Study Guides
From the first week of classes.
1.
Why compare?
2.
How is comparative politics scientific? What characterizes science?
3.
Can we extensively rely on the experimental method to make the field of
comparative politics progress?
4.
What are the main reasons for developing systematic comparisons?
5.
Is the political world less or more complex than the natural world? How
does this affect the development of scientific research in the field of
comparative politics?
6.
What is a unit of analysis?
7.
What is a variable? Which main types of variables can we recognize? What
differentiates them?
8.
What is an indicator, and how is it related to the valor of the variable?
Collier, David, and Steven Levitsky: “Democracy with Adjectives: Conceptual Innovation in Comparative Research.”
1.
According to the authors What new challenges presented the “third wave”
of democratization to students of comparative politics?
2.
How do scholars respond to the challenge? What are the strategies they
use? How are these strategies contradictory? What results from them?
3.
What is a procedural definition of democracy, and how does it help to standardize
the treatment of the subject, according to the authors?
4.
Why do the authors focus on the analysis of qualitative categories employed
in the study of democratization?
5.
What is the purpose the authors pursue in writing this article?
6.
Briefly describe Sartori’s strategies for conceptual innovation. What other
strategies do the authors identify? Characterize them, and evaluate the
authors’ contribution.
7.
The authors agree with philosopher W. B. Gallie on democracy being an “essentially
contested concept.” Why is that? Do you agree or disagree? Why?
Lane, Ruth, The Art of Comparative Politics, Ch.1
1.
What makes reality different from an ordered chess game, according to the
author?
2.
Lane argues that comparative politics is both “a world” and “a discipline.”
What does she characterize them?
3.
The author’s approach to the development of comparative politics is both
interpretative and historical. According to her, what are the advantages
of such an approach?
4.
How does Lane describe the process of development of the discipline? Does
she consider it exceptional?
5.
What makes a study comparative?
6.
Can theory “create” reality? What’s Lane position in this respect?
7.
Which major periods does Lane recognize to the development of comparative
politics? What characterizes each of them?
Lane, Ruth, The Art of Comparative Politics, Ch. 2
1. What is “the behavioral revolution”? What characterizes
it? What did all behavioralists have in common?
2. David Easton said that “the results of 2500 years
of political science were disappointing”? What did scholars engaged with
behavioralism criticize to “traditional” political science?
3. What are “hard facts” when it comes to the world or
politics? What is the value of looking for them?
4. Was the behavioralist movement homogeneous? What differences
can you identify within the movement? Briefly describe the main approaches
we subsume under the label “behavioralism.”
5. Why is Almond’s and Verba’s The Civic Culture still
important today? Why did the authors emphasize on the study of political
culture? How did they define both political culture and “civic culture”?
6. What assumptions did Almond and Verba start with?
How did they carry out their research? Why surveys? Summarize their findings.
Did the results confirm their hypotheses? Evaluate their approach looking
for both strengths and weaknesses.
7. What is “social capital,” and why is it important
for democracy, according to Robert Putnam? Summarize Putnam’s “Bowling
Together.” How does his analysis resemble Almond and Verba’s? Compare.
8. Why does Lane include Anthony Down’s work within behavioralism?
Why is his approach called “rational choice”?
9. When Downs wrote his book, his approach did not look
“scientific” to many. Yet, through time rational choice has become one
of the dominant paradigms in political science. What assumptions do rational
choice scholars depart from? What methods do they use?
10. Within behavioralism, Lane also includes other authors-all
influenced by theories and methods coming from fields such as sociology
and anthropology. Among them, she mentions Robert Dahl’s work Who Governs?,
Lipset’s Political Man, and David Easton’s structural functionalism. Briefly
summarize each approach, and explain why they are also included under the
label “behavioralism.”
Downs, Anthony, “An Economic Theory of Political Action in a Democracy.”
1. What problems does Downs address? According to him,
why have economic theorists failed to explain the government? How does
he define the government instead?
2. What is a democracy, according to Downs? Do you find
his concept of democracy satisfactory? Why?
3. Following Downs’ insights, define rationality.
4. What central hypothesis does Downs advance in the
article? What kind of view of politics does his article promote?
5. What problems do you think Downs contributes to explain?
6. Evaluate his approach, considering both strengths
and weaknesses.
Lane, Ch. 3: “Political Development, Its Rise, Decline, and Transformation.”
1. Lane opens the chapter with this words: “In comparative
politics, as in many things, necessity has been the mother of invention,
and political events have been a primary stimulus in the development of
new theoretic approaches, concepts, and research concerns.” How did world
political events influence the emergence of the paradigm of political development?
