Authoritarianism

By most definitions, half of the world's countries fail to meet the standards of democracy, and there are troubling global tendencies in an authoritarian direction. This course introduces students to basic patterns and trends in authoritarian politics, with an emphasis on identifying similarities and differences across a broad set of cases. In the first half, students learn about the various mechanisms authoritarian leaders use to control their citizens and retain power. In the second half, students examine and evaluate various threats to the stability of authoritarian regimes. Students have the opportunity to study one authoritarian regime in detail as part of a semester long research project. In addition, the course surveys major theories in the study of authoritarian politics and introduces a variety of common methodological approaches in political science, including game theory, qualitative research, and quantitative methods.