographical and documentary searches.
- Students must be capable of communicating information, ideas, problems and solutions to both specialised and non-specialised audiences.
- Students must develop the necessary learning skills to undertake further training with a high degree of autonomy.
- Use metatheoretical data to argue and establish plausible relation of causality and establish ways of validating or rejecting them.
Learning Outcomes
- Analyse the public policies of different countries and political systems.
- Analysing the electoral processes, including campaigns, parties' electoral strategies, political scenarios and analysis and interpretation of electoral results.
- Arguing from different theoretical perspectives.
- Connecting the different components that shape the structure and operations of political systems and the environment where they interact.
- Demonstrating good writing skills in different contexts.
- Demonstrating knowledge about the structure and working of the European Union and its main institutions, as well as identifying the main political actors and recognising the main means of integration.
- Demonstrating the comprehension of the structure and functioning of political systems in the internal and international arena, both in the analytic area and in the elaboration of intervention proposals or public policies.
- Draw up comparative analyses of different political systems, identifying the way in which differences and similarities are argued.
- Explaining political, individual and collective attitudes and behaviours, as well as the education process and expression of political preferences.
- Identify data sources and carry out rigorous bibliographical and documentary searches.
- Identify the main actor, structure and operation of different political systems .
- Identify the main actors, structures and operation of internal and international political systems from a comparative perspective.
- Identifying and distinguishing the functioning of the electoral processes.
- Identifying sources of data and conducting bibliographic and documentary searches.
- Interpreting and applying English texts in an academic way.
- Managing the available time in order to accomplish the established objectives and fulfil the intended task.
- Students must be capable of communicating information, ideas, problems and solutions to both specialised and non-specialised audiences.
- Students must develop the necessary learning skills to undertake further training with a high degree of autonomy.
- Synthesizing and critically analysing information.
- Use metatheoretical data to argue and establish plausible relation of causality and establish ways of validating or rejecting them.
- Working autonomously.
- Working in teams and networking, particularly in interdisciplinary conditions.
Content
1. States creation and democracy emergence in the world
- Colomer, J.M. (2006) Grandes imperios, pequeñas naciones. Barcelona. Anagrama.
- Colomer, J. M. y Ashley L. Beale (2021) Democracia y Globalización, Barcelona. Anagrama.
- Huntington, S (1994) La tercera ola: la democratización a finales del siglo XX. Barcelona, Paidós.
2. Theories on democratic development
- Diamond. L.(2003) ¿Puede el mundo entero ser democrático?” Revista Española de Ciencia Política, núm. 9 págs. 9-38.
- Diamond, L. (2011) “Why democracies survive” Journal of Democracy 22 (1):17-30.
- Diamond, L., D. Horowitz, F. Fukuyama, M. Platnner (2014) “Reconsidering the Transition Paradigm”, Journal of Democracy 25 (1)
- Engerman y Sokolof (varias obras, ver en campus virtual)
- Inglehart, R. (2003) “How Solid is Mass Support for Democracy and How Can We Measure it?” PS Online January
3. Measurement of democracy and quality of democracy
- Geisel, B. et al. (2016), “Measuring the quality of democracy”, International Political Science Review, 37 (5): 571-579
- Levine, D.H. y Molina, J.E. (2007) “La calidad de la democracia en América Latina”, América Latina Hoy, 45:17-46
- Rothstein, B. y Teorell, J. (2008) “What is Quality of Government? A Theory of Impartial Govenrment Institutions” Governance, 21 (2):165-190
+ Freedom House, VDEM, Polity IV,Economist Inteligence Unit
4. Presidentialism in Latin-America, Africa and Asia, ¿Is it theproblem?
- Linz, J. (1990) “The Perils of presidentialism” Jornal of democracy, Vol 1, N.1.
- Fukuyama, F. et al. (2005) “Facing the Perils of Presidentialism?” ,” Journal of Democracy, 16 (2):102-116
- Pérez-Liñán, Aníbal S. (2003) “Pugna de poderes y crisis de gobernabilidad: ¿Hacia un nuevo presidencialismo?”, Latin American Research Review, Vol. 38, No. 3, pp. 149-164.
- Valenzuela, A (2004) “LatinAmerican Presidents Interrupted,” Journal of Democracy, 15 (4): 5--9
5. Federalism, democracy and secessionism
- Bermeo, Nancy (2002) “A New Look at Federalism: The Import of Institutions”, Journal of Democracy, Volume 13, Number 2, April, pp. 96-110.
- Elazar, D. (2011) Anàlisi del federalisme i altres textos. Institut d’Estudis Autonòmics, Generalitat de Catalunya.
