Politics of the Developing World

Catalog description

This course explores the political process at work in non-Western countries. We ask questions about why certain countries experience revolution, economic development, religious fundamentalism, stable democracy, ethnic conflict, famine, or effective judicial systems, among many topics. At an intuitive (and biological) level we know that there is something that makes the human inhabitants of the planet remarkably similar to one another. But at second glance, we are also incredibly diverse. In this class we will ponder this basic question of similarity and difference, and ask the following question: how do these similarities and differences impact the ways societies are governed?.