Why “development”?
2. What is “modernization”? Why was it seen as good,
and how was it related to democracy, at least in theory?
3. How were progress and development represented in most
theories in the fifties and the beginning of the sixties? Do you see those
ideas are still dominant?
4. What is a “developing nation,” and how did the concept
originate? What are the main theoretical assumptions behind this concept?
5. How representative of developmentalism is Rostow's
approach? How does Lane characterize him? Resorting to both Lane's chapter
and Rostow's article, briefly summarize his main assumptions and theses
on development.
6. How does Samuel Huntington explain modernization?
What does he privilege, political or economic factors? Which alternative
"roads" to development does he identify? How does he characterize the United
States in relation to both economic and political modernity? Resorting
to both Lane's chapter and Huntington's article, summarize the main points
of his approach to development.
7. According to Lane, how does Barrington Moore contribute
to the understanding of the problem of development? How does he use class
analysis? Which "routes" to development does he identify?
8. How does Lane evaluate the efficacy of developmentalism
to explain concrete cases? Was the approach successful in explaining (and
contributing to achieve) the development of "new nations"? What did not
these frameworks take into account?
9. How does Lane evaluate the contribution of the dependency
theory to the understanding of (under)development?
F.H. Cardoso and E. Faletto: "Capitalist Development and the State: Bases and Alternatives."
1. What is dependency, and how does it question the developmentalist
approach?
2. Briefly characterize the concepts of center and periphery.
3. What sectors are allied and become integrated within
the dependent polity? Which sectors are excluded from it?
Wallerstein, Immanuel, “A World-System Perspective on the Social Sciences.”
1. What do the “hidden consensuses” in our discipline
impede us to see, according to Wallerstein? How does he refer to “behaviorism”
and the “developmentalist approach”?
2. Why is the choice of units of analysis decisive, in
Wallerstein’s view? What kind of units of analysis have been privileged
so far in political science? Which ones does he propose us to privilege?
3. Once we shift towards a world-system perspective,
what can we see?
4. Is there any necessary direction in the development
of history, according to Wallerstein?
5. How does Wallerstein define “mode of production”?
Which ones does he identify?
6. “Our empirical knowledge is largely limited to larger
divisions of labour which I shall term world-systems,” says the author.
How does he characterize “world-systems”? Describe both “world-empire”
and “world-economy,” identifying their similarities and differences.
7. Why did the “world-economy” survive only in Western
Europe since the sixteenth century?
8. How is our “world-economy” politically organized,
and how is that different from the political organization of former “world-empires”?
9. “What is crippling about a developmentalist perspective
is the fact that these large-scale historical processes are not even discussable,
if one uses the politico-cultural entity (the ‘state’) as the unit of analysis.”
(p. 352). Imagine how a “developmentalist” scholar would address this criticism.
Theories of Development (table)
Lane, Ch. 4: “Comparative Politics Reconsiders the State.”
1. What factors led comparativists to
pay special attention to the study of the State? How did the dependency
theory approach contribute to this shift?
2. The book Bringing the State Back
In led this movement towards focusing on the role of the State and processes
of state building to explain politics in a comparative perspective. Historical
studies and structural analysis (with either Weberian or Marxist roots)
characterize the approach. In what senses is the State recognized relevance?
3. How is the State “autonomous”? What
is autonomy, as used by these authors?
4. How is this perspective different
from Behavioralism? (p. 79-80, 86-87)
5. What forms of conceiving “state
strength” were available? How did authors such as Skocpol, Evans, or Rueschemeyer
contribute to its understanding ? (p.81-86)
6. Lane critically assesses the contributions
of the movement centered on the study of the State. On the one hand, it
would contribute to highlight the importance of institutional arrangements
in the explanation of politics. On the other hand, “the movement had nowhere
to go once its original statement had been made.” (89) Why?
7. How does the work of Guillermo O’Donnell
on the “bureaucratic-authoritarian state” contribute to the understanding
of the role of the State, according to Lane?
8. The approach highlights the contribution
of relatively autonomous bureaucratic structures to politics. Lane and
Ersson contribute to explain how they emerge historically, and argue “the
specific cleavages in a society determine the patterns of conflict.” According
to this view, “political cleavages,” or the terms in which conflict is
expressed in society (class, race, ethnicity, religion) structure political
identities and party systems. How much do these structures actually determine
politics? Think of different examples that are for or against this structural
perspectives.
Guillermo O’Donnell, “Reflections on the Patterns of Change in the Bureaucratic-Authoritarian State.”