- Horowitz, Donald L. (2014) “Ethnic Power Sharing: Three Big Problems”, Journal of Democracy, Volume 24, Number 2, April, pp. 5-20.
- Mathew, G. (2009) “L’Índia: unitat en la diversitat a través d’un federalisme en evolució”. A M. Caminal i F. Requejo, Clàssics del Fedealisme, Generalitat de Catalunya. Institut D’Estudis Autonòmics (online)
- Stepan, A. (1999) “Federalism and Democracy. Beyond the US Model ” Journal of Democracy 10 (4): 519-34
6. Social and Health Policy in the non-western world
- Díaz.Cayeros A., B. Magaloni (2010) “La ayuda para los pobres de América Latina” Journal of Democracy en español 2: 185-200
- Cotlear D, Nagpal S, Smith O, Tandon A, Cortez R. (2015). Going universal: How 24 developing countries are implementing universal health coverage reforms from the bottom up. Washington, DC: The World Bank.
- Filgueira F. (2013). Los regímenes de bienestar en el ocaso de la modernización conservadora: posibilidades y límites de la ciudadanía social en América Latina. Revista Uruguaya de Ciencia Política. 22(SPE):10–27.
- Gough I, Wood G, Barrientos A, Bevan P, Davis P, Room G, editors. (2004) Insecurity and welfare regimes in Asia, Africa and Latin America: Social policy in development contexts. Cambridge: Cambridge U. Press, p. 68–121.
- Ramesh, M., Whu, X (2009). Health Policy Reform in China. Lessons from Asia. Science and Medicine 68: 2256-2262
7. Populism, personalism and globalization
- Colburn, F., Cruz, A (2012) Personalism and Populism in Nicaragua, Journal of Democracy 23 (2): 104-118
- Colomer, J. M. y Ashley L. Beale (2021) Democracia y Globalización, Barcelona. Anagrama.
- De la Torre, C. (2001) “Redentores populistas en el neoliberalismo: nuevos y viejos populismos latinoamericanos,” Revista Española de Ciencia Política, 4: 171-196.
- Mc Donnell, D., Cabrera, L. (2019) The right-wing populism of India’s Bharatiya Janata Party, Democratization, Volume 26 (3)
8. Islamism and democracy
- Diamond, L. 2010 “Why are there no arab democracies?” Journal of Democracy 21 (1): 93.104
- Roy, O. (2006) Islam en Europa, ¿una religión más o una cultura diferente? Conferencia en UCM
- Roy, O. 2012 “The Transformation of the Arab World” Journal of Democracy 23 (3): 85-18
- Stepan, A. 2012 “Tunisia’s Transition and the twin tolerations” Journal of Democracy 23 (2): 89-103
- Tessler, M, J. Amanal, M. Robbins 2012 “New Findings on arabs and democracy” Journal of Democracy 23 (4): 89-103
9. África, electoral democracies, ethnic conflicts and corruption
- Brumberg, D. (2002) “The trap of liberalized autocracy”, Journal of Democracy 13 (4): 56-68, 2002
- Collier, J. (2002) ” How to reduce corruption”. African Development Review, Vol. 12 (2)
- Goldstone, J. “Pathways to state failure” Conflict management and peace science 25(4): 285-296
- Van de Walle, N. (2004) “Elecciones sin democracia. La gama de los regímenes de África”, Estudios Políticos (Medellín) 24: 179-195. Originalmente en Journal of Democracy 13 (2) de 2002.
10. Asian South-East democratic development. China, the efficient authoritarian regime
- Bregolat, E. (2007) La segunda revolución china Barcelona: Destino.
- Chen, J. (2010) Democratization and the Middle Class in China. Political Research Quarterly 64 (3): 705-719
- Diamond, L (2012) China and East AsianDemocracy, Journal of Democracy 23, 1 pàgs. 5-13
- Hu, P. (2018) Popular Understanding of Democracy in Contemporary China. Democratization 25 (8)
- Nathan, A.J. (2016) The Puzzle of the Chinese MIddle Class. Journal of Democracy, Vol. 27 (2): 5-19
- Wu, W.C., Chang, Y.T., Pan, H.H. (2017) Does China's Middle Class Prefer (liberal) democracy? Democratization 24 (2)
11. India and nearby countries: ¿ineffective democracy?
- Drèze, J. A. Sen (2014) Una gloria incierta: India y sus contradicciones. Madrid: Taurus
- Lijphart, A. (1996) “The puzzle of Indian Democracy” The American Political Science Review 90, 2pàgs. 258-268
- Varshney, Ashutosh (2014) “India’s Democracy at 70: Growth, Inequality, and Nationalism”, Journal of Democracy, Volume 28, Number 3, July, pp. 41-51.