1. How does O’Donnell define the “Bureaucratic-Authoritarian”
state (BA)? In what circumstances did this form of state develop? Why?
2. When does and when does not capitalism
foster democracy?
3. According to O’Donnell, what are
the links between this form of authoritarianism and capitalism?
4. “The BA is a system of exclusion
of the popular sector,” says O’Donnell, that expresses an alliance between
the social classes linked to the international capital and the State bureaucracy.
Why are “the popular sectors” excluded, and how?
5. Where in the world did the BA develop,
either completely or partially, according to O’Donnell? What did all of
these areas/countries have in common?
6. What are the similarities and the
differences between the BA and fascism? (p. 30-31)
Juan Linz & Alfred Stepan, “Toward Consolidated Democracies.”
1. What minimal pre-conditions are required
to start speaking about democratic consolidation?
2. The authors consider a democratic
regime “consolidated” when democracy has become “the only game in town.”
What do they mean by this?
3. What features do “consolidated democracies”
exhibit, or what conditions must be present for a democratic regime to
be considered consolidated? Briefly describe each of them.
4. “Rightly understood, democracy is
more than a regime; it is an interacting system. No single arena in such
a system can function properly without some support from another arena,
or often from all of the remaining arenas.” (p.22)
5. Ethnic conflict and people’s disappointment
with the consequences of economic reforms are two main obstacles new democracies
face all around the world. According to the authors, are they possible
to overcome? How?
Lane Ch. 5 “State and Society and the New Institutionalism.”
1. How did studies on the State foster
the emergence of institutionalism?
2. How does Lane define “analytic institutionalism”?
3. What do peasants have to do with
the growth of institutionalism in comparative politics? What does James
Scott mean by “the moral economy of the peasant”?
4. How does Samuel Popkin respond to
Scott?
5. Compare Scott and Popkin’s understanding
of rationality to Downs’.
6. How did discussions on peasant’s
rationality develop into more general debates on (State) institutions?
7. What is the importance of March
and Olsen’s work on institutions for the development of the approach?
8. How do historical and rational choice
institutionalisms differ?
9. Lane proposes the existence of an
“institutional model” (p.121). How consistent do you find such a model?
From
the State to Institutions
Hernando De Soto, “Dead Capital and the Poor.”
1. How does De Soto evaluate the economic reforms carried
out in developing countries during the 1990s? What problems do they create?
2. What is crucial factor to explain the persistence
of poverty and inequality in the Third World, according to De Soto?
3. What does De Sot mean by "property rights"? How are
property rights an institution?
4.How did property rights develop in the West, and how
did they develop in the rest of the world?
5. What is "dead capital"? What is the problem with "dead
capital," and how can we turning it into "live capital," according to De
Soto? Think of examples.
6. How do we know whether property is formal or informal?
What is the importance of formalization?
7. How can formalization help people to overcome poverty?
8. What are De Soto's main assumptions? Do you agree
or disagree with him?
Cases and Methods.
1. Many units of analysis (i.e. countries),
just a few, or single case studies? Summarize the advantages and disadvantages
of each strategy.
2. How can we know which approach is
best suited in each case?
3. In the study of a few units of analysis,
what do we mean respectively by “Most Similar System Design” and “Most
Different System Design” in comparative politics? How do they differ?
Theodoulou, Stella, Policy and Politics in Six Nations.
1. What is Theodoulou’s purpose with
writing this book?
2. Why compare countries along policy
issues? How is comparative policy analysis relevant in a context of globalization?
3. Which approaches to the comparative
study of policy does Theodoulou identify? How can you relate them to the
main perspectives in comparative politics—as developed by Ruth Lane?
4. What criteria did Theodoulou use
in selecting the countries under study? Why include Brazil in the sample?
Do you agree with her choice of countries? Why?
Brazil.
1. What are the main distinctive characteristics
of the Brazilian society, in terms of the economy, the population, the
social structure, and cultural traditions? In what aspects is Brazil similar
to the U.S., and how are they different?
2. The process of political modernization
in Brazil took place relatively smoothly and peacefully. However, Brazil
is also known for the existence of death squads and extremely high violence
rates. So, is Brazil a violent or a peaceful country? Discuss.
3. “Autogolpe” seems to be a Latin
American tradition of strong executive powers cheating on the rules of
democracy. Recently Fujimori in Perú, and previously Getulio Vargas
in Brazil helped to develop this authoritarian concept. What is an “autogolpe,”
and why they occurred in Latin America? Could this phenomenon develop in
a democracy such as the U.S.? Why?
4. The Bureaucratic Authoritarian type
of state theorized by Guillermo O’Donnell developed first in Brazil. What
internal and external circumstances led to the military coup in 1964 and
account for the spread of BA in the 60s and the 70s? Are we still living
under those conditions? Why?
5. What were some of the main concerns
about the future of the new democracy in the 1980s? How did the 1988 Constitution
address them? How has it worked so far?
6. How are the basic Republican institutions
organized in Brazill? What do we mean when saying that Brazil is a presidentialist
regime? How is power distributed between the executive power, the legislature,
and the judiciary?
7. How would you characterize the Brazilian
party system? Why?
8. How is power distributed between
the federal and the local levels of government? Which regions are the most
powerful? Why?
9. Fernando Henrique Cardoso was one
of the leading The New York Times figures of the dependency theory. Years
later, as the President of Brazil, his understanding of power and development
seem to have changed. How can we account for that change? Did Brazil succeed
in overcoming dependency, dependency does not matter, or it does not exist?
10. How does the article in The New
York Times evaluate the achievements of Cardoso’s government, and how is
Lula depicted? What challenges does the Brazilian society face?
Germany.
1. Why was Germany invaded by four different countries
over the end of WWII? How did the country reach that situation, and how
was it reorganized?
2. Following Theodoulou, summarize the phases of development
of the divided Germany after WWII.
3. Students say that Germany is perhaps the society that
most suffered as a consequence of the Cold War. Why?
4. Why did both Easteners and Westeners want reunification?
What were their expectations?
5. Under what auspices did reunification take place?
Why does Theodolou mention the existence of “imbalance”?
6. Why could Germans successfully stop surges of xenophobia
and fascism in the 1990s and not in the 1930s? What is key difference?
Which theoretical approach in comparative politics do you think accounts
better to explain such a difference?
7. What is the German Basic Law? How are the Germans’
concern with the rule of law remind Theodoulow of Americans’? What are
the main differences?
8. Germany is a parliamentary republic. What do
we mean by that?
9. How is the executive power organized in Germany,
and how does it differ from a presidentialism?
10. What is distinctive about the German legislature?
(chambers, number of seats, electoral system).
11. In theory a multi-party system, the Germans have
actually developed a “two-plus” party system. What does this level stand
for?
12. Why does Theodoulou say the German political institutions
and their party system are oriented to produce consensus? Is that good
or bad?
13. Theodolou characterizes German judges as “activists.”
What does she mean by this? How is the judiciary organized in the country?
14. Is Germany federal or unitary? Explain.
15. How does the article in The Economist characterize
the German society a decade after reunification? What are the main achievements
they exhibit, and what the risks?
The United Kingdom
1. What main distinctive features do characterize
the United Kingdom as a result of its history? (i.e. early unification,
insularity, lack of a written constitution, etc.)
2. Is the United Kingdom a state? Explain.
3. What are the differences between referring to
England, Great Britain, or the United Kingdom?
4. So far, we have examined Federal political units.
The UK is unitary instead. What is a unitary state, and how is the UK organized?
5. The Westminster Parliament is the sovereign
body in the UK. What does this mean, exactly?
6. How did democracy develop in Great Britain,
suddenly or gradually? What is the institutional legacy of such a process?
Think of examples.
7. Stella Theodoulou identifies four major phases
of development of politics (and policies) in the UK since WWII. She calls
them respectively “The Post-War Consensus,” “The Post-War Consensus Under
Strain,” “The Ending of Consensus,” and “Post-Thatcherite Consensus Under
New Labour.” Briefly characterize each period, looking for the main bases
of consensus in different periods, the main goals in policy, and the results
in terms of party alignment and reorganization.
8. (Pay attention to the following questions looking
towards our next discussions on policy issues)
a. Characterize the British Welfare State and its links to Keynesian economics. What factors were behind the consolidation of the Welfare State, and what led to its dismantling?9. How are the judiciary, the executive, and the legislative powers organized in the U.K.?
b. Did the Conservatives led by Thatcher really reduce the State apparatus and state spending?
a. What are the roles performed by the Queen, the House of Commons, the House of Lords, the Prime Minister, and the Cabinet in government? How are they designated?10. How much of the votes do parties need to gain in order to form a majority in the UK? The case of the UK has led authors to talk about a “disproportional electoral system,” or “manufactured majorities.” Why? How is it possible that a party can obtain a majority of seats in Parliament without obtaining the majority of votes? Is this democratic? Why?
b. Compare the role, attributions, and stability of the British Prime Minister with those of the American President. Who is more powerful? Why?