Methodology
Directed activities:
- Lectures by the instructor
- Seminars: discussion of readings and exercises
- Presentation of papers: presentations by gropus, comments and evaluation
Supervision:
- Individual support to write papers and follow up of the course
Autopnomous activities:
- Readings: papers, articles, book chapters
- Individual study
- Writing papers and completing exercises: question on readings, comparative analysis of various countries followingthe guidelines provided by instructors.
- Evaluation: Individual exercises, written exams.
Annotation: Within the schedule set by the centre or degree programme, 15 minutes of one class will be reserved for students to evaluate their lecturers and their courses or modules through questionnaires.
Activities
| Title | Hours | ECTS | Learning Outcomes |
|---|---|---|---|
| Type: Directed | |||
| Lectures | 30 | 1.2 | 14 |
| Type: Supervised | |||
| Tutoring | 15 | 0.6 | 22 |
| Type: Autonomous | |||
| Individual work by the student | 75 | 3 |
Assessment
The evaluation of this subject will be made from the following deliveries by the student:
• Exam: 40% of the grade.
• Reading and exercise controls: 30% of the grade
• Course paper:30% of the grade (group paper of two or three students on one of the proposed topics).
Important considerations:
-
The course cannot be passed WITHOUT SEMINARS, GROUP PAPER and EXAM. If a student has not DONE THE SEMINARS or THE GROUP PAPER, he/she will not take the exam as he/she will not be able to pass the course.
- The course cannot be passed WITHOUT PASSING THE EXAM. The exam will not be exactly the same for the groups of morning and afternoon but it will be similar.
- Strict application of the rule of being present at the seminar to have access to the reading control.
- MANDATORY PRESENTATION OF THE DIFFERENT PARTS OF THE GROUP PAPER DURING THE COURSE on the date indicated. Those who do not will lose 1 point out of 10 for each delivery they do not make.
- THERE ARE TWO EXAM DATES. Those who pass on the first date will not be able to appear on the second. Only those who have failed on the first date may appear on the second date.
Assessment Activities
| Title | Weighting | Hours | ECTS | Learning Outcomes |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Exam | 40% | 5 | 0.2 | 1, 3, 20, 7, 6, 5, 8, 16, 11, 12, 10, 14, 15, 18, 17, 4, 19, 21, 22 |
| Group Paper | 30% | 10 | 0.4 | 2, 1, 3, 20, 7, 6, 5, 8, 9, 16, 11, 12, 10, 14, 13, 15, 18, 17, 4, 19, 21, 22 |
| Readings Control | 30% | 15 | 0.6 | 2, 1, 3, 20, 7, 5, 8, 9, 16, 11, 12, 10, 14, 13, 15, 18, 17, 4, 19, 22 |
Bibliography
See the section on Content
Other references:
- Almond, G., B. Powell, K. Strom i R. J. Dalton,(2000) Comparative Politics Today. A world View. Longman: New York.
- Bermeo, N. (2010) “¿Acaso la democracia electoral promueve la igualdad económica?” Journal of Democracy en español 2: 201-217.
- Blofield, M. (2010) “Desigualdad política en América Latina”. Journal of Democracy en español 2: 58-34.
- Elazar, D. (1991) Federal systems of the world, a handbook of federal, confederal and autonomy arrangements, Harlow, Longman.
- López García, B. (2000) El mundo árabo-islámico contemporáneo. Una historia política. Ed. Síntesis.
- Meredith, M. (2005) The State of Africa, A History of Fifty Years of Independence. Free press
- Putnam, R. (2000) Per a fer que la democràcia funcioni. Barcelona, Proa.
- Requejo, F. (2003) Federalisme plurinacional i estat de les autonomies. Barcelona, Proa.
- Roitman Rosenmann, M. (2019) Por la razón o la fuerza. Historia y memoria de los golpes de Estado, dictaduras y resistencias en América Latina, Ed. Siglo XXI España. .
- Rothstein, B. (2011) “Anti-corruption: the indirect big-bang approach”, Journal of International Political Economy, 18 (2): 228-250.
- Roy, O. (2002) El islam mundializado. Los musulmanes en la era de la globalización, Ed. Bellaterra.
- Saunders, C. (2003) “Federalism, decentralisation and conflict management in multicultural societies”, en Federalism in a Changing World. Montreal, McGill.
Software
Freedom House, VDEM, Polity IV, Economist Inteligence Unit