Japan
1. What are the salient characteristics of present Japan
and the Japanese democracy?
2. Western institutions such as democracy and free markets
thrive in Japan. In this respect, Japan stands in sharp contrast with other
non-Western countries. Why? How can we account for the Japanese case?
3. What are the main differences between Western and
Japanese culture, values, and religion/s? How does all this affect politics?
4. What lies behind the Japanese “miracle”?
5. What did Japan lose, and what did it gain by embracing
capitalism and democracy?
6. How much is the “McArthur” Constitution an imposition
of the U.S., and how much does it express the Japanese political culture?
Why was the monarchy conserved?
7. From foe to ally… What is special
about the article 9 of the Japanese Constitution? Is the spirit of this
article respected in present Japan? When did the U.S. argue for preserving
that article? Does this position still prevail in the U.S.?
8. Describe the main characteristics of the Japanese
party system right after WWII, and its evolution until the present. How
would you characterize the Japanese consensuses in terms of left and right
across time? How should we account for variations?
9. Describe how the executive power is organized
in Japan, and compare the roles of both the prime minister and the emperor
with the prime minister and the queen in the U.K. Identify similarities
and differences.
10. Compare the Japanese Diet with the German and
the British parliamentary systems. Which one is more democratic? Which
one would you recommend to be implemented in a new democracy? Why?
11. What other cases does the organization of the
judiciary in Japan remind you of? Why?
12. Where else are bureaucratic careers prestigious
as in Japan? Where are they not? How should we account for these differences?
Countries
Database (from Theodoulou and other sources)
Or, try with this one:
Countries
Database (from Theodoulou and other sources)
Sweden
1. Why did the Welfare State reach such a paradigmatic
level of development in Sweden? What (social, political) forces lie behind
this style of development? What kind of consensus supported it?
2. What is the logic behind the Welfare State? Is it
virtuous, vicious, or both? Mention some of its advantages and some of
its disadvantages (for both labor and business-owners).
3. Is the Welfare State a politically progressive or
conservative structure? Why?
4. How are the Swedish Social Democratic Party and the
Welfare State related?
5. Why do you think unions and people’s level of unionization
have been so important in the case of Sweden, while they seem to matter
little in the U.S.?
6. How did such a style of development enter into a crisis?
What alternatives do the Swedish have?
7. Summarize the Swedish experience in matter of immigration
policies and the challenges they face today. How does their situation resemble
the one existent in the U.S.?
8. Why are parliamentary regimes common in Europe, and
not in the Americas?
9. Compare the Swedish parliament with the other ones
we surveyed before, identifying similarities and differences. What is original
in the case of Sweden?
10. What stands as different in the functioning of the
executive power in Sweden? (i.e. the role of the monarch, the prime minister,
the cabinet)
11. What is the Swedish ombudsman?
12. Compare the role of local government in Sweden with
that played by local government in the U.S.
13. How is it possible that the same party wins elections
for more than 40 years in a country that has a multi-party system such
as Sweden?
The United States
1. According to Stella Theodoulou, there have been major
institutional changes in the U.S. since 1945, which have not been accompanied
by significant transformations in the country’s political culture. Why?
Summarize her argument and assess it critically.
2. What has been the role of war in the construction
of the American nation and the definition of the U.S. international leading
role? How does this affect the nature of the polity?
3. Contradicting established assumptions about the paradigmatic
nature of the American democracy, Rueschemeyer, Stephens, and Stephens
argue the U.S. should be only considered a limited democracy till 1965,
due to the existence of pervasive racial segregation. Is this argument
correct?
4. Theodoulou also argues that until present day Americans
debate themselves in pursuing contradictory goals for their government:
on the one hand, there is a traditional understanding on the need of keeping
a small government; on the other hand, there are high expectations about
the performance of State offices. Furthermore, the New Deal stands as a
paradigmatic moment in the building of the Welfare State in the West, in
a country in which State intervention seems to be rejected. How should
we account for this? (think of examples)
5. What are the main principles that organize the U.S.
constitution. How have they strengthened democracy in this country, and
why do you think they have instead failed elsewhere (for instance in Latin
America?
6. Describe how the Executive power is organized in the
U.S. Compare the U.S. president with European Presidents and Prime Ministers.
Who is more powerful? Why?
7. How is Congress organized in the U.S.? What prerogatives
it has, and which ones do Congressmen really exercise? Has Congress diminished
or increased its lawmaking role over the years?
(Here you have the source Theodoulou mentions, the WHO
webpage with indicators by country. I'll add these data to our database,
but please take a look at the webpage)
World Health
Organization Country Indicators